浅析《卡斯特桥市长》中亨查德悲剧成因毕业论文.doc

【标题】浅析卡斯特桥市长中亨查德悲剧成因 【作者】罗雁丹 【关键词】命运;性格;亨查德 【指导老师】赵洪尹 李雷 【专业】英语 【正文】. IntroductionA. Introduction to the Author Thomas HardyHardy was a twentieth century poet as well as a nineteenth century novelist. The date of his birth is now nearly one hundred and sixty years distant, the date of his death already over seventy. But after his death his reputation and popularity is continuing and even increasing, which implies his strong artistic vitality.Born June 2, 1840, in Dorset in Southwestern England, Thomas Hardy lived well into the twentieth century, dying in 1928 at the age of 88, and he remained a Victorian to the end. This is particularly true of his career as a novelist. All of his major novels were written before the turn of the century. They were called Wessex novels, that is, the novels which described the characters and environment of his native countryside. The town of Casterbridge itself, for example, is just Dorset.B. Introduction to the NovelThe Mayor of Casterbridge tells a story of the protagonist Henchard. The Mayor of Casterbridge opens with an act of such heartlessness and cruelty that it still shocks readers today. Michael Henchard, a hay-trusser, gets drunk at a fair and sells his wife and child to a sailor for five guineas. The following morning, Henchard swears he will not touch alcohol for twenty-one years. Through hard work and acumen, he becomes rich, respected, and eventually the mayor of Casterbridge. Eighteen years pass before Henchards fateful oath comes back to claim its due. Upon the return to Casterbridge of his wife and daughter, Elizabeth Jane, Henchards fortunes steadily decline. He clashes with his business assistant, Donald Farfrae, who soon becomes his major rival. He ruins his business through impulsive speculations and takes to drinking again. One by one he loses his possessions and relationships to Farfrae. Soon Farfrae owns Henchards business and house, has gained the affection of his lover Lucetta, and has even become the mayor of Casterbridge. In the end, Farfrae marries Elizabeth Jane. Having lost everything he once possessed, Henchard is forced to face himself in his most tragic moment. It is a tragedy.“The characters of Hardys writing are bright, complicated. The protagonist Michael Henchards character is the focal point.”1“Henchards tragic fate results in his ambition instinct and natural selection principle, the protagonist arrives at the terminus of the life because of the outside factor and vivo factor.”2“Henchard is a sacrificial victim because of the changes comes from the social conflict.”3. The Factors Contributing to Henchards TragedyEvery man, in his effort to reach the goal, has to face frustrations. The result is the conflict between man and the society, man and man, and man and his ownself. This leads to clash of benefits, emotions and to psychic tensions, and this may cause death. Henchard is just a case in point. Internal and external factors combine together to contribute to his tragedy. These factors will be explained roughly from three aspects: Henchard in the transitional social background, Henchards defective character and the arrival of Farfrae.A. Henchard in the Transitional Social BackgroundHenchard is the mayor of Casterbridge. The community of Casterbridge itself has close connection and great resemblance to its mayor. Like Henchard, it pulls itself in, and refuses contact with its surroundings.“It is huddled all together”, says Elizabeth Jane when she sees it for the first time,“Its squareness was, indeed, the characteristic which most struck the eye in this antiquated borough of Casterbridgeat that time, recent as it was, untouched by the faintest sprinkle of modernism. It was compact as a box of dominoes. It had no suburbsin the ordinary sense. Country and town met at a mathematical line.4 It is in such a closed system of economic protection that Henchard achieves his success.Originally being a hay-trusser, just because of his amazing energy, Henchard is voted to be the chief magistrate. So he embodies values associated with the rural way of life. He is old-fashioned, behind the times in his business attitudes and unaware of the philosophical problems of the day. In doing his business,“His accounts were like a bramble-wood. He used to reckon his sacks by chalk strokes all in a row like garden-palings, measure his ricks by stretching with his arms, weigh his trusses by a lift, judge his hay by a chaw, and settle the price with a curse.5 Obviously, he lacks the scientific method of management. His rough and ready method can only be useful in doing a small business. When the business is enlarged, he cannot handle it alone, thus when the wheat has grown, he needs a manager. Henchards incompetence is exposed here.He is never good at calculation. Henchard half admires and half sympathizes those“who could care to give his mind to such finnikin details. Henchard himself was mentally and physically unfit for grubbing subtleties from soiled paper.6 The qualities that are needed in the city life are what Henchard lacks, and the more important thing is that he seems not to be made of that stuff, and its impossible for him to foster that quality.Henchard belongs to the past and lives in the past. He is superstitious and believes strongly in the power of oaths and omens. When he wants to abstain from strong liquors, he uses an oath to help him; when he realizes Elizabeths ancestry, he thinks that some sinister intelligence bent on punishing him. In doing his business, he visits the soothsayer for a prediction. The failure in speculation only makes him wonder if someone has placed a curse on him. Henchard wants to use superstitious power to strengthen him, but he is doomed to suffer.Several miles off Casterbridge, Farfraes efficient book-keeping and the new seed-drill all suggest the coming of a new materialistic and industrial age, which