The most common structuralist practice we partake in as readers and writers would seem to be generic classification—a topic Tyson dedicates an entire subsection to as “The structure of literary genres.” In this section, Tyson largely cites Frye’s “theory of myths,” a framework that sorts texts by narrative pattern and offers four patterns that are presumed to account for the totality of human work. Frye similarly offers the “theory of modes,” which, again, provides only four stations to occupy, this time based on the agency of characters. The specifics of each theory and mode are somewhat unimportant for my argument so long as we understand as methods of classification—methods limited to four categories.

Modern methods are similarly limited and coincidentally rely on quartets as well. We commonly understand the broader modern genres to be fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama. It’s safe to say that large fantasy series like Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings are fiction, that a memoir like Cheryl Strayed’s Wild is nonfiction, or that the Broadway-hit Wicked is drama. The elements that classify these texts might not be entirely tangible, but the creation and continued existence of all of these texts was and is undeniably informed by the genres (structures) into which they fall. With little regard for plot or character, this generic classification would likely be the main structuralist concern. What makes Wicked dramatic? In what ways did previous self-discovery memoirs shape Wild? How did Harry Potter redefine teen fantasy novels? The list goes on with nearly every structuralist question coming back to genre.

However, genre isn’t the only thing structuralism seems to rely on so heavily. The desire for systems of classification points to a need for essentialism in order for structuralist criticism to work. We have to first identify a text as nonfiction before we can ask how it being nonfiction has shaped it. The problem comes when not texts don’t fit so neatly into broad genres. Works of historical fiction and speculative memoir hang somewhere between fiction and nonfiction. Prose poems lack the lineation and meter we expect of poetry. How can we discuss the poetic structures of Brigit Pegeen Kelly’s “Iskandariya” when the “poem” doesn’t fit nearly any of the criteria we check when asking if a work is, in fact, a poem?

Surely structuralism fails when a text defies accepted structures; one can’t work without the other. At least, this was my original conception. In the process of writing this blog post, however, I’ve realized it’s not so simple. Defiance of essentialist structures doesn’t free a text from the murkier deep structure Tyson goes on about. “Iskandariya” might not be a typical poem but we can still consider how it’s indebted to schools of imagism or the way invertebrates contrast with biblical allusion. Structuralist questions can still be asked of the text. “How does ‘Iskandariya’ fail as a poem?” is a structuralist criticism in the same way as asking how it succeeds. And so we find the importance of the deep structure. Though structuralist criticism leans heavily on classification and definition, the unknowable/unidentifiable influences that make up a text’s “deep structure” can still be analyzed—even when a text resists being classified.