简奥斯汀小说中的反讽艺术

Irony in Jane Austen’s Novels
by
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December, 2009
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Abstract
Irony is an important feature of Jane Austen’s Novels, and is also the cornerstone of creation. It is used in the expressing of theme, characterization and plot development vividly and incisively. And it has its own distinct characteristics. This thesis aims to discuss the classification of irony, the use of irony in Jane Austen’s novels and function of irony from three aspects, namely the expressing of theme, characterization and plot development. Irony in Jane Austen’s novels is more than a stylistic device. Jane Austen criticizes the money-oriented attitude to life and marriage by use of irony.
Key words: Jane Austen, Irony, Verbal Irony, Situational Irony, Structural Irony, Model Irony
论简·奥斯汀小说中的反讽艺术
摘要
反讽是简·奥斯汀小说的重要特色，也是她创作的基石。

在表现主题、塑造人物和情节发展中反讽都运用得淋漓尽致，并有其鲜明的个性特色。

本文阐述了反讽的类别，及其在简·奥斯汀小说的表现，以及它们在表现主题，塑造人物，组织情节和语言上的作用。

关键词：简·奥斯汀；反讽；言语反讽；情景反讽；结构反讽；模式反讽
Contents
1 INTRODUCTION ..................................... 错误!未定义书签。

2 DEFINITIONS OF IRONY ............................. 错误!未定义书签。

T HE CONCEPT OF IRONY................................. 错误!未定义书签。

T HE CLASSIFICATION OF IRONY ........................... 错误!未定义书签。

Verbal Irony ................................... 错误!未定义书签。

Situational Irony .............................. 错误!未定义书签。

Structural Irony ............................... 错误!未定义书签。

Model Irony .................................... 错误!未定义书签。

3 THE FUNCTION OF IRONY ............................ 错误!未定义书签。

T O PERFORMANCE THE THEME.............................. 错误!未定义书签。

T O SHAPE CHARACTERS.................................. 错误!未定义书签。

The irony of flat figures (6)
The irony of round figures ..................... 错误!未定义书签。

T O ORGANISE THE PLOT AND LANGUAGE....................... 错误!未定义书签。

4 CONCLUSION ....................................... 错误!未定义书签。

BIBLIOGRAPHY ....................................... 错误!未定义书签。

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................... 错误!未定义书签。

