（英语语言文学专业论文）面对事实的失望和希望——《蝇王》寓意再探.pdf

摘 要 ii 摘 要 戈尔丁的寓言体小说蝇王的性恶主题自其出版以来一直是众多评论家讨论 的中心本论文以弗洛伊德死亡本能理论和人格三部结构说为理论依据在重新探 讨蝇王的性恶论主题的基础上进一步分析了它本身所蕴含的乐观因素指出 蝇王的寓意不仅仅在于揭示人性本恶本身更在于预示同邪恶抗争的必要性和 可能性 全文共分为导言第一章第二章第三章和结论五个部分其中 导言部分扼要介绍了国内外蝇王研究的现状 并澄清本文对蝇王寓意展 开探讨的原由和意义及本文运用的理论依据和主要观点 第一章在前人研究蝇王性恶论的基础上进一步分析这一主题 第二章着重论述了小说本身所包含的乐观与救赎因素指出小说的另一主题在 于预示同邪恶作斗争的必要性和可能性 第三章通过分析小说中的具体例子来呈现戈尔丁给予世人的警示不面对事实 人类的未来将是不可避免的悲剧 结论部分回顾和总结了戈尔丁的蝇王所蕴含的两个主题并点明戈尔丁 创作蝇王的目的及意义指出人性本恶是一个无法改变的事实但人类的未来 不是毫无希望可言 关键词 威廉 戈尔丁死亡本能人格三部结构性恶 abstract iii abstract the theme of evil nature in lord of the flies by william golding is always the focus of discussion of many critics grounded on the freudian psycho analysis of death instinct and the three psychic zones of mental personality theories this thesis rereads this much discussed theme and takes a further exploration into the optimistic elements golding offered in the novel attempting to present the two parallel messages in william golding s lord of the flies the evil nature of human beings and the expectation of a hopeful bright human future out of the vigilance against this fact the thesis consists of five parts introduction part gives an account on the current situation of the studies on lord of the flies and clarifies the purpose of rereading this novel and the theoretical basis chapter one rereads the one pessimistic message of lord of the flies the evil nature of human beings chapter two undertakes to present the other message of the possibility of salvation with an analysis focused on the optimistic factors contained in the novel chapter three concentrates on presenting golding s warning to human beings ignorance of man s evil nature is not bliss with these detailed discussion on the novel the thesis draws the conclusion that there are two parallel messages in lord of the flies the evil nature of human beings and a theme of salvation that so long as they can face up to the fact and try to curb it with their ego and superego human beings will have a bright future k e y w o r d s william goldingdeath instinctthree psychic zonesevil nature bibliography 1 introduction william golding won the nobel prize for literature in 1983 with his representative works lord of the flies he is the first british winner of this prize after winston churchill who also won this prize 30 years before golding in 1954 william golding published his novel lord of the flies which made him become famous overnight upon its publication lord of the flies established its position as a classics of modern british literature and became a book of required reading in the schools of english speaking countries it is also the focus of discussions of the literary critics for several decades treatises on lord of the flies come out one after another to sum up discussions have been focused on the following several fields first there is discussion on the narrative structure of lord of the flies represented by the thesis of xingyuan s on the theme characters and structural characteristic of lord of the flies the allegorical and symbolic characteristic of lord of the flies is a popular topic taking complier of allegory by liu ruoduan as an example the inner relationship between lord of the flies and human history notably discussed in bernard f dick s william golding is another field of the studies on lord of the flies the interpretations from the angles of feminism and mythology prototype are two original experiments in which fields the one favored scene by yu haiqing and the revenge of dionysus by hu lei are two representatives the different explanations on the breakdown of the society with their respective understanding on lord of the flies by bernard f dick john f fitzgerald john r kayser and kathleen woodword also attract much attention from the readers of lord of the flies professor zhang zhongzai s rereading on lord of the flies 40 years after its publication also expounds on the counter tradition aspect in lord of the flies and meets with much approval nevertheless discussion on the theme of the evil nature of human beings is the most fully experimented topic that achieves the most studies and treatises treatises and theses primarily discussing the evil nature of human beings always occupy a leading position 河北大学英语语言文学硕士学位论文 2 among the studies on lord of the flies in which a much impressive and representative one is an elegy on the loss of innocence by jiang rong and professor mao zhuoliang it is also from the close reading and study on the works of this field that a further exploration attempting to give a deeper and more detailed interpretation on golding s messages in lord of the flies gets its inspiration and help human nature has always been being a perpetual topic ever since the beginning of the age from time immemorial down to the present day the concept whether human nature is good or evil still remains a heated but undecided subject practically in every age there are some scholars and writers who propose their own understanding on human nature from the social reality of their respective age1 with whom william golding shared something in common in the aspect of strong social responsibility and commitment he paid close attention to the social reality of his own age golding got deeply lost in the thought after witnessing and experiencing the cruelty of world war ii and the world upheaval of post war time2 facing the calamities resulting from the cruel wars golding submerged in sober reflection what on earth made the western history of the 20th century into such a tragic scene eventually golding found the answer in the theory of freudian death instinct once being away from the supervision of superego id then is able to drive the death instinct inside human beings to commit all kinds of crimes3 it is neither the natural force of outside world nor the evil environment rooted inside society itself that results in all those calamities the root should be dealt within human beings themselves in the evil nature of human beings in the view