will greatly change the way of life. It is inevitable that the old society must give way to the new one. Henchard is experiencing such a historical period without being fully aware of it and prepared for it. The strong rural life is passing away, and the rural calmness is being threatened by urban complexity. The conflict between Henchard and Farfrae in nature is a conflict between two different ways of life.Living in the old society as an ambitious man, if Henchard still wants to distinguish himself, he has no other choice except to catch up with the progress of society, adapting himself to this fundamental change. Unfortunately, Henchard has remained old modes of behavior and is unable to adjust to new attitudes. One passage describes him this way“there are men whose hearts insist upon a dogged fidelity to some image or cause, thrown by chance into their keeping, long after their judgment has pronounced it no rarity-even the reverse, indeed, and without them the band of the worthy is incomplete.7In the struggle between man and social forces, man always proves to be powerless. If he cannot adapt himself to the social change, he will be rejected by it, thus occurs the tragedy of Henchard. His death, like the disintegration of the old society, is inevitable.B. Henchards Defective CharacterThe full title of The Mayor of Casterbridge is The Life and Death of the Mayor of Casterbridge: A story of a Man of Character, which suggests the close interrelationship between the character and the fate of the mayor. Reading through the novel, we can see that Henchards impulsive and proud character is responsible for his own tragic fate.1. Impulsive CharacterIn the beginning of the novel, Henchard is described as a person who makes decisions on the spur of the moment. He is ambitious and resentful of his wife and child for keeping him down. After selling them for five guineas to a strange sailor Newson, Henchard tries to evade the full responsibility for his act by blaming it on drunkness, he even blames his wife because she allows him to do the act:“Seize her! Why didnt she know better, than bring me into this disgrace!8 Then, almost immediately he blames himself. These contradictory impulses are typical of his personality.In Chapter Five, we know his“personal goodness, if he had any, would be of a very fitful castan occasional almost aggressive generosity rather than a mild and constant kindness.9 In the dispute about the bad wheat he just manages to control himself but“there was temper under the thin bland surface.10 He shows his strong love to Donald Farfrae. He employs him and impulsively dismisses Jopp, but the same day Farfrae is“eclipsed” by the arrival of Elizabeth Jane immediately, so that Farfrae wonders at“the suddenness of his employers moods.11After knowing Donald Farfrae for only one day, he tells him what he has not told others about his past. Later, he dismisses him in jealousy of his popularity and regrets his haste when it is too late. This spur of the moment decision brings him danger. Farfrae does a parallel business in the town, and becomes his rival. Henchard is doomed to fall in this struggle. It is he himself who causes it.Knowing that Farfrae has established the same business, he expresses his angry feelings to his fellow councilmen in a voice that“might have been heard as far as the town-pump,12 but they do not show any reaction. Henchards fluctuating temperament has not brought him one friend. Considering Farfrae his enemy, Henchard writes a note forcing Farfrae not to court his daughter Elizabeth,“loving a man or hating him, his diplomacy was as wrongheaded as a buffalos.13 Henchard loses the chance of avoiding his tragic fate in refusing Farfrae to be his son-in-low. This makes him in a more passive position, and later Farfrae is attracted by Lucetta and marries her. Knowing Elizabeths true parentage, his affectionate feelings change into a cold one, and he hurts Elizabeth deeply, so she moves to live with Lucetta. Henchard regrets losing Elizabeths company.Henchard hires Jopp as his manager unwisely, and he does not pay attention to Elizabeths distrust of Jopp. His strong desire to force Farfrae out of business makes him take a wrong actionto speculate heavily upon rainy harvest weather, when the weather turns to be a glorious one,“the momentum of his character know no patience.14 He sells everything cheaply, and he is forced to mortgage his property to the bank. Instead of blaming his own mistake, he blames Jopp for not advising against the speculation. He dismisses Jopp, and Jopp vows to revenge against Henchard. So Henchards impulsive character not only makes him lose fortune, but also makes an enemy of himself. Great loss result in his bankruptcy. Henchards struggle with Farfrae in business ends in his failure. It is Henchards own impulsive character that brings himself danger.Jopp opens the letters that Henchard asks him to deliver to Lucetta. So the relation between Henchard and Lucetta in the past is revealed, and Lucetta dies because of shame. At last Elizabeth Jane becomes his only emotional prop, but his impulsive lie to Newson knocks it down. So he thinks everyone has left him, and nothing to come, nothing to wait for. Henchard commits suicide.Henchards impulsive character leads him to a series of unnecessary mistakes. He never considers the serious consequences before he takes actions, and often regrets only when it is too late. His impulsive character brings harm to himself. Reading through the whole novel, we can easily realize that impulsiveness is responsible for his tragic fate.2. Proud CharacterIn Chapter One, when Henchard and Susan are walking side by side, Henchard“speaks to her hardly at all, because of his cursed pride, and mortification at being poor.15 As Henchard says in Chapter XLIV. After selling Susan, Henchards pride does not let him reveal the shame of selling his wife, even it would be helpful in searching for her. If not because of his cursed pride, he may not despise Susan so much as to sell her for five guineas, and he may not be afraid of losing face to reveal the truth. So he has only one choice that is to find her. Eighteen years later, when he remarries Susan, he is resolved to“castigate himself with the thorns which these restitutory acts brought in their train, among them the lowering of his dignity in public opinion by marrying so comparatively humble a woman.16 Since marrying Susan is lowering his dignity, Henchard has no respect for her. He reads her letter without obeying her restriction. At the same time he receives an emotional blowElizabeth Jane is not his but Newsons daughter.