从《嘉莉妹妹》看德莱塞客观的女性观及其成因

VIP免费

3.0 侯斌 2024-11-19 4 4 445.55KB 44 页 15积分

侵权投诉

摘要

西奥多·德莱塞是美国文学史上具有深远影响的男性作家。他的作品中塑造

了很多栩栩如生的女性形象,他深入挖掘了这些身处社会不同阶层，扮演不同社会

角色的女性人物的内心。这一选材模式，很大程度上使其作品富有浓厚的女性主

义色彩。同时,德莱塞的作品也具有浓厚的现实主义色彩。然而, 和以往的男性作

家描写女性形象非美化即丑化,非“天使” 即 “妖妇”不同的是,德莱塞看待女

性的态度是客观公正的,是还原她们的本来面目和生活本身的。

在这篇论文中，笔者利用女性主义文学批评理论和现实主义理论，首先以其

长篇小说《嘉莉妹妹》为例深入分析其作品中客观的女性形象,然后,再从德莱塞

所处的时代大背景和他的独特的人生经历及创作经历来探究其客观公正的女性观

形成的原因。从而得出这样的结论:德莱塞独特的客观公正的女性观是在当时的时

代大背景下以及其个人的人生和创作经历中养成的,并在其作品中表现得淋漓尽

致。

本篇论文分 5 章进行阐述。其中第一章引言由三个小节构成，分别是对德莱

塞及其作品《嘉莉妹妹》的研究成果的综述，对德莱塞女性观研究成果的总结，

并阐明本研究的目的和意义。第二章为理论基础部分，对论文中所采用的女权主

义思想以及现实主义理论作了简单阐述。作为本文的主体部分，第三章和第四章

分别以上述两种理论作为依据对德莱塞的代表作品《嘉莉妹妹》中的女性形象和

男女形象对比进行深入分析。同时, 从作家所处的时代背景和独特的人生和创作

经历来探究其客观公正的女性观形成的原因。笔者最终在第五章得出结论：德莱

塞的女性观是客观公正的, 这是他的独特的人生经历所造成的,也是反映和渗透

在他的作品当中的。其所持的客观公正的女性观不仅在当时是先进的，即使在今

天仍然具有十分重要的现实意义。

关键词: 德莱塞《嘉莉妹妹》女性主义 “天使与妖妇”理论现

实主义客观公正

Abstract

Theodore Dreiser was a male American writer with worldwide prestige. Actually,

he exerted influences upon people in almost the whole decade of the 20th century, and

tends to influence the next decade continuously. Conspicuously, his characters are

mostly female. Exquisitely, he digs deep into the hearts of those women, who are of

different social status, and play different roles in society. A large quantity of lifelike

female images is portrayed in this way. This choice of materials, to a great extent,

endows his fictions with the feminist color. His fictions also contain realist elements,

which are characterized by truthfulness. However, different from the previous male

writers, who either beautified their female characters or smeared them, namely either

“Angel” or “Lamia”, Dreiser’s attitude towards females is objective and impartial, with

which the true colors of life are presented.

In this thesis, with the application of feminist criticism and realist critical

theories, I conduct an in-depth analysis into the character depiction, especially the

objective and impartial image of Carrie in Sister Carrie. After that, the cause why

Dreiser develops such an objective attitude towards Carrie and females is analyzed

from the perspectives of the social ideology in Dreiser’s era as well as his life and

writing career. Through the above analysis, I conclude that Dreiser’s specific attitude

towards females results from the social background of his time, his unique life and

writing experiences, which is reflected incisively in his works.

The thesis is made up of 5 chapters. The first one consists of three sections,

including a review of the studies on Dreiser and Sister Carrie and previous studies on

Dreiser’s attitude towards Carrie and females. More importantly, I state clearly here

the aim of the research and the organization of the thesis. Chapter 2 deals with the

theoretical bases, including the brief introduction to feminist criticism and realism. As

the main part of the thesis, Chapter 3 and Chapter 4 deal with the text interpretation

from which Dreiser’s objective attitude towards females is inclusively presented and

the cause why Dreiser would form such attitude is also explored from the social

background and his life and writing experiences. Chapter 5 is a conclusion, in which I

emphasizes again that Dreiser’s attitude towards females was objective and impartial.

What Dreiser insisted on one century ago not only had the practical impact on his era

but also has its profound contemporary significance.

