Theodore Dreiser
13th week theodore dreiser 英美文学赏析 教学课件
• The prominence of psychology and the theories of Sigmund Freud
2) They reported truthfully and objectively, with a passion for scientific accuracy and an overwhelming accumulation of factual detail.
3) The major representatives of American naturalists include Jack London, Stephen Crane, Frank Norris, Theodore Dreiser and so on.
Naturaliቤተ መጻሕፍቲ ባይዱm
• The practice of describing precisely the actual circumstances of human life in literature.
• 法国作家左拉将这一概念引入文学，用以倡导一种追求纯粹 的客观性和真实性、从生理学和遗传学角度去理解人的行动 的创作理念。体现在文学作品中，自然主义文学力图事无巨 细的描绘现实，给人一种实录生活和照相式的印象。
• 自然主义文学对社会异化现象的感知的深度是现实主义文学 无法企及的，这一点深刻的影响了20世纪的现代文学。
VI. Naturalism and Muckraking
TheodoreDreiser西奥多·德莱塞1871-1945
Dreiser’s Major Works
▪ 1) Sister Carrie ▪ «嘉莉妹妹» ▪ 2) Jennie Gerhardt ▪ «珍妮姑娘»
Dreiser’s Major Works
3) The Trilogy of Desire « 欲望三步曲» (1) The Financier « 金融家» (2) The Titan « 巨人» (3) The Stoic « 斯尔葛»
Theodore Dreiser 西奥多·德莱塞
(1871-1945)
Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945)
The Important Points
• 1. Dreiser idea of Sister Carrie
• 3. Comments on Theodore Dreiser’s style
Dreiser’s Style
Without good construction deficient characterization lack in imagination Simple words Journalistic method of reiteration重复新
闻手法
Techniques in painting (word-picture, sharp contrast, truth in color, movement in outline)
Sister Carrie
Jennie Gerhardt
The theme of Sister Carrie
It best embodies Dreiser’s naturalistic belief that men are controlled and conditioned by heredity(遗传), environment and chance, but a few extraordinary and unsophisticated human beings refuse to accept their fate wordlessly, instead strive unsuccessfully, and to find meaning and purpose for their existence. Carrie, as one of such people, senses that she is merely a cipher(无足轻重的人) in an uncaring world yet seeks to grasp the mysteries of life and thereby satisfies her desires for social status and material comfort. In Sister Carrie, Dreiser expressed his naturalistic pursuit by expounding the purposelessness of life and impotence(无能为力) of men.
经典课件Theodore_Dreiser
Main Literary Works
Sister Carrie 1900 《嘉莉妹妹》 嘉莉妹妹》 Jennie Gerhardt 1911 《珍妮姑娘》 珍妮姑娘》 Financial 1912 《金融家》 金融家》 The Titan 1914 《巨人》 巨人》 The “Genius” 1915 《天才 》 An American Tragedy 1925 《美国悲剧》 美国悲剧》 The Stoic 1947 《斯多葛》 斯多葛》
Born Died Occupation Wife Parents
Hale Waihona Puke 1871-08-27,Indiana 1945-12-28,Hollywood Novelist Sara White Sarah and John Paul Dreiser
Dreiser was born in Terre Haute, Indiana, to Sarah and John Paul Dreiser, a strict Catholic family. John Paul Dreiser was a German immigrant from Mayen in the Eifel region, and Sarah was from the Mennonite farming near Dayton, Ohio; she was disowned for marrying John and converting to Roman Catholicism. Theodore was the twelfth of thirteen children (the ninth of the ten surviving). The popular songwriter Paul Dresser (1857–1906) was his older brother.
