The Cave...

 So since our group projects are coming up, I thought it best to get my butt in gear and read my chapter in Frye... which is the cave. It was intense, and I finished the reading with a headache and utter confusion... but I will try to reiterate what I have just read... Sorry for any headaches I cause.. or confusion.. I just want for everyone else to be as confused as me... Here we go! The cave deals with themes of descent usually pertaining to death and hell (shocking). Frye mentioned that we rise up or climb ladders or towers with the prospect of falling or descending downward (230). The cave to me, appeared to be a place where people have the ability to ascend up again and not be left in darkness like those too far gone (possibly the furnace).  On page 231 there is a quote that reads like this, "Hell is social and individual...a kingdom of the dead." In this descent world, people have no possessions, and once you cross into this world, you are called a shade.  this possession of nothing is known as Katabsis or danse macabre. the thing I found to be most compelling is the idea of dreams, and Freud. even our dreams are considered a lower psyche which is a form of the descent or inner workings of hell.  our dreams extend down into the sub conscious and Frye writes, "Descent to dream worlds go deeper than hell... they go deeper than shallow graves of death". so without even knowing it, every night subconsciously we are descending downward past hell. another theme mentioned is that of Shakespeare. these ghosts are from the depths of hell but refuse to stay there, this notion of the descent and the return, like the ghost in Hamlet.  the descent can also be looked at as a social or political entity. for example, socially Adam was cast out of the garden of eden and Cain was cast out of society for murder. Exile is a form of a downward spiral. another prominent theme is that of repression and then release. sky metaphors became mechanical and alienating, when people used to look to the sky thinking that God was up there looking down upon us. there is a lot, and I mean a lot of talk about William Blake, Frye loves his ideals especially in innocence v. experience.  and children putting the world view in their subconscious. .... I am still attempting to figure the chapter out, and making some progress. But, hopefully this helped a little bit!