1 Introduction
The end of 18 and beginning of 19 centry is the era of growth and development of women writers. Jane Austen is so long-lasting that she occupies an important position in English literary history, She inherited the Irony tradition of European literature. Her novels describe everyday life with her unique style. She makes irony, as a device used in novels, more concisely and maturer. She creats six novels, Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Persuasion, Northanger Abbey, Mansfield park, and Emma. Her masterpiece---“pride and prejudice” has been listed in the most famous novels of world’s top ten. All of these had become models of pure English.
Researching Austen's novel can improve our English and deepen our understanding of the Westernworld. In this world of accelerated globalization, we are very beneficial for researching Jane Austen .
The irony is the most commonly used method of Jane Austen. By studying Jane Austen’s novel, we can understand the social patterns and people’s values of marriage. Jane Austen, as one of the United Kingdom's most famous writers in modern times, the humanistic Western society, customs and the spirit reflected in her novels is worth studying.
2 Definitions of irony
The concept of irony
Irony is one of the most common Micro-rhetorical skills. It’s the
skill which allegory people or things from the opposite side, or by using ironic words. But the real mean is hidden in the lines. And the reader also can understand. Since we can narrative plot, shape characters, show the author's emotional attitude by using irony, people draw attention to this technique. Though the words seems small, the topic is profound, powerful and meaningful .
The classification of irony
As a literary technique, irony can be divided into Verbal Irony, Situational Irony, Structural Irony, Model Irony by YangJun. We can see that irony is one of the main means of artistic in Jane Austen’s novels and is also a principal way to comprehend the world.
Verbal Irony
Verbal Irony contains a metaphor meaning. The speaker's remarks on the surface are usually contrary to real meaning. The author's true intentions are inclued, we can get it easy. This ironic statement can express an attitude or evaluation of the speaker. However it implicit the different even oppsite attitude or evaluation. Verbal Irony is reflected in the surface of language, used in fic tion’s narrative, description, and dialogue. By using irony, the auther can stimulate the reader's imagination. It’s implicit rhetoric.
For example, in the novel Emma, the Verbal Irony is abound, when we read the novel at the first time, we can find that the irony is widely used.
“Emma Woodhouse, ,and rich,with a comortable home and a happy disposition ,seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence ;and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little ti distress or vex her .”
At the beginning of the novel, Jane Austen uses the adjectives which are of broad and unclear meanings, such as “clever”, “handsome” and so on. These broad and unclear word also are used in Jane Austen‘s other novels,Northanger Abbey, Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice. These words not only can describe the roles’ character truly, but hint that clever people may be victims of their own cleverness.
Jane Austen uses those words to discribe Emma, and this means that it is a story of “Clever people may be victims of their own cleverness”. Besides , the writer uses “seem”, this hint the fact is not like this case. And her life is too good to be unbelive. As expected, next paragraph is that she's fly in the ointment ---her wayward. Estimates of their own highly . In the pride and prejudice, “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man inpossession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife”. In the famous opening sentence, the author gives a hint of irony. In her description of the society, parents are always taking money as the standard when looking for their daughter's husband. Therefore, this work is the model for both Structure Irony and verbal Irony.
Situational Irony
Situational Irony, extends to the novel the scene and circumstances
of a relatively independent from the language level. In the Situational Irony, the writer and readers understand the present or the future development of the situation, yet the people in the novels are unaware, so they do what incompatible with the actual situation and things go contrary to their wishes. In other words, Situational Irony, is the p lot’s development or character’s idea in the novel runs counter to other side. Or even contrary to the expectation of the readers. And the atmosphere is disharmonious with character's inner flow. Both of them formed a great contrast.
In Jane Austen's novels, most of the heroine have the same weaknesses:"divorced from reality, the reality of imagination is too romantic and legendary , imagine people, according to their own aesthetic standard”, and this is all Jane Austen heroine s “sin”. In the novel Emma, Emma is not a exception. And perhaps her imagination is the most active. With Jenny Fairfax and Frank Churchill have returned to Highbury, her imagination has been activated. At this time, readers can think her as the object of situational irony and have fun. In accordance with the heaviest principle in Germany·Ke·muker’s definition of Situational I rony that "The target of irony are unknown or ignored.”The other things except the present thing to put it simply, the reason why we feel that a situation is an ironic sense, because someone think it is a very ignorant. Emma is such an irony object. When she is flirting with Frank; when she and Frank laugh at Jane Fairfax, make joking and ridicule, she has never
