English 1000

Motifs and Archetypes in The Princess Bride

Instructor: Scott Mitchell (email)

Assignment: In the paper focus on one common archetype or motif from folktales that is present in The Princess Bride.  Research this archetype or motif and how it is commonly used, and then in your paper, make a specific argument about how and why Goldman uses that motif.  Use your research to support this argument.  You must have at least four scholarly sources, a works cited page, and in-text citations.

Reference Books About Literary Motifs and Archetypes

Archetypes and Motifs in Folklore and Literature: A Handbook. Armonk, N.Y: M.E. Sharpe, 2005.  Reference GR72.56 .A73 2005

Companion to Literary Myths: Heroes and Archetypes. London: Routledge, 1992. Reference PN56.M95 D4813 1992 

Dictionary of Literary Themes and Motifs. New York: Greenwood Press, 1988. Reference PN43 .D48 1988

Grote, David. Common Knowledge: A Reader's Guide to Literary Allusions. New York: Greenwood Press, 1987. Reference PN43 .G68 1987 

Man, Myth & Magic: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Mythology, Religion and the Unknown. New York: Marshall Cavendish, 1995. Reference  BF1407 .M34 1995

Thompson, Stith. Motif-Index of Folk-Literature; a Classification of Narrative Elements in Folktales, Ballads, Myths, Fables, Mediaeval Romances, Exempla, Fabliaux, Jest-Books, and Local Legends. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1955. Reference GR67 .T52

Oxford English Dictionary - for definitions and word histories

Sources for Book and Film Reviews and Scholarly Criticism

LION: Literature Online is the main index for literary scholarship, including film studies and folklore.

• Choose Criticism & Reference from the sidebar.
• Choose Criticism to search both the MLA International Bibliography and ABELL, the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature.
• Choose Reference to search a variety of literary encyclopedias and handbooks.
• Choose Web Sites for a select collection of links.

FIAF is the main film studies database.

Communication and Mass Media Complete includes television and film studies.

Art Index covers all aspects of the visual arts.

GenderWatch provides access to materials all aspects of gender studies.

The Alternative Press Index indexes alternative, radical, and left periodicals, magazines, and newspapers.

Academic Search Premier indexes the core journals in all fields and many popular and news sources.

Lexis Nexis Academic is a major source for the full text of newspapers, many magazines, television and radio transcripts, and a collection of blogs. To find book reviews in Lexis Nexis choose "News", then under select sources choose "Book, movie, music, play, and video reviews".

If an article looks interesting, but there is no immediate link to full text, use the gold  button to run a search for full text in other databases and a search for print versions in the MERLIN Catalog.

Finding Books Using the MERLIN Catalog

The MERLIN catalog uses broad subject headings. Some useful headings are:

• Folk literature - themes, motives
• Folklore - europe
• Fairy tales - history and criticism