Theodore Dreiser
Report Of Theodore DreiserTheodore Dreiser (1871—1945) who was known as a powerful novelist was born at Terre Haute, Indiana, in1871. He lived in a poor and intensely religious family. And his family was also a big one. There were thirteen children in all and he was next to the youngest. Dreiser attend a number of schools and from 1889 to 1890, he attended Indiana University. But in order to earn a living, he left the university after a year’s hard working.The early life of Theodore Dreiser was very miserable. He had done a variety of menial jobs, such as washing dishes and clothes for others, working as a real estate clerk and a collection agent. These difficult life experiences provided him many real materials for his works. He became a full-time writer after 1911. And he turned entirely away from fiction toward political activism and polemical writing during the last two decades of his life.His best works are in the form of short stories and novels. Short stories: Free and Other Stories (1918), Chains (1921), Five Furniture(1930), etc. Novels: Sister Carrie (1900), Jennie Gerhardt (1911), The Titan (1914), Stoic, The Genius (1915), and An American Tragedy (1925).Theodore Dreiser, as an outstanding representative of naturalism, whose novels depict real-life subjects in a harsh light. In his fiction, Dreiser deals with social problems and with characters who struggle to survive. His principal concern was with conflict between human needs and the demands of society for material success. He showed human beings to have their own will and capacity for realisation of idealism. Theodore Dreiser was considered by many as the leader of Naturalism in American writing. And what’s more, Dreiser was also praised as “the greatest living realist” of the early twentieth century. He was a fine writer of Naturalistic novels.。
Theodore Dreiser
Summary of Chapter one
Carrie is a pretty young girl at the age of eighteen. She leaves home by train for Chicago where her sister lives to look for work. On the train, she encounters Drouet, a traveling salesman, who is attracted by Carrie’s prettiness. Carrie longs for wealth and affection, for the glitter of the big city, Chicago. Drouet’s fashionable clothes, rings, gold watch chain, knowledgeable talk and affectionate attention to Carrie made her hardly know how to repulse. He succeeds in getting her sister’s address before the train arrives at the station. Carrie’s sister comes to meet her at the station, but at the sight of her lean-faced, commonplace sister, Carrie’s heart sinks for she feels the cold reality with no promise of light, warmth, wealth and merriment.
Theodore Dreiser
Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945)作品有：代表作：An American Tragedy.Sister Carrie. (嘉莉妹妹). Nigger Jeff. Old Rogaum and His Theresa. Jennie Gerhardt. Trilogy of Desire(欲望三部曲):1. The Financier. 2. The Titan.3. The Stoic. The Genius. Dreiser Looks at Russia.Theodore Dreiser is generally acknowledged as one of America‘s literary naturalists. (美国著名的自然主义作家)With every disadvantage piled upon him, Dreiser, by his strong will and his dogged persistence, eventually burst out and became one of the important American writers.Dreiser is a prolific writer and many of his works are familiar to us Chinese readers. (是个多产作家。
) . Among them, Sister Carrie is the best known, tracing the material rise of Carrie Meeber and the tragic decline of G.W. Hurstwood.The Genius, a classic story of a ―misunderstood artist‖, was once condemned for ―obscenity and blasphemy. (《天才》讲的是一个“被误解的艺术家”的故事，这部小说因其“淫秽和对神的不敬”而遭到谴责。
10 Theodore_Dreiser美国文学
As a novelist Dreiser made his debut with Sister Carrie, a powerful account of a young working girl‘s rise to success and her slow decline. “She was eighteen years of age, bright, timid and full of the illusions of ignorance and youth. Whatever touch of regret at parting characterized her thoughts it was certainly not for advantages now being given up. A gush of tears at her mother’s farewell kiss, a touch in the throat when the cars clacked by the flour mill where her father worked by the day, a pathetic sigh as the familiar green environs of the village passed in review, and the threads which bound her so lightly to girlhood and home were irretrievath
the help of his former teacher, he was able to spend the year 1889-1890 at Indiana University. Dreiser left after only a year. He was, however, a voracious贪婪 的 reader, and the impact of such writers as Hawthorne, Poe, Balzac, Herbert Spencer, and Freud influenced his thought and his reaction against organized religion.
Theodore_Dreiser德-莱-赛..
Experience
• At 15, he began to do some odd jobs. • Went to Chicago and worked on Chicago’s newspaper. • Groped his way to authorship • In 1925,his greatest work An American Tragedy appeared.
• One of the most significant American writers.
Education
• Had some education at a Catholic school in Terre Hante. • Went to a public school of Warsaw, Indiana. • Spend a year at Indiana University. • Read voraciously by himself.
• In 1927,he visited Russia.
• He joined the Communist Party shortly before his death in 1945.