of golding man produces evil as a bee produces honey 4 it is man himself who creates the hell it is the bloodthirsty death instinct inside the nature of human beings which surfaces after being peeled off the cloak of civilization losing the bounds of laws morality and discipline thus swelling that brings out the catastrophic destructive power5 when the primitive unguarded aspect of man comes out golding says that this is what happens the beast struggled forward broke the ring and fell over the steep edge of the rock to the sand by the water at once the crowed urged after it poured down the rock leapt on to the beast screamed struck bit tore there were no words and no bibliography 3 movements but the tearing of teeth and claws p 161 golding takes the viewpoint that human nature is not gentle but rather a beast the death instinct inside the id of human beings which comes out to destroy all the order and civility in life henceforth golding wanted to make man face the sad fact of his own cruelty and nature 6 lord of the flies one of golding s great works unmasks human beings mercilessly and utterly bares the evil nature of human beings to the eyes of all people however the disappointed tone of its whole style when lord of the flies is mentioned is not mutually exclusive to its positive social significance because golding did not mark a comma on the paper of human beings future7 it is for the purpose of arousing the vigilance of society thus striving to suppress the evil nature of human beings that golding exposed it so deeply and disappointedly in lord of the flies in other words cure is the goal of criticism what golding was looking for under the pessimistic theme was a new way with which human beings could get out of the abyss of misery and regain the long lost soul where there is vigilance there is hope while golding was well aware of the applicability of the freudian death instinct theory describing human nature he also saw the bright future of human beings from another freudian theory the three psychic zones of mental personality while man could not alter his nature golding felt he could certainly be conscious of it and it was this consciousness according to him that contained the supreme achievement and delight of being a human being8 therefore it is not surprising to see that when he was expressing the idea of human s evil nature in lord of the flies golding had reserved this idea to a certain extent and added to some optimistic factors of the salvation of human beings in the novel mark kinkaid wick has once pointed out that it is impossible to try to conclude the theme of golding s lord of the flies from one angle since the content of this novel is so complex and intricate9 therefore grounded on freudian theory of death instinct and three psychic zones of human personality it might be reasonable to inquire into the optimistic factors lying in lord of the flies on the basis of human self analysis in the novel the evil nature of human beings and this close exploration might bring out a possible conclusion that the massages of lord of the flies is not just to reveal the evil 河北大学英语语言文学硕士学位论文 4 nature of human beings but also to indicate the necessity and possibility of resisting evil since it is not totally pessimistic according to freudian theory of death instinct the evolution and development of life is merely a kind of accidental phenomenon and must be attributed to externalities on the contrary the return of life to the state of extinguishment is its essence and the instinct hidden inside life itself namely the death instinct10 in other words there is a kind of stifled death instinct existing in the id of human beings which is the deadly defect and evil element of human nature and is the source of destruction aggression and all the wars lord of the flies by william golding is the very allegory that reveals this essence to people this novel describes vividly how a group of english schoolboys aged six to twelve degenerated into savages cruelly killing human beings after they were stranded on an uninhabited island in a future world war being away from civilized society the bloodthirsty instinct inside human nature namely the death instinct lost the guard and restriction of ego and superego and thus emerged quickly and fully which caused the degeneration lord of the flies bares the evil and darkness of human nature and expresses the theme that civilization seems so fragile in face of human s evil instinct however there remains another message under the cover in this novel so long as human beings can face up to and recognize the evil nature of themselves it is not impossible for them to control and then maybe to get rid of evil thereby avoid the occurrence of new tragedy of human beings the freudian three psychic zones of mental personality theory provides the theoretical basis for this view where there is id there is ego and superego is guiding ego all the time to supervise and control the unconscious instinct of people11 therefore human beings should recognize the existence of id then face up to and accept it so that ego is able to restrain with the guidance of superego the impulse of id more appropriately instinct can be controlled consciously lord of the flies reflects this point rightly for william golding had discounted the theme of evil nature when he was unmasking it the underlying optimistic factors in the novel to be found might give proof of golding s positive message from the novel and his warning to readers there are two results if following the order of soul either becoming a devil or becoming an angel human beings are not perfect nevertheless they are not hopeless it is also the focus of the whole elaboration at the bibliography 5 same time golding also pointed out to people the danger of ignorance in the inherent evil nature of human beings ignorance is not bliss in terms of human beings evil nature a sober mind and vigilance are the keys to a hopeful future of human beings 