We have to look at the figures of speech a writer uses, his images and symbols, to realize that underneath all the complexity of human life that uneasy stare at an alien nature is still haunting us, and the problem of surmounting it still with us. Above all, we have to look at the total design of a writer's work, the title he gives to it, and the his main theme, which means his point in writing it, to understand that literature is still doing the same job that mythology did earlier, but filling in its huge cloudy shapes with sharper lights and deeper shadows. [p.32]

The order of words
The recurring primitive formulas Frye noticed in his survey of the "greatest classics" provide literature with an order of words a "skeleton" which allows the reader "to respond imaginatively to any literary work by seeing it in the larger perspective provided by its literary and social contexts" (Hamilton 20). By attaching criticism to an external framework rather than locating the framework for criticism within literature this kind of critic essentially "substitute[s] a critical attitude for criticism. Frye proposed the possibility of movement beyond the literary constraints of the garrison mentality: growing urbanization interpreted as greater control over the environment would produce a society with sufficient confidence for its writers to compose more formally advanced detached literature.

Herman Northrop "Norrie" Frye CC FRSC (July 14 1912 – January 23 1991) was a Canadian literary critic and literary theorist considered one of the most influential of the 20th century. " Frye's contributions to cultural and social criticism spanned a long career during which he earned widespread recognition and received many honours.