他还活着吗

On the Themes of Mark Twain’s Is He Living or is He Dead?Abstract:One of Mark Twain’s most famous short stories Is He Still Living or Is He Dead contains many themes: such as the coldness and ostentatiousness, sacrifice and compensatory, and the importance of media. The whole story develops around these themes, which are the clues of the short story, showing mark twain’s writing style: humorous and satirical.Key words: themes，satirical,surviving by dying;1.IntroductionIs he living or is he dead is an important short story written by American writer Mark Twain. The story is short but pithy, humorous, and satirical. Even though it was written more than 100 years ago, during the one hundred years, few people have studies it in the field of literature. One scholar has analyzed miller’s life, and he think Millet’s fame is mainly made by medium.” pretending dead”brings him world reputation, but the dead miller can not enjoy the fame open and aboveboard, instead, he lives a lonely life. The paper will try to expound this work through the three themes.2. Discussionthe themes in this story2.1 The coldness and ostentatiousness of the richMark Twain satirizes people in high class and the rich in most of his works. And this theme has also been expressed in his is he living or is he dead.At the beginning of the story, the writer tells us something he has experienced inthe Riviera.’’ At this retired spot one has all the advantages, privately, which are to be had publicly at Monte Carlo and Nice, a few miles farther along. That is to say, one has the flooding sunshine, the balmy air and the brilliant blue sea, without the marring additions of human pow-wow and fuss and feathers and display. Mentone is quiet, simple, restful, and unpretentious; the rich and the gaudy do not come there.”Obviously, by these description, we can know that the writer stand against the ostentatious bourgeoisie. He looks down upon their vainglory life style, from these sentences and vocabulary, Mark Twain shows his satirical and ridicule attitude to the ostentatious rich.In the ninth paragraph, by the mouth of Smith, the writer introduces us a philosophic story, which is written by Hans Andersen. It is a beautiful little story. A child has a caged bird, which it loves but thoughtlessly neglects. The bird pours out its song unheard and un heeded; but, in time, hunger and thirst assail the creature, and its song grows plaintive and feeble and finally ceases—the bird dies.The child comes, and is smitten to the heart with remorse: then,with bitter tears and lamentations, it calls its mates, and they bury the bird with elaborate pomp and the tenderest grief. The children don’ t know that the money they pay for the f uneral could have kept the bird alive and made it easy and comfortable. Many poets and artists are like the caged bird, they struggle to live when they are alive, and hardly can they keep their body and soul together,and usually, most of them will die in poverty and obscurity. However, after their death, fame and fortune which they deserve will arrive, but the reward will be put into others’ pockets.Now, let us come to the four young painters, from their experience, we can see the coldness of the rich. In Is He Living, or Is He Dead,Francois Millet, a poor and young artist, is a case in point. He and his fellows painted stacks and stacks of as good pictures as anybody in Europe paints, but they could not sell any of it. Millet once asked eight francs for his“Angelus” , but nobody would like to pay the price. They could hardly make a living. It seemed obvious that Millet and his fellow painters would follow the footprints of many other artists—die in poverty and obscurity.Fortunately, one of the fellows, Carl, came up with a good idea. His project wasthis: they must cast lots—one of them must die to save others and himself. The person chosen was Millet. In the next three months, he should paint with all his might—not pictures, but skeleton sketches, studies, parts of studies, fragments of studies, a dozen dabs of the brush on each……Because these things would be collected at fabulous prices for the world’ s museums after the great man is gone. And his friends would be busy supporting the moribund and working Paris and the dealers—preparations for the coming event. When everything is hot and just right,they would spring the death on the world and have the notorious funeral. But of course, Millet would not really die; he just changed his name and vanished.This plan worked. They had sold eighty-five small pictures and studies for sixty-nine thousand francs. Nobody would like to pay eight francs for Millet’ s “ Angelus” before, but Carl sold it for twenty-two hundred francs. At last, Millet was “ dead” . There was a great funeral for him. It stirred all over the globe and people from all over the world came to attend it and testify their sorrow. Finally, Francois Millet was not starved to death in poverty and absurdity, he changed his name and vanished. At the end of the story, we got to know his identity now is a rich silk manufacturer in Lyon.2.2 