《了不起的盖茨比》中的女性形象及爱情观分析.doc

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1、摘要了不起的盖茨比是美国现代小说家菲茨杰拉德的代表作，也是美国文学史上最伟大的作品之一，深受世界读者的喜爱。小说写于第一次世界大战和经济危机爆发期间，它深刻地展示了爵士时代人们迷惘、空虚的生活状态。在以男性为主导的社会中，女性不可能凭借自己的能力取得成功。小说中的女性虽有脆弱、虚伪的一面，但仍有奋力抗争、主动追求、努力实现自我价值的愿望。本文通过分析了不起的盖茨比中的不同女性形象，进而从女性主义视角解读女性的爱情观。此外，小说中所展示的爱情悲剧对现代青年人的爱情选择也具有重要的警醒与启示作用。关键词：女性形象；爱情观；女性主义；父权制社会； AbstractThe Great Gatsby i

2、s the masterpiece of Fitzgerald, a modern American novelist and is also considered as one of the greatest works in American literature which has been favored by readers all over the world. This novel is written between the World War I and the economic crisis, and it shows peoples perplexed and inane

3、 living state at Jazz Age. In the society dominated by the male, it is impossible for females to be successful. Although these females in The Great Gatsby are vulnerable, hypocritical, and unable to withstand any temptation, they still strive to achieve their aspirations and struggle to realize self

4、-value. All in all, this thesis aims at analyzing different female images and interpreting the view of love in The Great Gatsby from the perspective of feminism. In addition, the love tragedy in The Great Gatsby has played an important role in enlightening and awakening teenagers in the choice of lo

5、ve. Key words: female images; perspective of love; feminist; patriarchal society; Table of ContentsACKNOWLEDGEMENTSI摘要IIABSTRACTIIITABLE OF CONTENTSIVINTRODUCTION1PART ONE THE AUTHOR FITZGERALD AND THE GREAT GATSBY21.1 The Sketch of Fitzgerald21.2 About The Great Gatsby31.3 Literature Review4PART TW

6、O FEMALE IMAGES AND FATE IN THE GREAT GATSBY62.1 Three Female Images in the Novel62.1.1 The Image of Protagonist Daisy Buchanan62.1.2 The Image of Jordan Baker72.1.3 The Image of Myrtle Wilson82.2 Image of Feminist Closely Related to Males Attitude82.2.1 The Narrators Attitudes to Women82.2.2 The Au

7、thors Attitudes to Women92.3 Females Fate Love in Patriarchal Society10PART THREE LOVE IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF FEMINIST IN THE GREAT GATSBY123.1 Feminism and Types of Love in The Great Gatsby123.1.1 Feminist Consciousness123.1.2 The Love of Material Women133.1.3 The Love of Independent Women133.2 An A

8、nalysis on the Failure of Love in The Great Gatsby143.2.1 A Chasm between Wealth and Social Status143.2.2 Weakness in Womens Character153.2.3 The Influence of Traditional American Dream16CONCLUSION17WORKS CITED19IVIntroduction 19F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940), the famous American novelist in the 19

9、20s, is a brilliant star in the American literary world, and is known as the “poet laureate” and “Chronicle” in Jazz Age. The authors life is legendary and epic but tortuous and short. To a certain extent, Fitzgerald is considered as a cultural hero in Jazz Age. The Great Gatsby, his representative

10、work, is also regarded as an American classic.The Great Gatsby is superficially a tragic love story, but the theme of the novel is actually more than the love itself, and it has a more profound significance of the day. This story happening in Long Island is a meditation on American society in the 19

11、20s, and displays peoples living state in Jazz Age. The protagonist Gatsby is such a typical example, living in the gone past and a hopeless future. The world of Gatsby is only the reconstruction of the past whenever he lives in. Gatsby refuses to acknowledge the passing of time, fantasies in an old

12、 dream that Daisy will come to him. Meanwhile, the reason why we call him “the Great Gatsby” is not only for that he is simply advocating materialism in the materialistic society, but for that he works with all the emotions and energies. The accumulation of wealth and the ultimate goal for Gatsby is

13、 attributed to not only the ideal of the spirit, and even the courage to bear the consequences of a car crash that made by Daisy for the sake of love. Unfortunately, the dream girl Daisy is a typical “golden girl”. Beneath seemingly pure appearance hides a greedy heart. Daisy is emotionally indiffer

14、ent and morally degenerate. No wonder, it is far more than the representative of the last generation with romantic spirit. The tragedy of The Great Gatsby also exposes the dark society and human weaknesses. The hypocrisy of the social relationships has reached the peak at the end of the novel.In thi