河北大学英语语言文学硕士学位论文 6 chapter one tragedy of human nature as a topic which has puzzled people for decades of centuries the question that human nature is good or evil still remains undecided however it goes clearly that people seem more willing to believe in the tenderness of human heart and that they try to avoid witnessing the other side of the story yet if they look back upon the turbulence of the 20th century take a broad view over the world in the beginning of the 21st century which is infested with terrorism wars national crises as well as heretical religions smuggling aids and traffic on narcotics people have to admit that the bloodthirsty instinct of animal nature is still existing in the heart of human beings and this destructive instinct of human beings described as death instinct by freud is the motive power of all evils the freudian theory of death instinct explains exactly all the evils brought by the bloodthirsty destructive instinct inside the conscious of human nature if it is true that once in an inconceivably remote past and in an unimaginable way life arose out of inanimate matter then in accordance with out hypothesis an instinct must at that time have come into being whose aim it was to abolish life once more and to re establish the inorganic state of things if in this instinct we recognize the impulse to self destruction of hypothesis then we can regard that impulse as the manifestation of a death instinct which can never be absent in any vital process 12 aiming at revealing the theme of the evil of human nature william golding located the characters of lord of the flies far away from social civilization to the isolated environment to display human instinct the story of lord of the flies shows to readers a tragic picture in which the children gradually show their savage instinct in a self governed world far away from civilization lord of the flies relates the story of a group of british school boys abandoned on a desert island and forced to survive without adult supervision bibliography 7 during a global war they are alone on the island the only two adults having been killed when the plane carrying them crashed they form a sort of government at the very beginning with ralph the appointed leader and the keeper of the fire he is assisted by piggy an intelligent and myopic boy and by simon a boy of uncanny insight and sensitivity jack heads the hunting party golding s work is a parable about the inherent evil in human nature reflected in the natural brutality of these children the author s psychological insights are brought to fore by concise depiction of perverted behavior and degrading moral standards thus readers see how the boys become increasingly savages as jack and his band track down and murder other boys and worship a pig s head the symbol of their created god which they call the beast this is the lord of the flies of the title referring to beelzebub whose evil forces readers see at working the boys in a pivotal scene simon who has refused to believe in the beast and its power is overcome with fear when he believes it speaks to him saying i m part of you p 151 this message is reinforced when a dead parachutist a victim of the war that rages outside of their isolated island lands and the children mistake it for a wild beast so that the fear roams the island thus they confront the beast incarnate in humankind and the fearful message that evil and savagery is the lot of humanity during the course of the novel both simon and piggy are killed and ralph is being pursued when a naval officer appears to rescue them recalling the boys to the world of adulthood and war where the savages they have known so intimately reign after reading the novel hardly can anyone not be shocked by the savagery of the boys who are traditionally reckoned as most innocent angels lord of the flies is a good exploration of the nature of good and evil and an examination of innocence golding exposed bitterly the defect of human nature by successfully describing the children s state of mind and life on the solitary island as well as their behavior he pointed out to readers that the natural instinct of human beings is evil and that even children who are traditionally regarded as the embodiment of moral excellence have the inhuman cruelty hidden in their nature therefore it might be a sensible way by enquiring into the details of the novel itself and analyzing images of a few of the main characters in the novel to recall how golding with the theory of death instinct in his 河北大学英语语言文学硕士学位论文 8 mind utterly exposed the evil nature of human beings to common people first of all there is the hunting group who readily submit themselves to their inner evil jack is the head of this hunting group and the typical embodiment of evil if a reader with sensitive insight were to label the weakness in jack s personality he would easily make the words list lengthy enough required for the topic but when summarized all those words would come down to evil from his first presence in the novel jack impresses readers with his horrifying appearance inside the floating cloak he was tall thin and bony and his hair was red beneath the black cap his face was crumpled and freckled and ugly without silliness out of this face stared two light blue eyes frustrated now and turning or ready to turn to anger p 16 this description of jack s appearance smears his image making readers feel disgusted with him unconsciously and indicating his cruelty as a result the author elementarily achieved the purpose of exposing jack s inherent evil jack s evil nature is totally exposed to readers by golding s tacit description of jack s evil behaviors on the island jack is indeed responsible for a majority of evil deeds and trickery whether it is stealing fire even though it would have been given or leading people away from the one person who wants to help them and get them saved to take a closer look over his evil deeds will be necessary in understanding one of golding