美国文学史全文赏析

The Scarlet Letter: Bathaniel Hawthorne
Main characters
Hester Prynne: the heroine of the novel. It is bot a praise of a Hester sinning, but a hymn on the moral growth of the woman when sinned against. Hen response to the adultery and the scarlet letter A is positive. Her life eventually acquires a real significance when she reestabilishes a meaningful relatinship with her fellowmen. An industrious, brave and unbending woman, she was once a sinner and later turned to a figure of high virtue.
Dimmesdale: the unrevealed adulterer, on the other hand, is negative. He cuts himself off from society and withers spiritually as well as physically. And finally he dies an honest man. He dies in the end in her arms while confessing his sin at a public gathering. Only at the end if his life was he delivered from his sin and sense of guilt.
Chillingworth:the real murderer of the story, who really commits “the Unpardonable Sin”. As a cold-natured physician,however, he designed a inhumane scheme if cold revenge by constantly tormenting the sinning soul of minister until the poor clergyman is tormented to death. He becomes a demon in his revenge, but the end of him is also tragic enough. Dimmesdale’s declar ation before his death, “Thou, too, hast deeply sinned!” is like God’s judgement on him and gives him a deadly blow. The last time we see him, he is kneeing down besides Dimmesdate,”with a blank, dull countenance, out of which the life seemed to hhave depa rted.”
Features
The symbolic significance of the A. A is symbolic of Hester’s moral development.
At first, it is a token of shame, ”Adultery”. But then the genuine sympathy and help Hester offers to her fellow villagers changes it to “able”. Finally in th e story, the letter A appears in the sky, signifying “angel”.
Inner minds description.All the major figures have complex psychologies. There is a sembalance of interior monologues which reveal their states of mind.
Hawthorne’s influence has been great. T he psychological realism of Henry James may have taken its cue from Hawthorne’s descriptions of inner minds, and William Faulkner, clearly shows his indebtedness to him.
Mobe Dick:Herman Melville
The theme:
1, the human research for truth and meaning of existence; conflect between good and evil, between man and nature; alienation\ isolation, which exists in the life of Melville’s time on different levels, between man and man, man and society,and man and nature.
2, it is first a Shakespearean tragedy of man fighting against overwhelming odds in an indiffrefnt and even hostile universe. It represents the sum total of his bleak view of the world in which he lived. Man can observe and even manipulate to a certain degree, but he can’t influence and over come n ature at its source.
Character Analysis
Ishmael: The narrator of the story and a cool observer and judge of the whole incident. His thoughtful mind added a strong philosophical notion to the novel and his good knowledge in whaling made the novel an interesting book on whaling. His very name is powerfully loaded. He resembles his namesake in the Bible in that he is a wanderer. He starts out feeling bad, hoping to find a place where he can live a happy and ideal life. Up to the time he goes on board the Pequod and midway through the book, he is an escapist. However, gradually he comes to see the fully of Ahab seeking to conquer nature, and begins to feel significance of love and companionship.He learned to accept, an attitude which alone ensures his --- and humanity’s --- survival. Voyaging for Ishmael has become a journey in quest of knowledge and values.
Captain Ahab: A man who is obsessed with the killing of a white whale that has maimed him. He has a scar which extends from his head to his leg. He is a monomaniac person who set out to destroy Evil but only to be destroyed. He was passionate, powerful, and single-minded. He hates Moby Dick which is the embodiment of evil. He is angry because his pride is wounded. He is bent on avenging himself. He loses sanity and humanity and becomes a devilish creature rushing headlong towards his doom. He stubbornly attached a moral quality to an amoral creature and launched a battle against it at the expense of his life as well as the lives of his crew.
Starbuck:He the first mate, is bold enough to criticize Ahab's vengeance, considers mutiny but fails. In contrast to Ahab, he was the embodiment of rationality. But his weak reasonable mind was never a match to the burning passion of the captain.