Key Words: Dreiser, Sister Carrie, Feminism，Angel and Lamia

Theory, Realism, Objective, Impartial

Contents

中文摘要

ABSTRACT

Chapter One Introduction .............................................................................................. 1

§1.1 Brief Introduction to the Studies on Dreiser and Sister Carrie ..........................2

§1.2 Previous Studies on Dreiser’s Attitude towards Carrie and Females .................3

§1.3 Aims of the Research and Organization of the Thesis ....................................... 5

Chapter Two Theoretical Framework ............................................................................ 7

§2.1 Feminism ............................................................................................................ 7

§2.1.1 Women’s Historical Subordinate Situation — Women as Men’s Other ..8

§2.1.2 Contemporary Womenfolk ....................................................................... 9

§2.2 Realism .............................................................................................................11

§2.2.1 American Realism .................................................................................. 11

§2.2.2Characteristics of American Literary Realism ........................................ 12

Chapter Three Text Interpretation: Dreiser’s Attitude towards Females through Sister

Carrie ..............................................................................................................................13

§3.1 Desirous and Independent Carrie ..................................................................... 15

§3.1.1 Sexual Attractiveness and Liberation ..................................................... 15

§3.1.2 From Economical Dependence to Independence ................................... 19

§3.1.3 From Spiritual Dependence to Independence .........................................23

§3.2 Depiction of Male Characters in Sister Carrie .................................................25

§3.2.1 Depiction of Drouet ................................................................................ 25

§3.2.2 Depiction Hurstwood ..............................................................................26

Chapter Four Cause Analysis: Influence of Social Ideology and Dreiser’s Unique

Experiences ..................................................................................................................... 29

§4.1 Trend of Feminist Thoughts in the First Half of the 20th Century and Its

Influence ...................................................................................................................29

§4.2 Dreiser’s Life Experiences and Its Influence ................................................... 30

Chapter Five Conclusion ..............................................................................................34

Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 37

Publications .....................................................................................................................37

Chapter one Introduction

Chapter One Introduction

The first half of 20th century saw a great American writer –Theodore Dreiser

(1871-1945), who was deemed highly by Kazin as “head and shoulders above the

contemporaries of his own generation. No other writer in America during the present

century has exerted so great a moral force on his successors. No other novelist has

done more than Dreiser to free American Letters” (Shapiro 182) As an outstanding

realistic writer, Dreiser excelled in exploring the real American life, especially the dark

side of the decayed capitalistic life and the miserable suffering of the working class,

and was also famous for his vivid depiction of the characters of different social status.

It is conspicuous that his characters are mostly female whose hearts he exquisitely digs

deep into. Therefore, a large quantity of lifelike female images is produced in this way.

This choice of materials, to a great extent, endows his fictions with the feminist color.

Meanwhile, his fictions also contain some elements of realism, which are characterized

by truthfulness, just as Dreiser stated in his own Autobiography “Life itself is a

tragedy… I just want to depict it as what it is.” (Dreiser 152)

Dreiser makes a great contribution to American modern novels, and as an

outstanding American realistic writer, many critics reach such an agreement that

Dreiser is the leading figure in a national literary movement that replaces the

observance of Victorian notions of propriety with the unflinching presentation of

real-life subject matter. His exposure of the real female character is a good case in

point. It is he who liberates American novels and brings forth a revolution to American

literature. It is he who depicts the female characters from an all-round and integrated

perspective and it is he whose attitude towards females is objective and impartial

without any bias and prejudice, unlike the traditional male writers.

The Nobel Prize winner Sinclair Lewis states his opinion about Theodore

Dreiser’s contribution in his Nobel Praise Acceptance Lecture: “Now to me, as to

many other American writers, Dreiser more than any other man, marching alone,

usually unappreciated, often hated, has cleared the trail from Victorian and Howellsian

timidity and gentility in American fiction to honesty and boldness and passion of life.

Without his pioneering, I doubt if any of us could, unless we liked to be sent to jail,

seek to express life and beauty and terror.” (Lewis 1930)

文档加载中……请稍候！
如果长时间未打开，您也可以点击刷新试试。

下载文档到电脑，查找使用更方便

15 积分 4人已下载

立即下载 VIP免费下载

摘要：

摘要西奥多·德莱塞是美国文学史上具有深远影响的男性作家。他的作品中塑造了很多栩栩如生的女性形象,他深入挖掘了这些身处社会不同阶层，扮演不同社会角色的女性人物的内心。这一选材模式，很大程度上使其作品富有浓厚的女性主义色彩。同时,德莱塞的作品也具有浓厚的现实主义色彩。然而,和以往的男性作家描写女性形象非美化即丑化,非“天使”即“妖妇”不同的是,德莱塞看待女性的态度是客观公正的,是还原她们的本来面目和生活本身的。在这篇论文中，笔者利用女性主义文学批评理论和现实主义理论，首先以其长篇小说《嘉莉妹妹》为例深入分析其作品中客观的女性形象,然后,再从德莱塞所处的时代大背景和他的独特的人生经历及创作经历来探究...

展开>> 收起<<

从《嘉莉妹妹》看德莱塞客观的女性观及其成因.pdf

共44页,预览5页

还剩页未读，继续阅读

从《嘉莉妹妹》看德莱塞客观的女性观及其成因

相关推荐

开通VIP享超值会员特权

作者详情

相关内容

推荐作者

热门标签

举报选择: