论《看得见风景的房间》中的人文主义

论《看得见风景的房间》中的人文主义
摘要
《看得见风景的房间》中，小说人物的性格及其追求充分显示了人文主义。

人物真诚坦率或虚伪与保守的性格都是小说中的人文主义的一部分，另外，实现自我价值与打破束缚，追求平等与自由也是其精髓所在。

本文基于人文主义理论，旨在通过分析不同人物的性格与追求，分析小说中的人文主义，为欣赏该小说增加新角度。

关键词：人文主义，《看得见风景的房间》，人物，性格，追求
The Humanism Reflected in A Room with a View
Abstract
In A Ro om with a View, humanism is richly embodied by characters’ personalities and pursuits. The humanism reflected in the novel is shown by characters’ favorable personalities like sincerity and candor, as well as their unfavorable personalities like hypocrisy and conservatism. Meanwhile, fulfilling self-value and breaking the shackles to pursue equality and freedom showed by characters are exactly the essence of the humanism of the novel. The thesis, based on humanism theory, aims to show the humanism reflected in the novel A Room with a View, especially through analyzing different characters’ personalities and pursuits, in the hope of adding a new standpoint to appreciate the novel.
Key Words: Humanism, A Room with a View, Characters, Personalities, Pursuits
1. Introduction
Edward Morgan Forster is not only an English novelist, but also an essayist and a short story writer. With only six novels, he still enjoys a lasting popularity as one of the renowned novelists of the 20th century in English literature. “Fors ter and Butler are alike in their refusal to indulge a blind devotion to instinct and spontaneity that would make them neo-romantics in their point of view.”[] His novels are mainly about the liberal humanism and the characters created by him mostly are caught up in the contradiction between their own personalities and the society. “His analyses of sexuality, gender, class, and nationality constitute some of the more modern aspects of his novels.”[] Liberal humanism is richly embodied in Forster’s novels, i n which
human heart, nature and pursuits are the hubs. Oliver Stallybrass comments him “The intensely, stifling human quality of the novel is not total avoided…we may hate humanity, but if it is exorcised or even purified the novel wilts; little is left but a bunch of words.”[] As Forster is at the key turning period for novels, there exist both the traditions of realism and the trends of modernism in his works. “The effect of knowing Forster was that he becomes a kind of supplementary conscience talked on to my own.”[](p23) He is known best for his ironic and well-plotted novels examining class difference and hypocrisy in early 20th century British society. Because of his good quality works, Forster is acknowledged by the public and other writers. His follo wers believe that Forster’s plentiful life and cultural experience highlights his works, and they describe him “the great liberal sage of the interwar and postwar periods.”[](p6) Prakash comments that Forster is “the greatest living master of the novel.” A famous literary critic once perceptively asserted that “E.M. Forster is for me the only living novelist who can be read again and again and who, after each reading, give me what few writers can give us after our first days of novel-reading, the sensation of having learned something.”[](p40) A critic wrote “There have not been many English novelists of our own time, who have established with us the second function, but E. M. Forster is certainly one of them, he has served as an embodiment of the virtues he writes about.”[](p35) At the end of the nineteenth century and the early years of the twentieth century, a great change took place in British society, whose surface prosperity was covered with a crisis of decline and Victorian traditional ideas and beliefs came under questions. During such a time, A Room with a View, a novel filled with significance in terms of human personalities, was published. “Forster thought this novel was his nicest but seems to have been uneasy about the happy ending.”[] It is Forster’s third novel and also the second one of his Italian novels. Among Forster’s six novels, it is regarded as the most romantic and optimistic novel. “With considerable artistic daring, Forster translates the materials of romantic comedy into a novel of ide as.”[] In l985, It was first time to be adapted into film by Merchant-Ivory and then ranked 79th on the Modern Library’s list of 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century in 1998.
Without too complicated a plot, the novel mostly concentrates on the development of the main characters: Lucy and George. Lucy, a lady with good education, meets George, British young man in Florence while traveling and cannot help being attracted by his enthusiasm and free mind. When she meets him in England again, she, sparing a lot of efforts, eventually gathers courage to admit and express her love to George and breaks the shackle of engagement and pursues her real happiness. In addition, in the novel, the characters are from different classes and have different personalities and pursuits, which represent some kinds of distinct humanistic features.