thought of she is actually the object and victim of irony in this situation .Even the reader is also kept in the dark. For suspense of this part of the story, the authors try to keep readers aren’t aware of Frank and Jenny's marriage and who give Jenny the piano. When the readers read at the second time, they can find the tension of a dramatic irony after the mystery is exposed, learn Emma prepare an abyss of erro for herself, even those who first reading will be able to identify the secrets of Churchill, who also particularly feel the effect of irony. When Emma and Frank is together, her naive and ignorant are even more impressive. Because Frank is “the only person who can outguess Emma” in the story and also "conceit ed, a small smart. like her’. But he beat her, in her own game, because he is not self-deception like her. Heroine was manipulated for the first time in the story by an even better person in the. In Pride and Prejudic e, at first, Elizabeth, was with a strong prejudice of Darcy, so when Darcy proposed to her with arrogant rhetoric for the first time , Elizabeth rejected him firmly. When read at this point, readers are still doubt the possibility of their combining, but they overcome their own arrogance and prejudice to become a pair of well-being, which is a typical Situational Irony.
Structural Irony
Structural Irony is to introduce a double meaning, to contain the structural features of the whole work. Which starting from the overall structure of the novel. Common technique of Structural Irony is to creat
a naive protagonist or an unnormal narrator. Their naive always lead them to make a variety of simple or strange interpretation of many things . Readers understand the author's satirical intent and thus be able to get a different evaluation ,while the parties concerned do not know.
In Emma , Emma first imagined frustratedly because she misjudged the intentions of Mr. Elton and she had specially strong control of Harriet. In this section, the authors use the Structure Irony mainly. According to the definition of Man·He·Abrams(MH Abrams), Structure Irony is to create “a pure (female) protagonist, or a simple narrator, (her) his simple-minded can’t overcome or a stupid cause (she) he is stubborn.”While the reader is able to realize the truth and can share the author's point of view behind the simple figure and follow the author’s request to correct the error of this figure. Structural Irony depends on that readers can share the author's satirical intention. In fact, the author’s practicing of this irony is giving a compliment of reader's intelligence. The key of Structural Irony is to create a simple and dull hero or heroine. Readers and writers would share the truth at the same time. Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever and rich, with a comortable home and a happy disposition, was spoiled by a loving and indulgent father and a docile and obedient female family teachers. Despite her cheerful disposition, she is stubborn, and always indulged by imagination. Her most fundamental characteristic is that "only trust her own judgments”, She handled matters completely according to the imagination and speculation, so “she often explained
things with wrong inference. ” As a result of his father and the family teacher’s overi ndulgence, Emma cultivated a habit of control others. Therefore, after Miss Taylor (the female Family teachers) got married, she need to control and patronize people. And that is why she choose Harriet Smith as her companion. Harriet is the kind of peole Emma likes patronizing, because she is tempered and not calculating, moreover she is “ignorant”. In addition, she is negligible. At least Emma’s vanity can be satisfied, because she can enjoy a sense of superiority by transforming Harriet. As said, "when in the favors of others, she also raised her own status at the same time.
Model Irony
Model Irony is reflected by comparing with other fictions, is to smash the old model of f iction’s genre, character, structure, plot ect. Model Irony creates a different novel model to satirize the old mode.
In the history of women writers’ literature, Jane Austen made a pioneering effort to the lierature. Her novel Pride and Prejudice completed the oversteping of narrative’s mode of the literary by the construction of omnidirectional narrative pattern. In the 18 century to the early 19th century, English literature is full of vulgar, silly sentimental novel and the Gothic novel. and Austen brought new ideas forth for her novels. Her novels comes out the daily life of the British rural middle classes and the rural scenery without the impact of the capitalist industrial revolution. Her works, often mock people's stupidity,
selfishness, snobbery and blind self-confidence, contemptible weakness ridiculous through the comic scenes. Austen's novels appeared in the early 19th century. She swept away the popular pseudo-romantic trend of that moment, inherited and developed the good tradition of British 18th-century realist and prepared for the climax of the 19th-century realist novel. Although reflection of the breadth and depth in her work is limited, her works reflects the whole social formation and the ways of the world from a small window such as“two inche s ivory". And she played a good role of changing the vulgar culture of creation. She is the nexus in the history of the novel in British and is known as a writer on an equal footing with Shakespeare.
3 The function of irony
The function of irony is performance the theme 2. To shape characters 3. In order to organize the plot and words.
To performance the theme