Moby Dick: It is the White Whale; the world’s largest creature. It is powe rful, legendary image of nature. It swims peacefully in the sea until disturbed by humans, then shows a terrible fury and anger. By far the most conspicuous symbol in the book is, of course Moby Dick. The white whale is capable of many interpretations. It is a symbol of evil to some, one of goodness to others, and of both to still others. He is paradoxically benign and malevolent, nourishing and destructive, “massive, brutal, monolithic, but at the same time protean, erotically beautiful, infinitely variabl e.” Its whiteness is a paradoxical color, too, signifying as it does death and corruption as well as purity, innocence, and youth. It represents the final mystery of the universe which man will do well to desist from pursuing. As Ahab and his crew do not leave it alone, it is only natural that they get drowned. Melville manages to achieve the effect of ambiguity through employing the technique of multiple view in his narratives. Moby Dick is portrayed from different angles. The method of multiple view definitely helps to create a symbolic effect.Moby Dick thus reveals the basic pattern of nineteenth-century American life: loneliness and suicidal individualism in a self-styled democracy.
Writing techniques:
1, the symbolism used in the book:
The Pequod is a symbol of doom. Adorned like a primitive coffin,it is painted a gloomy black and covered in whale teeth and bones. It is , in fact, marked for death.
The voyage of the Pequod itself is the symbol of he pursuit of ideals, adventure, and the hunt in the vast wilderness as well as a metaphor for the search for the ultimate truth of experience.
Mobe Dick possesses various symbolic meaning for various individuals. It is a symbol of nature foe human beings because it is mysteriouse, powerful, unknown. For the Captain Ahab, Mobe Dick is the symbol of evil, one of the symbols of good and purity because of its whiteness to others, and of both to still others.he is “paradoxically benign and manlevolent, nourishing and destructive”. Its whiteness is also a paradoxical color, signifying death and corruption as well as purity, innocence and youth. It represents the final mystery of the universe which man will ado well to desist from persuing.
2, the technique of multiple points of view in his narratives:
Melville manages to achieve the effect of ambiguity through employing the technique of multiple points of view in his narratives. The method of using it, while indicating the author’s unwillingness to commit himself,definitely helps to achieve the effect of ambiguity, and the reader is thrown upon himself for judgement.
the Portrait of a Lady:Henry James
I sabel’s personality : imaginative, intelligent, smart, people think highly of her intelligence, she thinks highly of herself, self-esteem, innocent
The Grate Gateby: F.scott Fitzgerald
It is the story of an idealist who is destroyed by the influence of the wealthy, pleasure-seeking people around him, a portrait of moral decay.
Gateby character is purified by a deep, unselfish love for Daisy, a beautiful, silly woman who, earlier, married a rich husband instead of Gatsby and moved into high society.Gatsby has never lost his love for her and , in an era when divorce has become easy, he tries to win her back by becoming extravagantly rich himself. He does not succeed, and in the end he is killed almost by accident because of his determination to shield Daisy from disgrace.None of Gatsby’s upper friends come to his funeral. The narrator is so disgusted that he leaves New York and returns to his original home in the province. Li ke Franklin, Gatsby also made a timetable and a list of “do’s and don’ts”, but unfortunately he did not know that the time had changed. There was too much “floating dust” that blocked and broke his dream. Under this great thematic design, the book also ski llfully treats a variety of modern motifs like the “waste-land” theme as a symbolize by the Valley of Ashes and boredom as reflected in Tom and Daisy.
Themes: the novel is a parody of the American dream as represented by Gatsby’s pursuit for wealth and love. American Dream is a popular belief that people can achieve success, whether it is wealth, fame or love through honest hard working in a new world of liberty, equality, chances and promises. It is true that Gatsby had a huge wealth, but it was built up through illegal means --- bootlegging;
Daisy was the embodiment of love for Gatsby, but she was only a mindless and spiritless woman who retreated to her boring but secure way of life rather than accepted the responsibility at the moment of crisis.
The use of the reserved narrator and impressionistic descriptions bring the book to a unique aesthetic height.