15、s novel which reflects the American dream, the author vividly depicts the female images from different classes of the United States in the twentieth century. This thesis attempts to discuss love in The Great Gatsby from the perspective of feminism, which mainly includes four parts. The first part is

16、 an introduction of the author, the novel and its historical context, which provides a broad background for this paper. The second part gives a detailed analysis of the three women and the views of the narrator Nick and the author Fitzgerald on the fate of women in the patriarchal society. In the th

17、ird part, it gives a deep analysis on female love and the causes of the love tragedy in The Great Gatsby. And the last part makes a brief conclusion and distillation of this thesis. Part One The Author Fitzgerald and The Great GatsbyF. ScottKey Fitzgerald, a modern American writer, is one of the mos

18、t excellent novelists in American literature and has won a high evaluation and reputation in literature circle at home and abroad. The famous novel, The Great Gatsby has been adapted for movies for several times in the United States, which produces an extensive reading in the world. Furthermore, Fit

19、zgerald wrote this novel in the 1920s the period of Jazz Age flowed by excessive lust. In real life the author Fitzgerald enjoyed himself with the extravagant life and the material wealth. Hence, Fitzgeralds real life also reflects a living state of disillusionment and perplexity about the Lost Gene

20、ration in depth. 1.1 The Sketch of Fitzgerald F.ScottKeyFitzgerald, as one of the most brilliant American novelists, is an important novelist in the Lost Generation. He grew up in Minnesota, St Paul and studied at Princeton University. After the outbreak of World War, he joined the army, but he had

21、never been to Europe and was discharged in 1919. In 1920, Fitzgerald became distinguished and married a girl of the upper class for publishing of his first novel This Side of Paradise. Fitzgeralds marriage gave him an opportunity to understand and experience the life of the upper class, which made a

22、 great influence on the writing of his representative work The Great Gatsby. And the publication of this novel had laid an important position for him in the history of literature. However, Fitzgeralds fame, marriage and extravagant life made him indulge in the upper society, thus he was down and out

23、 and his health was greatly damaged. Under this sorrowful condition, the novel Tender is the Night, as well as the novel The Crack-up was written and published after his death. In order to make a living and revive his reputation, Fitzgerald moved to Hollywood and wrote script for the film company in

24、 1937. In 1940, Fitzgerald passed away at the age of 44 because of a burst of coronary heart disease and his last novel The Last Tycoon did not been completed. Although Fitzgeralds writing career lasts only twenty years, he writes a total of 4 excellent novels and more than 160 short stories. His wo

25、rks vividly reproduce the original look of the history and truly reflect the spirit and the social character of Jazz Age and also expose the emptiness behind the glitz and the illusory nature of the “American Dream” (Wu Weiren 2011). It is popular with young people from generation to generation, and

26、 gets much attention from the literary circles of all countries. As more commentators keep eyes on the affirmation of his works, Fitzgerald has been famous as a writer again. And his works have been translated into many languages and accepted by people from different cultural backgrounds. Some of hi

27、s works have been put on the Broadway stage and Hollywood movie, to promote the dissemination of these works. Some of his stories have been included in high schools textbook, and even become the classics in English Literature. Fitzgerald is really an outstanding writer (Wu Jianguo 2002). 1.2 About T

28、he Great Gatsby The Great Gatsby told a love story about a young man named Jay Gatsby. Gatsbys early sweetheart Daisy married a rich and arrogant man named Tom Buchanan. In order to attract the attention of Daisy and win back Daisys affection, Gatsby hold a grand party every night in the opposite to

29、 Daisys palatial mansion with the accumulation of wealth that was got by illegal business. Through the introduction of Daisys cousin Nick, Gatsby finally met his sweet lover Daisy again. He displayed his gorgeous mansion and wealth to Daisy to re-capture the love of Daisy and try to evoke the romant

30、ic past. However, the tragedy occurred at that time. Daisy killed Toms lover Myrtle who was a garage owners wife by chance and everything changed. Gatsby loved Daisy so deep that he did not tell anyone the truth. Unfortunately, the garage boss Wilson considered Gatsby as the murderer who killed his

31、wife and killed Gatsby by the misleading of Tom. Nick was full of sympathy for Gatsby and held a funeral for Gatsby alone, but no one attended. Daisy and Tom also disappeared from the city. At the end of the story, Nick returned to a quiet life in Minnesota where people still respected the tradition

32、al values. The Great Gatsby was written in the period of the Lost Generation which was one of literary schools and composed of a generation of young American writers growing up during 1920s. Most of the members had experienced the World War, which left some wounds to their bodies and souls, so the m

33、ajority of them were terribly dissatisfied with the reality of society and became an unprecedentedly lost generation in American society. The Lost Generation has a strong desire for money and the lavish profligacy of the upper class which could be seen from the gorgeous party in The Great Gatsby. Du

34、ring this particular epoch, Fitzgerald and Hemingway were two outstanding talented novelists in the American literature. They were the excellent leaders and outstanding representatives of the Lost Generation. What is more, Fitzgerald referred to the period of 1920s in the United States as Jazz Age.

