关于大卫科波菲尔中的人物形象英语论文-范本.doc

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1、西安石油大学外语系本科论文 An Analysis of Image in David CopperfieldChapter 1IntroductionDavid Copperfield was the masterpiece of Dickens; it was his unremittingly efforts up to the longest of a semi-autobiographical work, in May 1849 to November 1850 installment was published. In the preface, Dickens said: In a

2、ll my works, my favorite in this department. . It is my favorite child. This paper began with a brief introduction of the author and the social background, and then it tried to analyze the novel. Thus the author paved the way for the following analysis, then it came to the essential part of the pape

3、rthe analysis of image in David, Dora, Davids great-aunt, Mr.Micawber, and Steerforth, The Mr. Murdstones, Heep. Next, the essay came to the authors impact on the two figures in order to make readers know more about the novel and the author. Finally, the author attempted to analyze different peoples

4、 image and show peoples different destinies. The paper wanted to tell people that maybe fate is unfair to you, so that you are suffering from human sufferings, but you cannot do anything without the goodness of heart and you must fight for your own destiny. And stressed: only love can give courage t

5、o face the misery and suffering.David and Steerforth were two different images that have great differences. Such as kind-hearted fisherman Peggotty and David, despite a poor family, didnt receive education, but to hold an honest and good heart, while rich Steerforth was an invalid character in stark

6、 contrast.At the same time, it reflected Dickens own morality: What goes around comes around. Such as a symbol of evil Heap and Steerforth has been duly punished; kind-hearted people have found a popular destination that they were dreamed to come all the time. 1.1 The introduction to the authorDicke

7、ns was the main representative of realism literature of the 19th century. The art of witty words, nuanced psychological analysis and realism were combined together closely. He was particularly famous for his vivid comic characterizations and social criticism. He was the first author who had written

8、of the poor with fidelity and sympathy. His works were famous during novels of the Victorian age and among the great classics in all fiction. Dickens was born in February, 1812, at Landport, Portsmouth. He was the second of eight children. His father was a clerk, hardworking but imprudent, later car

9、icatured as Mr. Micawber in David Copperfield. In 1822, the family moved to London, where Charles had to leave school to help support his impoverished family. In 1824, his father was put into prison for debt. At the age of 12, Dickens was sent to going to work at a factory. He wrapped and labeled fo

10、r 6 shillings a week. After work, he wandered through the streets of London, enthralled by the sight of the dockyards, the files of convicts, and vast sections of the city inhabited by the poor. These bitter days remained in his memory and later found expression in his works. Dickens was able to ret

11、urn to school after a small legacy helped release his father from prison. He was an avid reader and spent much time in the reading room of the British Museum and learnt short-hand. Although he later returned to school for a time, this experience left a permanent mark on the soul of Charles Dickens.

12、Even many years later, after he had become a successful author, he could not bear to talk about it, or be reminded of his familys ignominy.At the age of fifteen Dickens began working as an office boy for a law firm. He taught himself and by 1828 he became a reporter for courts of Doctors Common. The

13、 dull routine of the legal profession never interested him, so he became a newspaper reporter for the Mirror of parliament, the True Sun, and finally for the Morning Chronicle.(John Forster, were later his closest friend and biographer, was also employed at the True Sun.) By the age of twenty, Dicke

14、ns was one of the best parliamentary reporters in all England. During this same period Dickenss interest began to switch from journalism to literature. His first work of fiction, “Dinner at Poplar Walk”(later reprinted as “Mr. Minns and His Cousin”), appeared in the Monthly Magazine when he was twen

15、ty-one. His newspaper work had given him an intimate knowledge of the streets and by ways of London, and late in 1832 he began writing sketches and stories of London life. They began to appear in periodicals and newspapers in 1833 and in 1836 were gathered together as sketches by Boz, Illustrations

16、of Everyday life, and Everyday People. By this time, Dickens was enjoying the luxurious life he had dreamed of as a child. In 1850, he published the last installments of David Copperfield, a partly autobiographical novel that was his favorite. In 1858 Dickenss twenty-three-year marriage to Catherine

17、 Hogarth dissolved when he fell in love with Ellen Ternan, a young actress. The the last years of his life were filled with intense activities: writing, taking part in management, and undertaking tours that reinforced the publics favorable view of his work, which took an enormous toll on his health.