Dreiser and his wife
• Dreiser’s residence
Main Literary Works
• Repressed aggression
Plot
Famous actress
George Hurs
Mistress
Urban worker Country girl
Charlie Drouet
Middle
Train
Her sister Chicago Low
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Theme of Sister Carrie
• It best embodies Dreiser’s naturalistic belief that men are controlled and conditioned by heredity( 遗 传 ), environment and chance, but a few extraordinary and unsophisticated human beings refuse to accept their fate wordlessly, instead strive unsuccessfully, and to find meaning and purpose for their existence. Carrie, as one of such people, senses that she is merely a cipher(无足 轻重的人) in an uncaring world yet seeks to grasp the mysteries of life and thereby satisfies her desires for social status and material comfort. In Sister Carrie, Dreiser expressed his naturalistic pursuit by expounding the purposelessness of life and impotence(无e
She first stays with her sister whose working-class home is, however, too poor to keep her. Winter is coming and she is seriously ill. A traveling salesman, Drouet by name, comes to her rescue and takes her home as his mistress. Sister Carrie's beauty appeals to Drouet’s friend, Hurstwood, so that the respectable manager deserts his comfortable home and family and forces her to elope with him. They run first to Canada and then settle down in New York. For some time they experience dire poverty. Sister Carrie goes out to find work on the stage, but Hurstwood proves himself to be utterly unfit to survive. He can not find work, and begs for and receives some occasional support from Sister Carrie. His downfall is complete when he commits suicide one cold winter night. Sister Carrie manages to move up in her career, and Drouet comes back to renew some connection with her, only to be rebuffed and leave rejected. At the end of the book Sister Carrie is seen sitting in her rocking-chair, still rocking.
Main works
• An American Tragedy (1925)美国的悲剧 • The Bulwark (1946)堡垒 Free and Other Stories 1918 collection of short stories
An American Tragedy
An American Tragedy (1925) is the finest of Dreiser's books. It concerns a weak young man who is executed for the murder of his pregnant girl friend. Again, Dreiser did not condemn his villain, but the amoral society that produced and destroyed him. Dreiser based the book on a notorious criminal case.
Theodore Dreiser
(1871-1945)
• an American novelist and journalist of the naturalist school
Theodore Dreiser
• • • • Life Works Some comment about Dreiser Sister Carrie
Some comment about Dreiser
• His novels often featured main characters who succeeded at their objectives despite a lack of a firm moral code, and literary situations that more closely resemble studies of nature than tales of choice and agency.
Main works
• Sister Carrier(1900)嘉莉妹妹 • Jennie Gerhardt(1911)珍妮姑娘 • Trilogy of Desire欲望三部曲 The Financier (1912)金融家 The Titan (1914)巨人 The Stoic(1947)斯多葛 • The “Genius” (1915)天才
Key Words for Writing style
• • • • • Without good construction deficient characterization lack in imagination Simple words Journalistic method of reiteration重复新闻 手法 • Techniques in painting (word-picture, sharp contrast, truth in color, movement in outline)
Life
• Born in August 27, 1871 • Died in December 28, 1945 • His family moved a lot because of poverty, insecurity, and internal division • Went to Indiana University in 1889 • In 1892, he wangled his first newspaper job with the Chicago Globe, as an itinerant journalist • Began his writing career in 1900
Some comment about Dreiser
Sherwood Anderson writes： Heavy, heavy, the feet of Theodore. How easy to pick some of his books to pieces, to laugh at him for so much of his heavy prose ...he fellows of the ink-pots, the prose writers in America who follow Dreiser, will have much to do that he has never done. Their road is long but, because of him, those who follow will never have to face the road through the wilderness of Puritan denial, the road that Dreiser faced alone
Character
• Caroline (Carrie) Meeber, the protagonist of the novel, a poor girl alone in Chicago, Carrie finds success, but not happiness, as an actress • Charlie Drouet is a charming, flashy (浮华的) salesman with a strong appetite for romance. • George Hurstwood is the manager of a saloon in Chicago. At the beginning of the novel, he is a wealthy, important man.
Key Words for Theme
• • • • • • American Dream Change and Transformation Choices and Consequences Wealth and Poverty Identity Sex
Writing style
Dreiser's novels are formless at times and awkwardly written, and his characterization is found deficient and his prose pedestrian and dull, yet his very energy proves to be more than a compensation. Dreiser's stories are always solid and intensely interesting with their simple but highly moving characters. Dreiser is good at employing the journalistic method of reiteration to burn a central impression into the readers' mind.