sacrifice and compensatory in lifeSacrifice and compensatory, this theme often appears in bible and Greek stories, in is he living or is he dead, the writer use this theme again.Mark Twain, by describing the depravity of human nature—the social mood crazily seeking for money and neglecting the true value of a artist and his woks, represents the tragic nature in the form of a humorous farce as well as the implied deception reflected by humorous comic plot, revealing the tragic connotation in Is He Living,the corruption of people’ s aesthetic value.Millet, the genius painter was not starved to die. He saved himself and his friend by pretending to die and all of them got rich.But he was not happy; he had to change his name and vanished,and turned out to be a sad and dreamy silk manufacturer For a genius painter, to give up painting equals to give up living.According to Northrop Frye, a form of comedy is one in which the comic hero resolves the particular situation he finds himself in.The process by which he resolves this situation is what comedy becomes. The journey or convention of the character, from low to high or from high to low, makes for the action in the comedy. The journey often begins with the absurdity and proceeds with how the character overcomes the absurdity.At the beginning, the bird died off hungry, but later its death draws the children’s attention and makes the children feel regret. This story pulls the way for the story of the four young painters Is He Living, or Is He Dead begins with the absurdity: when a genius artist is alive, he is totally unknown and neglected and he can hardly make a living. All of his merit has never been acknowledged until he was starved and dead. The absurdity forced Millet and his friend to find ways to avoid being starved; this is the journey or convention of the character. Finally, their plan worked and they weren’ t poor anymore, and a genius painter became famous when he was actually alive, this is the overcome of the absurdity of the character..At the end of the story, we cannot help smiling for the happy ending of the four young men—all of them did not follow the cursed fate of artists. All of them got rich and Millet got famous when was still alive. However, all of this were achieved at the price of a young and genius painter’s death,though he was not dead indeed, but actually, when he changed his name and vanished, when he stopped painting and could not claim he himself was Francois Millet, when a painting-lover was deprived of the right to paint and did not have the right to claim the fame he deserved, he was dead spiritually and only a living body.From this aspect, Is He Living, or Is He Dead is a tragedy masked by the humorous satire.When Millet was young and poor, he and his fellow were “ as happy as we were poor, or as poor as we were happy”.(Mark ,1978) Even they had to pinch now and then, “ we painted away together with all our might, pilling up stock…”(Mark ,1978) They had the “ sunniest spirits that ever laughed at poverty and had a noble good time in all weathers”(Mark ,1978) . When he was “ dead” and rich, “…he is alone in the world, for he always looks sad and dreamy, and doesn’ t talk withanybody” .(Mark ,1978)A genius painter cannot get what he deserves when he is alive. If he wants to live better—to keep away from poverty and obscurity, he has to give up his life or his identity. How ridiculous the fact is, however, this is the reality of the commercial society.2.3 The importance of mediaThere is no doubt that a good fame can bring huge wealth and profit. This piece of principle cannot be more proper for artist. Suffered by hunger and poverty, the four understand an important point: if one of them cannot be famous in the field of artist, they will not sell any picture even if they draw best.Carl deeply knows that our fame can be made except waiting for becoming famous after death. Therefore, each of them carried a dozen of Millet's small pictures, purposing to market them. Carl struck for Paris, where he would start the work of building up Millet's name against the coming great day. Claude and Smith were to separate, and scatter abroad over France. At first Carl draw pictures out of a rich man’s villa, and showed the man Millet’s works. The ostentatious rich man was not willing to admit his ignorance, so he bought one picture at a high price in order to show his appreciation ability. Later Carl sold one picture per day, and told others “I am a fool to sell a picture of Francois Millet's at all, for that man is not going to live three months, and when he dies his pictures can't be had for love or money."They also introduce miller by using the media efficiently: 'Every now and then we got in with a country editor and started an item around through the press; not an item announcing that a new painter had been discovered, but an item which let on that everybody knew Francois Millet”. Carl was soon in Paris and he worked things with a high hand. He made friends with the correspondents, and got Millet's condition reported to England and all over the