18、 Working feverishly to the last, Dickens collapsed and died on June 8, 1870, leaving The Mystery of Edwin Drood uncompleted.1.2 The introduction to the background1.2.1 Social Background Like so many parents I have in my heart of hearts a favorite child, wrote Charles Dickens. And his name is David C

19、opperfield. Here Dickens made good use of his own life experience to attack the social evils of the time, the miseries of child-labour, the tyranny in schools, the debtors prison, as well as the cruelty and immortality and the treachery that were prevalent in Victorian England. Thus the novel was no

20、t merely a personal record, but a broad picture of the society of the authors day.David Copperfield (also called The Personal History and Experience of David Copperfield the Younger), was published in monthly installments between 5. 1849 and 11. 1850. An edition was published near the end of 1850. D

21、avid Copperfield was a novel written in first-person point of view. It was sometimes referred to as an apprenticeship novel because it centered on the period in which a young person grows upthat is, serves his apprenticeship. The type of novel was pioneered by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

22、in his novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre (Wilhelm Meisters Apprenticeship). An apprenticeship novel could also be identified by its German name, meaning novel (roman) of educational development (buildings). Dickens based the book in part on the difficult early years of his own life. The narration cha

23、nged names, locales, and other details of Dickenss life but maintained its general tenor. For example, when Dickens was only a child, he had to leave school to work in a factory that polished some shoes. In the novel, David Copperfield has to leave school to work in a warehouse washing and labeling

24、bottles used in the wine trade. Davids initials (D.C.) were, of course, the reverse of Dickenss (C.D.). Dickens was a master at drawing memorable characters. Some were simple and uncomplicated, like Barkis, Creakle, Murdstone, and Clara Peggotty. Others were complex, like David Copperfield. Througho

25、ut the novel, he befriended the wealthy and charming James Steerforth, ignoring his devious and malevolent side. At the same time, he befriended the good-hearted Tommy Traddles and the humble Peggottys. These two worldsthe world of Steerforth and the world of the people Steerforth and his family loo

26、k down uponboth attract David, and part of his maturation was deciding what should constitute his own world. To bring his characters to life, Dickens invested them with clearly defining virtues or vices and describing the characters in a way that enabled the reader to picture them and the scenes in

27、which they appear.1.2.2 Novels BackgroundOf all the Dickens novels, David Copperfield reflects the events of Dickens own life the most. Davids early suffering was adequately compensated with a rich, happy marriage and a successful literary career, just like Dickens himself, and the world is still fu

28、ll of hope and sunshine. The plot construction was rather loose, but it also excelled in its vivid characterization. The novels detailed narration was also worth mentioning, which gave the work a truthfulness to the real life.The early success with the public not only gave Dickens an assurance that

29、led to increased powers of poetic expression and narrative technique, but also the confidence to assert his thematic priorities to a point where they contradicted the social assumptions of many of his readers. All his later novels, except A Tale of Two Cities, present a criticism of the most fundame

30、ntal institutions of the Victorian England.Although David was ignorant of Steerforths treachery, we were aware from the moment we met Steerforth that he didnt deserve of praise which David feels toward him. David didnt know why he hated Heep or why he trusted a boy with a donkey cart who stole his m

31、oney and left him in the road, but it was possible for him to realize Heeps inherent evil and the boys real intention. In Davids first-person narration, Dickens conveyed the wisdom of the older man implicitly, through the eyes of a child.The novel began in the early 19th Century (presumably in 1812,

32、 the year of Dickenss birth) in Blunderstone, a fictional name for a real town, Blundeston, which Dickens visited. It was in eastern England in the county of Suffolk. Other cities in which action was set were London, Canterbury, Yarmouth, Dover, and Highgate, suburbs of London. Near the end of the n

33、ovel, David visited Switzerland, and the Peggottys and Micawbers traveled to Australia. (However, neither the Swiss nor the Australian locales actually appeared in the novel.).Somewhere about the middle of the serial publication of David Copperfield, happening to be out of writing-paper, he sallied

