“Experience is nearly always commonplace; the present is not romantic in the way the past is, and ideals and great visions have a way of becoming shoddy and squalid in practical life. Literature reverses this process.”

— Northrop Frye

"Quotes", The Educated Imagination (1963), Talk 3: Giants in Time

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Northrop Frye 137

Canadian literary critic and literary theorist 1912–1991

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