continent, and America, and everywhere. They did not sell any work of millet to make people believe that millet will soon pass away. Later, they announce the news that Millet was dead by media and hold a funeral. Millet’s works become precious things because of his death and fame.From their success we can conclude that fame is the most important thing to an artist, and this kind of fame cannot be separated with the advertisement of media. Carl knew this best, so he put up the plan and made it come true. From then on, their lives have been changed.3.ConclusionThe themes of death and rebirth are never far below the surface in this story. The two images, rebirth and death, provide a frame for all the plots of the story. Surviving by dying—the characteristically paradoxical narrative strategy Twain employs in this story almost runs through many of his novels.The “ death” of young Millet symbolizes his denial of the malformed civilization of the commercial society. The “ rebirth”of the old Millet embodies the regaining of justice of human society, its old self “ dies” and its new self, an unpredictable different organism, is “ born.”Decent people，healthy education，right valuation，good manner, sound morality, and proper gentility, are what we expect from a true civilized society, while the deformed society in the story, hidden under the semblance of hypocritical, genteel civilization, is flooded with such ugly and evil vices as corrupted greed, bloody violence, family feud, deception, and cruel lynch．In such a society,many an honest and gifted people cannot live happily and comfortably, some time they even cannot make a living. Or they will be starved and die, or they will follow the trend, give up the things they love and do some other things that can make money. Francois Millet had finally found a way out. He pretended to die so he was not starved to die—this is the paradox of life—surviving by dying.Surviving by dying—this is a strange survival principle. But in a malformed society, this is a normal survival rule for some people: otherwise, you will have no way out but wait for the end of your life approaching helplessly. Just like the caged bird in Hans Anderson’ s story: The bird pours out its song unheard and unheeded;but, in time, hunger and thirst assail the creature, and its song grows plaintive and feebleand finally ceases—the bird dies. Many poets and artists are like the caged bird, they struggle to live when they are alive, and hardly can they keep their body and soul together, and usually, most of them will die in poverty and absurdity.However, after their death, fame and fortune which they deserve will arrive, but the reward will be put into others’ pockets.Francois Millet’ s friend “ Carl” knew the rules of game in this malformed society, so he proposed the surviving-by-dying plan. This plan woks to some extend —they survived, but at the price of Millet’s concealing his identity and giving up painting.The “ death” of young Millet symbolizes his denial of the malformed civilization of the commercial society, and also it stands for his compromise to the society—he had to keep his soul and body together, so he had to follow the rules of ga me in the disordered society. The “ rebirth” of the old Millet embodies the regaining of justice of human society, its old self “ dies” and its new self, an unpredictable different organism, is “ born.” But the new self is not an ideal one—he is sad and dreamy. In a malformed societ y, surviving means a person isn’ t a free man, but just a living body.As an outstanding work of mark twain,” is he living or is he dead? “It makes us to think about the coldness, ostentatiousness in the society. Why talented artist like millet live a dog’s life, but become famous overnight? The four artists’ experience shows a fact: we must sacrifice something if we want to survive in the cold and ostentatious society. No pains, no gains. What is important, we should build our fame by media even that we are talented drawer. Only by this way can we succeed.Is He living, or is He Dead is a typical example of Mark T wain’ s humorous satire writing style and his keen insight into human nature. In this humorously told short story, Mark Twain explores many weakness of human nature.Is He Living, or Is He Dead is a comedy at first sight. However, it is a tragedy in comic form. When Francois Millet, the painting-lover was deprived the right of painting and did not have the right to claim the fame he deserved,he was dead spiritually and only a living body. But he has no other choice: To die, or to live? This is the question. Surviving by dying,this is the only way out for Francois Millets in such a malformed society.References：[1] Twain M.The Complete Short Stories of Mark Twain[M].Bantam 20th Printing,New Y ork:Bantam Books.Inc,1978.[2]常耀信.美国文学选读[M].天津:南开大学出版社,1991.[3]马克·吐温. 马克·吐温幽默小品选[M].叶冬心,译.北京:百花文艺出版社,1987.[4]张友松．马克·吐温短篇小说选[M].北京：人民文学出版社，2002.[5] 张震. 论马克吐温的幽默[J]. 武汉航海职业技术学院学报，2009(3):27-31.[6]吕秀梅.《他是否在人间》的多重主题解读.文化纵横［J］2011(10)[7]朱树飏.马克.吐温名作欣赏［M］北京：中国和平出版社，1995.[8]薛梅，王杏娟，简海红，刘海平.英美小说选读［M］长春：吉林人民出版社，2008.。