34、forth one morning to get a fresh supply at the stationers. He was living then in his favorite haunt, at Fort House, in Broadstairs. As he was about to entering the stationers shop, with the intention of buying the needful writing-paper, for the purpose of returning home with it, and at once setting

35、to work upon his next number, not one word of which was yet written, he stood aside for a moment at the threshold to allow a lady to pass in before him. When it was handed by her, Oh, said she, I have read. I want next one. Next one she was thereupon told would be out by the end of the month. Listen

36、ing to this, he added, in conclusion, knowing the purpose for which I was there, and remembering that not one word of the number she was asking for was yet written, for the first and only time in my life, I feltfrightened! (Kent, Charles Dickens as a Reader, pp. 45-46). Many of his novels, particula

37、rly the later ones, required meticulously plotting in advance, but David Copperfield unfolds relatively simplyperhaps because it relied in part on events of Dickenss own experience, with which he was naturally familiar, but also because its first-person voice dictated an omniscient third-person narr

38、ator, and coincidences characters, could provide. In his next novel, Bleak House, Dickens would combine these approaches in two distinct narrative strands; the result is a structurally complex work whose denouement links an aristocrat with the lowliest of street-sweepers and touches on every social

39、class between. But the world of David Copperfield, with the exception of the scene of Davids birth (the facts of which he relays on good authority of eyewitnesses), is limited to Davids own recollections of events in which he plays a part, and the fabric of society is likewise limited to Davids pers

40、onal acquaintance. Chapter 22. Literature Review of the Novel2.1 Some scholars views on the novel Scholars believe that David Copperfields careers, friendships, and love life were most highly influenced by Dickens experiences, as well as his time working as a child. Davids involvement with the law p

41、rofession and later his career as a writer mirror the experiences of Dickens. Many of Davids friends are based on people Dickens actually knew, and Davids wives, Agnes Wickfield and Dora, are believed to be based upon Dickens attachment to Mary Hogarth. Dickens keenly felt his lack of education duri

42、ng his time at that factory, and according to the Forster biography, it was from these times that he drew Davids working period.British writer Somerset Maugham as truly a masterpiece of literary works.One of American literature connoisseurs recommends one hundreds of the 20th century, distinguishing

43、 English novel.David Copperfield is filled with characters of the most astonishing variety, vividness, and originality, noted Somerset Maugham. They are not realistic and yet they abound with life. There never were such people as the Micawbers, Pegotty and Barkis, Traddles, Betsey Trotwood and Mr. D

44、ick, Uriah Heep and his mother. The story is told almost entirely from the point of view of the first person narrator, David Copperfield himself, and was the first Dickens novel to do so.Dickens based the book in part on the difficult early years of his own life.2.2 Main Views of Dickens ideaInfluen

45、ced by Carlyle, Dickens learned, as did his literary contemporaries, to direct his fiction to a questioning of social priorities and inequalities, to a distrust of institutions, particularly defunct or malfunctioning ones, and to a pressing appeal for action and earnestness. He was prone to take up

46、issues, and to campaign against what he saw as injustice or desuetude, using fiction as his vehicle. He was not alone in this in his own time, but his name continues to be popularly associated with good causes and with remedies for social abuses because he was quite the wittiest, and he have had the

47、 most persuasive, and the most influential voice. Dickens was faithful to the teaching, and to the general theological framework, of Christianity as a moral basis for his thought, his action and above all, for his writing, nevertheless. A critical awareness that there was something deeply wrong with

48、 the society in which he lived sharpened the nature of his fiction and gave it its distinct political edge. Dickens novels are multifarious, digressive and humorous. In an important way, they reflect the nature of Victorian urban society with all its conflicts and disharmonies, its eccentricities an

49、d its constrictions, its energy and its extraordinary fertility, both physical and intellectual. But the standard pattern in his novels is the basic conflict between money on the one hand, and loves on the other. What this conflict usually reveals is that the people who have greatest love for their fellow humans are also the ones who are most hurt by the world of