There are a lot of studies about Forster’s works, and Forsterian studies which were promoted by the International E. M. Forster Society established in 2010. However, for A Room with a View, the degree of related researches is far from enough. During these existing researches on A Room with a View, commentaries overseas concentrate more on its plot and cultural influence, as for the inboard literary critics, they mainly focus on their analysis of the female character’s development and the artistic skill of the novel. There are few people who have studied the humanism reflected in A Room with a View. Thus, this paper, through analyzing the characters, aims to explore the humanistic features in it.
To better study the humanism reflected in the novel, the analysis on humanistic feature and pursuits of characters become the most important way and purpose of this paper. From the whole structure of this thesis, it can be briefly divided into four parts. The first part is introduction, which mainly introduces the author of the novel, E. M. Forster, and his accomplishment he had achieved, besides, some information about the novel has also been involved, like the reputation it has obtained, literature review on it and the comments have made by critics, etc. In order to explore the humanistic ideas reflected in the novel, the second and third part of this thesis are mainly concentrated on analyzing the characters from different aspects: ch aracters’ personality and pursuits. The novel shows Cecil’s hypocrisy contrasted with Mr. Emerson’s honesty and sincerity, which allows humanistic features of characters to present to readers clearly and obviously. Besides, the pursuits of self-value, gender
liberty and freedom shown by Lavish, Lucy and George are also analyzed to prove the humanism reflected in the novel.
2. The Humanism Reflected in Characters’ Personalities
The novel A Room with a View embodies the idea of humanism from the various characters and elaborate plots. In another word, this novel, the most romantic and optimistic novel of Forster, is full of humanism. The novel can be divided into two parts: the first part takes place in Italy, which starts with the complaints about the room between Lucy and Miss Bartlett, and the second part is set in England. In the following part, the essay focuses on analyzing the personality of characters which can reflect humanism in the novel.
2.1 Mr. Emerson and Freddy’s Sincerity and Candor “Humanism is defined as a naturalistic world view that takes man to be a product of natural evolution, integral to it in body and mind. It emphasizes the power and responsibility of human beings to survive and progress in their development…Such human activity determin es and creates the uniquely human values.”[] The word “humanism”, from the very beginning, was derived from the Latin concept “humanistas”, and entered English in 19th century with the form “humanism”. Humanism is a philosophical and ethical stance which attaches importance to the nature of human beings. It focuses on maintaining the freedom of people, as well as emphasizes that people should release their nature, and be brave to express themselves. However, some critics comment “Humanism heretofore has ove r stressed human power and has neglected the powers of nature that create and transform our values in ways that we cannot.”[] Humanity and the presentation of human nature are the core of humanism. In the novel of A Room with a View, “Several different cha racters show humanistic idea through their words, behaviors, thoughts, as well as their different social class and social conditions.”[](p203) From the words and behaviors shown by Mr. Emerson and Freddy, it’s easy to reveal that human’s sincerity and cand or are one of cores of humanism which is reflected in the novel.
In the novel, there are several male characters who are representative of humanism, like Mr. Emerson, Freddy, as well as George who possess the similar good
nature of honesty and sincerity. They are always brave to express themselves without hesitation. From the behavior to suggest changing rooms showed by Mr. Emerson and Freedy’s direct comments on Cecil, the honesty and sincerity are clearly represented to readers.
As the title A Room with a View suggested, Lucy always wants a room with a view when she and her cousin Miss Bartlett travel in Florence, however, they find that they don’t get the promised room, thus the disputation about the rooms becomes the very beginning of the whole novel. Lucy wants to see the Arno through her room, but the alteration makes it impossible. When the disputation continues about who should live in the room with the advantage of the views of the Arno, some of her neighbors don’t break into disputation but stand by. However, a man interrupts the disputation and says loudly that he has a view twice. The man is Mr. Emerson, the first time to appear in the novel, without any description of his outlook but only one sentence to introduce. Mr. Emerson interrupts their argument in a direct way and declares that his room has the view, moreover, he volunteers to change rooms with them, which allows Mr. Emerson’s natural kindness and sincerity obvious to readers.
Another fact to show Mr. Emerson’s sincerity directly is when Lu cy got lost in Santa Croce. The first day in Florence, Lucy wants to go outside to enjoy the Italian view. Miss Lavish provides the guidance to Lucy actively, but at Santa Croce she disappears after talking with her acquaintance. As a result, Lucy, without the Baedeker which is taken by Miss Lavish before, gets lost and she wanders around the Santa Croce where she happens to meet Mr. Emerson. Through such a coincident plot here and their conversion, readers know that Mr. Emerson and his son, George are kind to invite Lucy to join them so that she won’t get lost, which is exactly showing their sincerity in their nature.