In Pride and Prejudice, Austen criticized the single-minded pursuit of money and status of marriage in the society at that time by using irony. At the openning of the novel, the writer contrast the theme by using Verbal Irony. The first paragraph of the novel, “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.” T his sentence seems to be a description of the facts and may arise the readers’ think widely. However, she immediately said
that “However the little feelings or views of such a man may be known when his first entering a neighbourhood, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families, that he is considered the rightful proper ty of some one or other of their daughters”. The beginning insinuated Mrs. Bennett has been trying to marry her five pretty daughters to the rich. So it is not a rich bachelor have to marry a wife, but single daughter have to marry a man with industry.
The whole process is full of situational irony, Darcy and Elizabeth’s marriage is the most successful marriage combination in the novel. At first they didn’t like each other at all, but they attracted each other and later loved each other and marriaged at last. In the 19th century, hero and heroine are perfect in the traditional romance novels, they usually fall in love at first sight. Yet in Pride and Prejudice arrangement is opposite. A certain extent, this model is the irony to a traditional novels’mode in the 19th century. Darcy appeared as a handsome, rich man, but was known as an arrogant, indifferent and unpolite guy. when he met Elizabeth in the ball for the first time, he insulted her, so it lead to the girl’s extreme antipathy. However, after meeting again and again, he was atrracted by Elizabeth’s astute and wit, and fell in love with her.
After the long repression, Darcy finally proposed marriage to Elizabeth, even though Elizabeth's status is low and her family is not so good.
However, this marriage proposal was refused by the girl, This scenario arrangement, the outcome of rejected is the irony to good match concept of marriage in the upper classes of society.
At first, Elizabeth thought Darcy with a strong prejudice, so when he proposed to her for the first time, Elizabeth firmly rejected him, and claimed that she was much unwilling to marry such a person like Darcy in the world. When we read at this point, all readers is still doubt the possibility of the combining of them. They overcome their own arrogance and prejudice to become a pair of well-being. This is a typical scenario irony. But in any case, such an arrangement is the same as the beginning of the novel, the theme is the money and the status is still the basic of the marriage. Although Elizabeth refused Darcy beause of her own prejudice and emotion, but in the end she was married to the single people of wealth and status.
In the Pride and Prejudice, the four marriages, four types of marriages, all have happy endings. When we laugh, we could also see the writer how to criticize the real face of of the bourgeois marriage.
To shape characters
E·W·Foster divide d the novels’ characters into flat figures and the round figures according to a single-system and multi-faceted of character. Jane Austen extensively used Verbal Irony and Situational Irony, When she shaped these two types of people.
The irony of flat figures
The flat figures are the persons who are relatively simple, and sneered at by the narrator. They are minor character. In the "Pride and Prejudice", the most typical “flat people” is Mrs. Bennet and Collins.
The irony of Mrs. Bennet, is Mrs. Bennet is a poor intelligence, moody woman”. The business of her life was to get her daughters married, visiting and asking about news”. In t he novel’s first chapter, when Mrs. Bennet and Mr. Bennet talk about Mr. Bingley, she had some wonderful performances. The words of the bennets are root in the opening words---It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”Mr. Bennet disagreed the truth of this article about the “man of large fortune”---Bingley. It seemed noboby care what he thinks in the final analysis .That was just wishful thinking of Mrs. Bennet.
She talked to her husband about the news of the arrival of Mr. Bingley fluently and endlessly. She couldn’t say something about irony and aphorism, her words usually are long and she always shout emotionally. This is the mental, deficient, temperamental, Mrs. Bennet's conversation.
There were many wonderful performances. when Lydia and Wickham eloped , she worried about her daughter's whereabouts and no new wedding dress for marriage, these two kinds of feelings were intertwined. They Turned to torture her. After Elizabeth refusing Collins's proposal of marriage, “man of large fortune” was robbed by Lucas instantly in the neighboring villages, Mrs. Bennet fell ill --- at least she thought she was ill. She
was not so much worried about her daughter, but her own Frustration. At that time, sister-in-law’s visit made her happy. In her own words, You come just in time, give me great comfort, I like to hear you speak of those long sleeves fashionable news. This is Mrs Bennet, a woman who is clumsy and looked funny.
Anther flat fingure is Mr. Collins. When he had not yet appeared, he had been disclosed in the letter to be a philistine man. That clumsy, cumbersome but pretentious writing style betrayed him. He showed his own self-conceited, narrow-minded, stupid vividly, when he said his first word. He was condescending, like charity benefactor and declared he was ready to marry a daughter of the Bennet, so as to compensate the damage of his inheritance of their property. He first set the goal to Jane. After Mrs bennet’s hint, he chose Elizabeth as his marriage partners.
