McGill Libraries
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Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
Frye, Northrup, 1912-1991
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
1912-1991
History
Herman Northrop Frye was born on July 14, 1912, in Sherbrooke, Quebec.
He was a Canadian literary critic, literary theorist, and professor. He grew up in Moncton, New Brunswick, and was educated at Victoria College, the University of Toronto (B.A., 1933), where he edited its literary journal, Acta Victoriana. After studying theology at Victoria College, he briefly served as a student minister in Saskatchewan and was ordained to the ministry of the United Church of Canada in 1936. He then studied English literature at Merton College, Oxford, before returning to Victoria College, where he spent the remainder of his professional career. Frye served as the chairman of the Department of English (1952), the principal (1959), and finally, the chancellor of Victoria College (1978). In 1947, he published his first book, "Fearful Symmetry: a Study of William Blake." From 1974 to 1975, Frye was a Norton professor at Harvard University. He published two books on the Bible, "The Great Code" (1981) and "Words with Power" (1990).
In 1937, he married Helen Gertrude Kemp (1910–1986), and, in 1988, he remarried Elizabeth Eedy-Brown (1912–1997). He died on January 23, 1991, in Toronto, Ontario.