文学定义

Chapter Four The Victoria Period1.Critical realism: Victoria literature, as a productof its age, naturally took on its quality ofmagnitude and diversity. It was many-sided andcomplex. While sticking to the principle of faithfulrepresentation of the 18th century realist novel,they carried their duty forward to the criticism ofthe society and the defense of the mass. Althoughwriting from different points of view and withdifferent techniques, they shared one thing incommon, that is, they were all concerned aboutthe fate of the common people. They were angrywith the inhuman social institutions, the decayingsocial morality as represented by the moneyworship and Utilitarianism, and the widespreadmisery, poverty and injustice. Their truthfulpicture of people’s life and bitter and strongcriticism of the society had done much inawakening the public consciousness to the socialproblems and in the actual improvement of thesociety.2.The characteristic and achievement ofCharles Dickens’ novels a. Dickens is adept with the vernacular and large vocabulary. He is humorous and witty. Character-portrayal is the most distinguishing feature of his works. Among a vast range of various characters, marked out by some peculiarity in physical traits, speech or manner, are both types and individuals. And he is famous for the depiction of those horrible and grotesque characters and those broadly humorous or comical ones. Dickens’s works are also characterized by a mingling of humors and pathos. Three kinds of characters: a. the innocent, persecuted, helpless child characters like Oliver Twist, Little nell, David Copperfield and little Dorris. B. the horrible and groteque characters like Fagin, Bill Sikes and Qulip; C. the humorous and comic figures like Mr. Micawber, Sun Weller and Mrs. Gamp.3.The theme of Jane Eyre: In Jane Eyre, Charlottepours a great deal of her own experience, such as the life at Lowood school and life as a governess.One of the central themes of the book is thecriticism of the bourgeois system of education.Another problem raised by her in the novel is the position of woman in society. Jane Eyre, the heroine of the novel, maintains that women should have equal rights with men.4.The narrative method of The Wuthering Heights:the story is told mainly by Nelly, Catherine’s old nurse, to Mr. Lockwood, a temporary tenant at Grange. The latter too gives an account of what he sees at Wuthering heights. And part of the story is told through Isabella’s letters to Nelly.While the central interest is maintained, the sequence of its development is constantly disordered by fashbacks. This makes the story all the more enticing and genuine.5.The artistic style of Browning’s poetry: 1)“dramatic monologue” perfectly used as a dominant poetic medium in which the speaker reveals his or her own characters in telling the story unconsciously; 2) obscurity sometimes presenting itself in that psychological exposure mingles complicatedly with clipped syntax. 30allusions and implications abounding in his works;and 4) complicatedness in structural design which corresponds to the psychological exposure in the monologue.6.The artistic style of Hardy’s novels: he is a greatpainter of nature. In his hand, nature assumes the form of life and becomes a most powerful, forbidding force with its own life and will. And all the works of hardy are noted for the rustic dialect and a poetic flavor, which fits well into their perfectly designed architectural structures.7.The artistic characteristic of the novel “Tess of theD’urbervilles”: as on e of the best work by hardy, the novel is a fierce attack on the hypocritical morality of the bourgeois society and the capitalist invasion into the country and destruction of the English peasantry towards the end of the 19th century. In its bitter criticism of the ugly reality, the novel is also immersed in a naturalistic tendency in that Tess seems to be led to her final destruction step by step by Fate. One “wrong” after another mysteriously andcoincidently drive her to her tragic end. So it issuggestive that readers understand the novelfrom the view points of its critical realist andnaturalistic tendency.Chapter 5. The Modern period1.“Modernism” as a literary movement: 1) Modernism wasthe product of the skepticism and disillusion of capitalist in the West; 2) The French Symbolism in the late 19th century heralded modernism. It flourished at the beginning of the 29th century until the 30s, and produced such great artists and writers as Kafka, Picasso, Pound, Webem, T.S.Eliot, James Joyce and Viginia Woolf. After the Second World War, it had another upsurage with the rise of existentialism, reflected mainly in drama; 3) ideologically, modernism took irrational philosophy and the theory of psycho-analysis, and they wrote about the alienation of human beings in their distorted and ill relationship between man and nature, man and society,man and man, man and himself; 4) in literary trend, modernism was a reaction against realism with its major concern with the psychological rather than the realistical, the abnormal rather than normal, the spiritual rather than the material, and chaos rather than order.2.the plot , character and language of Mrs. Warren’sProfession: the play about the economic oppression of women. Mr.Warren used to be a prostitute and is a boss of a prostitution. He exposed the social root and the essence of the ugly appearance and connected the theme of corrupted women with the corruption of capitalism and criticized the capitalist system and the hypocrisy and horror of it. He makes the trick of showing up one character vividly at the expense of another. He would take an unconventional character, a person with the gift of insight and freedom, so as to reveal at every turn shock notions, prejudices and dishonesties. His language is true to life. Each person speaks the language that suits to his position.3.The characteristic and meaning of Yeats’ poetry: Yeatsgave a significance to the ordinary events of life in his poetry. The new vigor of his verse is reflected in theprecise and concret imagery, the strong passion, and the active verb forms. The early passive and dreamy mood was replaced by anger, disillusion and bitter satire. His style is both simple and rich, colloquial and formal, witha quality of metaphysical wit and symbolic vision, whichindicates that Yearts has already been on his way to modern poetry.urence’s “Songs and Lovers”: the novel certainlyreflects the problems of Lawrence’s young age. It is taken as a typical example and lively manifestation of Oedipus Complex in fiction, as the result of Lawrence’s long-range study of psychoanalytic theories of Sigmund Freud. But the theme of the novel is usually said to concern the effect of maternal love on the development of a son. The didactic elements in the novel and the looseness in structure are often criticized by some critics.5.The art of Joyce: his own style is a straightforward one,lucid, logical and leisurely; subtelety, economy and exactness are his standards. But when he tries to render the so-called stream of consciousness, the style changes;incomplete, rapid, broken wording and fragmentarysentences are the typical features, which reflect the shifting, flirting, disorderly flow of thoughts in the major characters’ mind. To create his modern Odyssey---Ulysses, Joyce adopts a kind of mock-heroic style. The essence of the mock-heroic lies in the application of apparently inappropriate styles. He achieves this mainly by elaborating his style into parody, pastiche, symbolic fantasy, and narration by question and answer from an omniscient narrator.。