The Attitude of Modern Women Towards Life from Pride and Prejudice 英语专业毕业论文.doc

the attitude of modern women towards life from pride and prejudiceabstractpride and prejudice has always been regarded as one of the most classic love stories in british literature. the protagonist of this masterpiece elizabeth, her sisters and friends marriages have always been the topic of its critics, audiences and readers. in regard of their marriage there had been many disputes. some hold the point of view that their marriage helped them to know more about life and made them know how to pursue happy life, while others think that they were trying to keep away from poverty by marriage. this article attempts to keep apart from the sights about marriages and help readers analyze this novel from the perspective of feminism to shed some new light on it. this thesis also tries to reveal the outlook of modern women towards life through analysis of the protagonist of pride and prejudiceelizabeth and her sisters and friends different attitudes in several aspects toward life. the main points of this article are focused on some of the main female characters attitudes towards marriage and marriage life, family and family life, and attitudes towards money and education, and also the positive attitudes towards difficulties .and the most important one is the positive attitude of modern women towards life and their courage when they face difficulties and the challenges of reality.keywords：female independent life attitude difficulty pride and prejudice摘要傲慢与偏见历来都被认为是英国文学史上经典的爱情小说之一。这部闻名遐迩的小说的主人公伊丽莎白以及其姐妹和朋友的婚姻始终是评论家、观众及读者评论、争议的对象。关于她们的婚姻，人们众说纷纭，争议颇多。有人认为是婚姻让她们更加懂得了生活，并懂得了如何去追求幸福生活；也有人认为她们只是在单纯的追求以婚姻来摆脱自己的困境。这篇论文主要试图撇开大众的婚姻意识说法，从女性主义角度解读傲慢与偏见并赋予其新的观点。同时也试图通过对傲慢与偏见的主人公伊丽莎白及其姐妹和朋友对待生活的几个不同态度的分析，来揭示现代女性对待生活的态度。本文的出发点主要是文章中的几位具有代表性的女性对待婚姻和婚姻生活,家庭和家庭生活，以及物质和精神生活的态度；和她们面对困难时所表现出来的积极态度以及所表现出来的现代女性对待生活对态度和面对困难时的积极乐观的态度和敢于面对和接受现实的挑战，不怕艰难的勇气。关键词女性 独立 生活态度 困难 傲慢与偏见contentsintroduction11. author and her novel:a general review21. 1.the author21. 2.the novel32. womens attitudes towards life reflected in the novel32.1. towards marriage and marriage life42. 1.1. towards marriage62. 1.2. towards marriage life.72. 2. towards family and family life92.2.1. as a mother92.2.2. as a labor102.3. towards difficulties and difficult life112.3.1. facing difficulties112.3.2. facing difficult life123. womens attitudes towards life enlightened from the novel143. 1. towards money143. 2.towards education17conclusion18bibliography20introduction“pride and prejudice” has always been studied at home and broad. there always have some different analysis of several aspects about women. at home, chen yanling and liu likun have studied the womens consciousness in austens novel. in 2008 xiong yanfei in jiangxi lantian college has done a detailed analysis about the small theme created in “pride and prejudice”. song wei and jiang lian in the foreign language college of yan shan university have studied the manifestation of female in “pride and prejudice”. the artist charm of austens works not only to see broad thing from small thing, but also detailed the ordinary lives and the ordinary people in vivid and dramatic in simple and humorous way. (chen yanling、liu likun, 2007:107-108) the well known british writer and critiques ttkemble said that, “jane austen was a comedy artist”, and he believes that she is the second only to shakespeare in pure comedy artist. (ttkemble, 1968:120) thomas make lai, the famous british historian, poet and political commentator in nineteenth century, said that: i believe that the readers have found out that “pride and prejudice” is the masterpiece of austens works; i think their assessment is fair. the reason that make a work become famous was not the praises of critics、the study of professors and been used as textbooks in school , but to make all readers get fun and get educated by reading this work. “in my own mind, pride and prejudice was the most satisfactory work in all novels”. kembles opinion not only stands for the scholars and experts comments, but also the voice of readers around this world. (zhu hong, 1986:105)this article attempts to find out some womens new attitudes towards life from “pride and prejudice”. at the same time, after analysis of the main female characters attitudes towards life, such as elizabeth, jane and elizabeths best friend charlotte, finally find out modern womens attitudes towards life. the attitudes towards life are reflected in the following three points: firstly, the attitude toward labor act; secondly, attitude toward the international relationships between people; thirdly, the use and evaluation of ones value in life. in the 21st century, modern womens attitudes towards family life, love life and marriage life have changed a lot. this article attempts to analysis modern womens attitudes towards family life, love life and marriage life by studying “pride and prejudice”. elizabeth was not only the charming female character in “pride and prejudice”, also the most famous female character in 19th centurys novels.（guo zhengnan，2001：101) her intelligent, witty, self-confidence and self-esteem were the same as the writers. her lucky love and perfect marriage was austins dream and also most womens dream.（zhang run.zhao shuli,2008:5）through the study of elizabeths character and her modern womens attitudes towards life, we can find out modern womens attitudes towards life in this world. this article consists of five parts:the first part is the introduction consists of five critics comments and opinions; and the second part is a general review about the author and her novel; the third part is the detailed analysis of womens attitudes towards life that reflected in “pride and prejudice”; last but not the least, the fouth part is about modern womens attitudes towards life enlightened from “pride and prejudice”; and the last part is the conclusion of this article. 