When Collins proposed marriage to Elizabeth, what he said is pious and orderly like reading the sermon. It seemed to be particularly tedious and distasteful. The most ironic thing is meet Mrs. Bennet when out of the living room. Althought Elizabeth refused him very clearly. Collins thought it was “This is nothing but paying lip service as usual”. Mrs. Bennet was unimaginable her daughter dare to negative the “truth universally acknowledged,” a nd refused the suitor. So the two stubborn fool congratulated each other. Thus Austen used many Verbal Irony and Situational Irony, combined with exaggerated comic style to shape these two “flat people”.
The characters fooled themseves. They are very funny and despised.
The irony of round figures
The irony of the round figures refer to the hero and heroine in the novel. It needed more complicated and profound things to shaping their character. Shaping the character often run through the whole story, so when we analysis, we should based on the entire novel. And we can be accurate on Austen's use of irony skills to shape the protagonist of the novel, but sometimes not so direct and obvious. The way of shaping round finguer is different from the flat finguer. The character is to show the quirks, illusion, self-contradictory of characters. By the use of irony, f igure’s character at different stages contrast. From composite irony, we can come to understand the process of character development.
Elizabeth is Jane Auste n ‘s favorite character. she was given a lot of irony by the writer. Elizabeth is undoubtedly the most outstanding figures in the book.
Compared with her sisters, she was more intelligent, lively, and generous. Compared with the snobbish Miss Bingley, she has human dignity, spiritual superiority. In her world, that is full of fools, she is the only one who is “reasonable person”.
Nevertheless, she also failed to avoid the impact of the truth which universally acknowledged. And she took part in Mr Bingley’s ball unconsciously, was snubed by Darcy. So that was a mockery of her. She strongly retaliated Darcy, gained the personality, showed her personality,
it seemed that she was very sharp, but she was cheated by Wickham, and believed what he said, was fascinated by his hospitality and grace. The results is she was fooled by him. This undoubtedly exposed her narrow-mindedness and liking to hear flattery.
When she refused Darcy’s courtship, she criticized him plausibly, this behavior was ridiculous and unwitting. This satirized her prejudice. Then, she overcome her prejudice after reading Darcy’s letter. She was ashamed and sorry, after the trip to Pemberley she realized she was stereotypes, ridiculous, and admiring Darcy. Lidiya’s elopement made her hopoless on the love. Mrs. De Bauer’s obstructio is a false alarm to her love. At last. Darcy proposed marriage again. After they knew each other’s love ,she removed her prejudice and enjoyed love. This course is irony that how hard the reasonable person remove her prejudice.
The writer used irony in characterization of fingure, and made mockery of Elizabeth. For she was unaware of herself and other persons. All of the irony revealed her intellectuality and prejudice in the different aspects of the change of her character. Form the ironic contrast in short, character’s change in later stages compared character in the previous stage is ironic contrast. And this showed the character’s update, which toward a higher consciousness level.
To sum up, she shaped characters whether it was flat character or round character, with plentiful irony skills. Even more valuable, she not only showed the character of the novel features, but also profoundly revealed
the process of development of character by the skillfully use of irony.
To organise the plot and language
In the Pride and Prejudice, the plot is consist of a series of dramatic scenes. In the novel, Irony is ubiquitous. It is hiden in the plots and scenes. As the basic unit of the plot, the main scene is countless balls, mang banquet and card games, a lot of walks and so on. What make up these scenes is not landscape and characteristics of figures, but their dialogues. The plots have become a collection of dialogue, the writer hided bebind the fingures, and she let characters to talk free. And irony is hidden in the dialogue. Jane Austen expressed her irony through the dialogues. Elizabeth and Collins, Darcy, Catherine’s dialogue constitutes the backbone of the plot. The plot is a concentrated expression of irony.
4 Conclusion
Irony runs through Jane Austen’s six novels, which is the most prominent and most beautiful artistic feature and distinguishes her from other writers. She is good at using humor, and sarcastic details to portray a true British town life. Her works vividly depict a small world, consisting of country gentleman, dude, wealthy ladies, housewives, and other rural residents.
Through her novels, not only can we see the tone of innuendo and mockery of sarcastic language, but also she consciously uses irony as a means in shaping the characters, arranging plot and showing various aspects of the theme. Irony is cozy carrier of Auste n’s understanding and evaluation of life. It is also her typical feature. Irony reflects the Jane Austen’s ideas. Jane attacks the values of marriage, life in the the capitalist society.
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Acknowledgements
My deepest gratitude goes first and foremost to Professor Zheng , my supervisor, for her constant encouragement and guidance. She has walked me through all the stages of the writing of this thesis. Without her consistent and illuminating instruction, this thesis could not have reached its present form.
And then my thanks would go to my beloved family for their loving considerations and great confidence in me all through these years. I also owe my sincere gratitude to my friends and my fellow classmates who gave me their help and time in listening to me and helping me work out my problems during the difficult course of the thesis.。