35、Jazz Age was a short period in the history of the United States with the prosperous economy as the background. It was full of money, fame and huge crisis. The whole society was showing the trend of the tragedy. Fitzgerald put his experience with his wife Zelda Sayre into The Great Gatsby to restore

36、the reality of Jazz Age which was filled with a luxury surface and the empty soul (Li Xin 78-80). With his keen observation, Fitzgerald elucidated the interactions of young people of post-World Warand put forward the concept of Jazz Age for the first time. 1.3 Literature Review According to the data

37、 collected from the Internet at present, the research of Fitzgerald in foreign countries has achieved a fairly high level and made some fruitful results whether in the scope of the study or the depth of research. However, the comments on Fitzgeralds works are not entirely positive. The criticism of

38、his works has also experienced the evolution from snub to hot pursuit. The rise of “the Fitzgerald Renaissance” in the 1940s and 1950s made Fitzgerald popular once again and his literary status was further improved. In the 1940s and 1970s, the foreign studies were mainly about Fitzgeralds life or th

39、e overall analysis of his works, and emerged a large numbers of biographies of Fitzgerald. In the 1980s, it was the period of the in-depth study of Fitzgerald. The research of Fitzgerald focused on three aspects at that time: the biography of Fitzgerald, the novels written by Fitzgerald and the film

40、s adapted from Fitzgeralds works. By 1996, on the occasion of the 100 anniversary of the birth of Fitzgerald, the study of his works reached a climax. Many critics actively analyzed Fitzgeralds works with all kinds of new theories, including structuralism, post structuralism, postmodernism and so on

41、, among which feminism, psychoanalysis and narrative theory were applied more frequently. The acceptance of Fitzgerald in China has gone through a procedure from negation to acceptance and then to affirmation. There is no doubt that the process was long and difficult. In the 1980s, the field of lite

42、rary translation in China did not paid enough attention to the works of Fitzgerald, which limited the translation and dissemination of his works in China. With the policy of reform and opening-up, the situation has been improved enormously. In particular, the professor Wu Ningkun translated and publ

43、ished Fitzgeralds masterpiece The Great Gatsby in 1983. Generally speaking, the academic study of Fitzgeralds works at present is not comprehensive and systematic both in depth and breadth, and far less than the research on Hemingway, Faulkner and other American writers. In addition, the focus of Fi

44、tzgeralds works is also limited to the novel The Great Gatsby and Tender is the Night. People pay less attention on his letters, autobiography and other works. What is more, the documented cases about The Great Gatsby on the Internet have reached about 1227. However, there were only a handful of pub

45、lished articles in the last century. Entering the twenty-first century, the number of the studies on The Great Gatsby has been soaring. Especially after 2008, the study on The Great Gatsby is developing faster and faster, and even the annual number of papers has been more than 100 articles. And in 2

46、013, the papers about The Great Gatsby have reached more than 370. Nevertheless, the studies on the interpretation of female imagines and love in The Great Gatsby from the perspective of feminist have been found little in China. Most of researcher only analyze female images, or just mention the conc

47、ept of love, and few people explore love from the perspective of feminist in The Great Gatsby. This thesis serves to open another window for the research of The Great Gatsby and try to bring a new light on the study of the fiction. Part Two Female Images and Fate in The Great Gatsby2.1 Three Female

48、Images in the Novel In The Great Gatsby, the author Fitzgerald vividly depicts the female images in different classes of the United States in 20th Century, such as, Daisy upper class; Jordan middle class; Myrtle lower classes. There is no doubt that a lot of papers have described the three major fem

49、ales in The Great Gatsby as false, selfish and merciless (Chen Xuhong 2005). However, we should pay attention to the reality of females in this novel who lived under the oppression of the patriarchal society. It is hard to understand and comprehend the real love of the female, not to mention an interpretation of love from the perspective of female. As we all know, The Great Gatsbyis narrate