1. author and her novel:a general reviewaccording to “concise encyclopaedia britannica”, the statement, jane austen was “the first realistic portrayal of everyday life, ordinary people in ordinary novelist. her work reflected the life of the british middle-class family life comedy, showing the family literary possibilities. she explored many young ladies fall in love and get married from the process of self-discovery. this focus on analysis of the character and the relationship between the heroine and social practices, that made her novel get rid of the eighteenth century tradition and close to modern life. it is this modern, coupled with her wit and humor, realism and compassion, her elegant prose and accurate story structure, made her novel keep long-term attraction to readers.” austen written her first novel “first impression” in the age of 21, and she did not get the chance to publish it. ten years later, she rewritten “first impression” and changed its name called “pride and prejudice”, finaly get published. “pride and prejudice” is the early works of jane austen, written in her hometown steventon.1. 1.the author jane austen was born at steven ton，hampshire，in 1775，the daughter of a clergyman. at the age of nine she was sent to school with her elder sister cassandra，who was her lifelong friend and confidante，but largely taught by her father. she began to write for recreation while still in her teens. in 1801 the family moved to bath，the scene of so many episode in her books and，after the death of her father in 1805，to southampton and then to the village of chaw ton，near alton in hampshire. here she lived uneventfully until may 1817，when the family moved to winchester seeking skilled medical attention for her i11 health，but she died two months later. she is buried in winchester cathedral.austens satirical art not only showed in some comedy characters and comedy plot treatment, but integrated the concept of irony in the whole story, and let reality to laugh at pepoles subjective fantacy. the leading man darcy in “pride and prejudice” initially accounted that the bennett family have so many negative family backgrands, the daughters of bennett family would difficultly getting married. but contrarily he married elizabeth at last. the leading woman elizabeth in “pride and prejudice”,was at the same situation, she has sweared never to marry darcy, but finally she brcomed mrs. darcy. mrs. bennett, whom the most ridiculous “fool” in the novel, the first sentence in the novel finally been proved to be the most correct words. she said: “it is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife”. this alternative between ridiculous and “truth” although was far away beyond general sense of right and wrong, but it correctly reflects the authors deep thinking of life.1. 2.the novelfeminism became a recognized movement in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but it didnt affect the lives of many women until the twentieth century. “pride and prejudice”, by jane austen, is one brilliant example of this. the female characters in this book had little money, and few family connections. they faced serious social restrictions, and, because of unwritten social rules, spent most of their time in the company of other women. there were also social expectations for upper class women, concerning everything from dress to language. the main subject of “pride and prejudice” is marriage in an acquisitive society. the plot of the novel is driven by its examination and satire of the difficulties to be faced by any eligible female in pursuit of a husband. austen mainly concentrates on the relationship of elizabeth and darcy, keeping the relationships of jane and bindley, charlotte and collins, and wick ham and lydia in the background. 2. womens attitudes towards life reflected in the noveltime went back to the 19th century in britain, conditions were fairly terrible, but there was a young and great woman fighting against these difficulties, and she firmly lived though life and finally got happiness. this paper would like to analyze modern females attitudes toward life from the respect of marriage and marriage life, family and family life, womens careers and their educational level through the female character of “pride and prejudice” - elizabeth. there had always been many disputes as to who should be responsible for womens happy life, and it has become the focus topic in todays society. the traditional viewpoints hold that man should account for womens happy life. a successful man can give a woman what she wants. another point of view is that the society should be responsible for womens happy life and every class of the society should pay more attention to womens happy life. in this respect, women are regarded as a weaker group. but another fact also deserves peoples attention that women are sometimes lowered down by themselves; they are likely to rely on men. today we advocate that there should not be gender discrimination, women should be responsible for their own happy life.2.1. towards marriage and marriage lifelong time ago, women had no right to choose their spouse, their marriage was determined by their parents, they must follow the man they married, no matter how bad and evil he was. however, today we own an equal era, in which woman can choose what kind of man she loves and decide how to live a happy life. marriage is considered to be one of the most important things in womens life. some even think that by marrying rich man can one gains happiness. however happy life is usually given by oneself but not by marriage or by others. in austens time, because of womens economic was depende upon man，it results in womans submissive attitudes sometimes even horrified feelings towards their husbands. but elizabeth does retort what darcy says. she says :“i