“had he obeyed the wise directions outside her letter this pain would have been spared him for longpossibly for ever.17 He regrets his action. Before this happens, Farfrae advises Henchard tell Elizabeth Jane the truth about his past, she might forgive him and stand by him. But stubborn pride prevented him as stubborn pride prevents him now from telling her that she is Newsons daughter. So Henchard cannot relieve his pain because of his proud character. He has to face the result, and when he wants to remedy it, it is too late.Henchard is described to be with“a temperament, which would have no pity for weakness, but would be ready to yield ungrudging admiration to greatness and strength.18 Imagining himself on a large scale makes him unhappy and vulnerable to any diminution of his position, possessions or relationship. Henchard is also frustrated in his domineering desire: first by Elizabeths refusal of his insistence on her taking his name, and then farfraes interference with his brutality to Whittle.With the movement of the plot, Henchards pride is wounded again and again. The successful entertainment made by Farfrae hurts his pride; the sympathy of Farfrae about his failure in speculation hurts his pride; Lucettas transferring her love to Farfrae hurts his pride; the revelation of his past in the court by the woman hurts his pride. After he goes bankrupt, Farfraes buying his house and furniture deeply wounds Henchard. But he still holds his pride when catching cold. He refuses Elizabeths visit at first, because he does not want to be regarded as weak. Working under Farfrae as a hay-trusser his stubborn pride can only be repressed. Reading Lucettas letters to Farfrae is just an act of revenge for his wounded pride; greeting the royal personage like a mayor is a reaction of his deep sense of the loss of position, respect and wealth. But once more he is hurt by public humiliation. Because of his remaining little portion of pride, he forces Farfrae to wrestle with him, but physical advantage does not mean a victory.“Henchard took his full measure of shame and self-reproach.19 We can also see Henchards pride when he is rejected by Elizabeth at her wedding, he says with pride.“Dont ye distress yourself on my account,“Ill never troubleee again.20 At the end of the story, Henchard asserts his pride by his will.“nobody is wished to see my dead bodyno murners walk behind me at my funeral21 Henchard is as proud in his death as he is in his life.Henchards pride prevents him from facing his own shameful act and taking some effective measures to put it right. He is punished by it. Imagining himself on a large scale only makes him become more and more weak. His pride makes him lose the opportunity of recovery in his downward course. He is eventually ruined by his pride.3. Isolated CharacterHenchard is drawn by Farfrae because he is very lonely, so he decides to give Farfrae a third share in the business. Henchards loneliness is an emotional reason for him to force Farfrae to stay.As we read the novel we can find that his attitude toward love is the most effective emotion to make him loneliness. Once he had a family like others, but he thought the marriage threatened him with“the extinction of his energies,22 so he rejected it to strive for financial success. Eighteen years later, we can see he succeeds, but still alone. About the sale of Susan, he only feels ashamed, without any sense of bereavement. Susans arrival does not arouse his renewed love, he remarries her because of the mechanical rightness.In courting Lucetta, he thinks the marriage again and again, whether for love or obligation.To his emotion Henchard has no evident resolution. Though troubled by an absence of feeling, a craving loneliness, he is not sure about whether he wants to marry Lucetta for the purpose of filling the emotional blankness or to gain added wealth. Henchard cannot keep his own motivation consistently. The money he earns does not return affection. His attitude towards love begins from rejection changes into indifference, at last gets into objection, all these have nothing to do with a full relationship or mutual responsibility, and whats more, Henchard seems unable to develop it, and this strengthens his isolation.Henchard is different from all others. He is dissatisfied with lifeoften aggressive, competitive and ready to conquer. His uniqueness and his exclusion from normalcy and constant dissatisfaction isolate him from all the others in this novel. Such an exceptional person cannot exist in the society.Henchards indifference to Farfraes feelings makes the young man to think their closeness as artificial, and to resist the pressure of mechanized friendship. Later, Henchards envy and jealousy exhaust Farfraes patience. His feelings towards Lucetta are not a single developing one, they are alternated by passion, pity, loneliness, greed and jealousy. Towards Elizabeth Jane there is an even more varied range of emotion, from acceptance when she and Susan arrive in Casterbridge, to resentment on the discovery of her true parentage, from a willingness to be served by her in his illness, to a complete settling of all his affec