Gatsby’s life follows a clear pattern: There is, at first, a dream, then a disenchantment, and finally a sense of failure and despair.
In this, Gatsby’s personal experience approximates the whole of the American experience up to the first few decades of this century.
America had “pandered to the last and greatest of all human dreams” and promised something like “the orgiastic future” for humanity.
Now the virgin forests have vanished and made way for a modern civilization, the only fitting symbol of which is the “valley of ashes”, the living hell.
Here modern men live in sterility and meaninglessness and futility as best illustrated by Gatsby’s essent ially pointless parties.
The shallowness of Daisy whose voice is “full of money”, the restless wickedness of Tom, the representative of the egocentric, careless rich,
and Gatsby who is innocent enough to believe that the past can be recovered and resurrected, but is tragically convinced of the power of money.
All these clearly denote the vanishing of the great expectations which the first settlement of the American continent had inspired.
The hope is gone; despair and doom have set in.
Thus Gatsby’s personal life has assumed a magnitude as a “cultural-historical allegory for the nation.
Here lies the greatest intellectual achievement that Fitzgerald ever achieved.
The Sun Also Rises: Hemingway
Hemingway’s book paints t he image of a whole generation, the Lost generation. This included the young English and American expatriates as well as men and women caught in the war and cut off from the old values and yet unable to come to terms with the new era when civilization had gone mad.
The novel concerns a group of psychologically bruised, disillusioned expatriates living in postwar Paris, who take psychic refuge in such immediate physical activities as eating, drinking, travelling, brawling, and lovemaking.
He comes to see that, in a world in which “all is vanity and vexation of spirit,” there is nothing one can do but to take care of one’s own life and be tough against fate and tough with grace under pressure.
In some impotant ways, Jake differs from those around him. He seems aware of the fruitlessness of the Lost Generation’s way of life. Moreover, he recognizes the frequent cruelty of the behavior in which he and his friends engage. Most impotant, perhaps,he acknowledges,if only indirectly, the pain that his war injury and his unreauited love for Brett cause him. However, though Jake does perceive the problems in his life, he seems either unwilling or unable to redemy them,. Though he
understands the dilemma of the Lost Generation, he seems to remain trapped within it. Brett is a strong, largely independent woman. She exerts great power over the men around her. Moreover, she refuses to commit to any one man. However, her independence doesn’t make her happy. She frequently conplains to Jake about how miserable she is. Although she will not commit to any one man, she seems uncomfortable being by herself. “she can’t go anywhere alone.” A liberated a woman is necessalily a corrupting, dangerous force for men. As with Jake and his male friends, WWI seems to have played an essential part in the formation of Brett’s character. During the war, her true love died of dysentery. Her subsequent aimlessness, especially with regard to men, can be interpreted as a futile, subconsciois search for this original love. Brett’s personal search is perhaps symbolic of the entire Lost Generation’s research for the shattered prewar values of love and romance.
The sun also rises aims to express is not only limited to one generation’s situation and their suffering, not only to inform people how destructive and hateful the war is or just how the generation gets hurt and lost in the war. Those, who consider the book only as the portrait of the “lost”, only get the surface of Hemingway’s writing. The other deep meaning of it,ie, the truth of it, in fact, is to build up a new way of life: disciplining and controlling oneself to exercise grace under pressure. It is a healthy apirit and Hemingway creats the code heros such as Montoya and Pedro Romero who act the theme out. It has a moral backbone, deriving much of its powers from the contrast between the heroes and the non-code charaters who are also called Lost Generation.
These characters have experienced and witnessed violence and miseried, but instead of becoming “lost”, they find values and life out of sufferings and vanity. Although they are suspicious of the abstract ideals of courage, heroism and national grand purpose and they bear physical and psychological wounds in a profoundly personal way, they still combine their disillusionment with traditional Am. value of hard work. They enjoy life in such a way that life for them is never meaningless. We can see Jake and other code heroed in the novel as uncompromised representatives of the “Lost Generation”.。