never saw such a woman. i never saw such capacity, taste，and elegance，as you describe，united.” (austen34) this response shows elizabeths challenge of the judging standards of “perfect lady” and her rebellion. it also shows her independence and strong-willed behavior. it expresses elizabeths power is the power which is against the patriarchal society and that produces the inequality between males and females.comparing to other females，neither elizabeth is much qualified self-defense nor even her unintended influence over darcy establish her as the powerful character she is. the most profound source of elizabeths power is her ability to turn her critical vision upon herself upon her own unthinking vulnerability to male approval. it is at this point in the novel that elizabeth establishes what we could call real female power. if the process of gaining self-reproach by knowing males is the path from outside to the inner world, the process of self-criticizing of the women is not only the way to self-reproach but the way from the inner world to outside. by comparing with other females, austen mocks the other females and eulogizes elizabeth superficially，but in fact she is criticizing the patriarchal society. thus the construction of the consciousness of female subject is built through the two paths: one is the process of self-reproach through knowing and criticizing othersthe males: and the other is the process of owing and criticizing the society from owing and criticizing the other females. combining the two paths is criticizing the males and the patriarchal society and self-criticizing. with the consciousness of female subject, elizabeth realizes her self-realization. and it is elizabeths self-realization that makes elizabeth marry darcy.however, many modern females are not aware of what a happy marriage can bring to them. even some enchanting, successful, rich and high-brow women choose another unusual way of life which broke their heart, demolished their family, destroyed their profession, even their whole life. even so, they are not conscious of this. to take tang jieone of the earliest millionaires in nan jing city as an example, she was very successful in her fashion profession in her early years. she possessed her own company and a large number of money swarmed into her account. with the growing of money and promoting of social status, she began to feel ashamed of her low-brow husband; their nice marriage came into an end. the middle-aged woman tang jie went into such a way that she can never go back. she fell in love with a man, who was 12 years younger than her and was cheated by him, and then she again fell in love with another man who was 14 years younger than her, and again she was hurt by this man and was stabbed by him. she didnt believe love any longer, she became crazy for comforting by drugs, which later destroyed her whole life. the drug made her poor, she began to smuggle drug. this is one of those women who have money and all the luxurious goods; after all, she is unhappy and owns a tragic life. modern women often lay stress on how to make money, but neglect what is more important in one s life. therefore we modern women should attach great importance to happiness but not money only.2. 1.1. towards marriagewhether women can live a happy life or not is totally dependent on themself. women love beautiful things constitutionally and they always pay much attention to their appearance, so some women will blame god and men why they dont have good-looking and give themselves up as hopeless. one may not be charming, but one may be lovely; one can have good temper or one can dress up oneself. beauty is not unique; it doesnt only refer to the beautiful face or slim figure. there are many things that are more enchanting than the charming face. some women will be indignant with their husbands for their disloyalty to them in their marriage life. they are not to blame their husbands or scold or cry, instead, women should check themselves first. suppose a woman is elegant, moral, capableher husband will not betray her. to take elizabeth as an instance, firstly, elizabeth has strength in her romantic love. she looks for a real love in regardless of financial security or social status. elizabeth herself has to overcome her prejudice against darcy - an upper-class gentleman to love her. we can just say that she is the representatives for typical british woman in the nineteenth century who want to demonstrate her freedom. in seeking for a true love, which is not regarded as an important issue in her conventional society. secondly, the character of elizabeth shows her significant feature in strongly dealing with the obstacles to protect her love. in this novel, elizabeth has to encounter the disagreement of lady catherine de bough on the love between mr. darcy (her nephew) and elizabeth. her confrontation with lady catherine shows clearly that her determined and independent viewpoint on her love: “i am only determined to do what in my opinion will bring me happiness, without reference to you”. in fact, elizabeth is self-conscious about the inferiority of her familys social position, but she seems so strong to protect her true love against the interference of the external force.thirdly, elizabeths strong character leads her to a happy marriage at the end. this woman who devotes herself to her truly romantic love can find the true meaning of her live. so, meaningful a true love is! elizabeth learns from her true love the experience of removing her hasty misjudgments about the other. that means her character improves much more in a good way. 2. 1.2. towards marriage life “pride and prejudice” was a classic novel on marriage, the author begins with the said:“it is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife”. this sentence not only determined the scope of the novels theme, but also pointe