When hearing the explanation of Giotto’s productions, Mr. Emerson shows his frank expression of his thoughts again. In the chapel, there are pious congregation gathering to listen to a lecture, and the lecturer is telling them about the history of the frescoes and directs them how to worship Giotto. At that time, Mr. Emerson exclaims loudly his negative attitude and disagrees that the frescoes are built by faith. Mr.
Emerson publicly opposes the lecturer’s speech, which unsettles listeners and Lucy. However, in the opinion of Mr. Emerson, he doesn’t think it’s improper. He thinks his attitude is based on his natural thought and his way of thinking is under the consideration of common people.
There is another typical representative of candor, Freddy who is Lucy’s young brother. From his words in his first scene, it’s easy for readers to know that he is inner-directed and has his own opinions on things. When he is asked to say about his view about Cecil by Mrs. Honeychurch, he doesn’t say some words of praise to hide his true opinions, instead, he shows directly his approval of Cecil. Freddy becomes the first one who says “no” directly to other people in the novel, he doesn’t ingratiate himself with Cecil, who would be his brother- in-law, by giving fine words. Without considering Cecil’s social status, Freddy just follows his heart to express himself that he dislikes Cecil because Cecil is a selfish person who doesn’t think in others’ position. His way of expression shows clearly his candor and straightforwardness in his depths of human nature, which makes readers grasp the humanism of the novel without a struggle.
The roles of Mr. Emerson and Freddy in the very beginning of the novel are significant to develop the whole plot and reveal the humanism reflected in the novel. The frank nature existing in Mr. Emerson and Freddy lets readers know better the advantages of natural people who never use social rules or sophisticated ideas to decorate themselves but bravely express what they think. It is really a precious nature to be straightforward between the associations, which helps reveal one’s inner world.
2.2 Cecil and Miss Bartlett’s Hypocrisy and Conse rvatism The reason why the novel A Room with a View is beloved mainly lies in the humanism and liberalism reflected in it, meanwhile, it is considered as one of masterpieces which speaks highly of humanism. Forster once said “What I believe is to keep open a few breathing-holes for the human right.”[] In many works of Forster, he has begun to explore human relationship and inner of human nature, and the novel A Room with a View is the epitome of exploration to human nature. Published in the late Edwardian period, the novel is influenced greatly by liberalism which emphases the importance of social
responsibility and believes that human being is the member of society. What the novel chiefly conveys is the importance of liberal-humanism and what it tries to refine is the value of human nature through the words and behaviors of the characters.
The nature of human is multifarious and varied, which has a large scope. Liberal-mind is one of good character of human nature. Mr. Emerson and Freddy are possessed of such personality. Another admirable character of human nature is sincerity, which requires one to be honest. Contrast with honesty and liberal-mind, hypocrisy and conservatism are other disagreeable characters of human nature. Cecil and Miss Bartlett are typical representatives of such characters.
Cecil Vyse, the second male protagonist in the novel, shows up for the first time in Chapter 8 of the second section of the novel. Uniquely, he is the character who begins in the indirection from the talking between Mrs. Honeychurch, Lucy’s mother, and Freddy, Lucy’s Brother. Through other characters’ mouths, the first description about Cecil is shown in the novel. “Humanism has always been about human being and becoming. Historically, it has related human being and becoming to various domains of thinking and acting.”[] Readers can judge the real character and nature of Cecil from Cecil’s words and behaviors after he is really put on the stage in the novel. When Cecil firstly meets Mrs. Honeychurch and Freddy, he even doesn’t make salutation to them. Conversely, Mrs. Honeychurch greets him and put her letters on the writing table. From these details, it reflects the Cecil’s arrogance. After entering, Cecil’s character against other people’s likeness is presented obvious ly through what he does. Mrs. Honeychurch tends to sit in the dark so that she could preserve the furniture, however, Cecil just doesn’t care and twitches the curtain to let the light enter regardless of Mrs. Honeychurch’s feeling. From such an action, it’s easy to see that Cecil just cares about himself and does things in accordance with his own intention.
Besides,
the first sentence Cecil says to Mrs. Honeychurch more clearly shows hypocrisy existing in Cecil. When Mrs. Honeychurch exclaims, “Oh, Cecil, do tell me!”, Cecil answers “I promessi sposi,” which is the first sentence of him to the others. He uses。