雾都孤儿_论文.doc

摘 要摘 要查尔斯狄更斯(18121870)是19世纪英国最杰出的小说家。1832年开始从事文学创作，先后写了歌剧、笑剧、随笔、长篇小说和短篇小说，以长篇小说最为成功。雾都孤儿是查尔斯狄更斯的代表作之一。小说描写了伦敦低层社会中贫苦儿童的悲惨生活,揭露了贫民救济所的黑暗。本文通过分析雾都孤儿中仁爱与暴虐在人物性格上的体现，把社会最黑暗、最丑恶的现象暴露出来。通过雾都孤儿创作的社会背景、意识形态背景以及小说中主要人物性格的分析，反映出狄更斯创作的深度和批判倾向。本文先回溯狄更斯雾都孤儿创作的相关社会背景以及当时文学创作中批判现实主义手法的发展， 进而深入探讨作者塑造的典型环境中的典型人物形象。研究者希望通过本文更好地了解狄更斯本人的价值观在人物形象塑造中所发挥的作用。关键词：查尔斯狄更斯；批判现实主义；人物性格；主要人物形象IABSTRACTAbstractCharles Dickens（18121870）was a prominent novelist. He began to take to letters in 1832. He wrote so many works, such as drama, farce, essay, short and story, and the last one is the best accomplishment of his. Oliver Twist was one of his masterpieces, which has reflected the real and terrible life of London underworld. It has given expression to the benevolence and despotic that lies in the novel, and exposes the darkest, filthiest phenomenon. Moreover, according to the social background, we can find the creative depth and critical tendency. By recalling the development of social background and critical realism, and discussing model to which the writer gives, we can know Charles Dickenss value in his novel. Key words: Charles Dickens；Critical Realism; Characterization; Typical Literary Image15CONTENTSContentsChapter 1 Introduction1Chapter 2 Character Analysis of Oliver Twist22.1 Charles Dickens22.2 Critical Realism4 2.2.1 Social Background.4 2.2.2 Ideological Background.6 2.3 Plot Setting8 2.4 Characterization.9 2.4.1 Oliver Twist.10 2.4.2 Nancy.11 2.4.3 Monks.12Chapter 3 Conclusions14References.15Acknowledgements.16Chapter 1 IntroductionChapter 1 IntroductionSince Oliver Twist was published, critical realism has become a main stream in literary history. It reflects the people who live at the bottom of society. These critical realists of the mid-19th century were all honest people and real artists in spite of their limitations in their general point of view on life. By exposing the social injustice and the vices of the upper class, they put their hearts into depicting the miserable existence of the common people; they gave a ruthful picture of capitalist England of the time. They followed the fine tradition of their great literary predecessors of 18th century realism and early 19th century romanticism. They showed their warm sympathy on those people who suffered a lot. The greatest of the critical realists was Charles Dickens. In his early years, he did a lot of work, these experiences gave him a good knowledge of the political life of England at that time and it had a far reaching effect upon his lifelong contempt for all the political institutions. Oliver Twist was one of Charles Dickenss masterpieces, which has taken up an important position in literature. He often creates with very certain ideas about right and wrong. He was called the real great master, in that the figure in his novel is imbued with the unique feature of critical realism. The research of Oliver Twist is widely carried out in China nowadays. To name a few, Professor Qiao Zhi guo, who is teaching in Shanghai International Studies University；Professor Qian qing , who is teaching in Beijing Foreign Studies University; professor Chang Yao xin, who is teaching in Nankai University in China and University of Guam in America. Based on former researches mentioned above, this paper is going to do some work on character analysis of this novel.To understand the aim of Charles Dickenss work, and his unique writing style, we should focus on the typical literary images, social background in the novel. Moreover, on the basis of Charles Dickenss personal experiences, also in this article the author, from its narrative perspective and writing feature, explores the novel, and presents the writers writing aim perfectly. We can find the creative depth and critical tendency.Chapter 2 Character Analysis of Oliver TwistChapter 2 Character Analysis of Oliver Twist2.1 Charles DickensCharles Dickens was born on February 7, 1812, in Portsea, England. His parents were middle-class, but they suffered financially as a result of living beyond their means. At 11 years old, as his father was in debt, the family was put in a debt prison. Forced by the plight, he had become a child labor in a boot and shoe cream workshop. The miserable experience in his young mind left psychic trauma, not only his deep concern and sympathy for the unfortunate children, and prompted him to struggle to escape poverty. As a young adult, he worked as a law clerk and later as a journalist. His experience as a journalist kept him in close contact with the darker social conditions of the Industrial Revolution, and he grew disillusioned with the attempts of lawmakers to alleviate those conditions. In 1836 he then decided to write his own stories under the name of Boz. They were called the Pickwick Papers which were like comics for adults. Charles would write the words and a man would draw pictures for them. They were published in cheap monthly instalments. For the first one they published only 400 copies but by the 4th they had to print40, 000! The main character Mr Pickwick served time in a debtors prison like Charless Father. Within four months of publishing his first story Charles was internationally famous. After that, he created one after another works, for example, Oliver Twist (1838), The Old Curiosity Shop (1840- 1841), Dombey and Son (1846-1848), David Copperfield (1849), Bleak House (1852), a Tale of Two Cities (1854) and Great Expectations (1860).（Chang Yaoxin, A Survey of English Literature, p.230）More than 20 novels and many short stories, essays, features and travel notes. Dickens successfully created many distinctive characteristics, the image of a unique character. His socially realistic novel of critical significance is not only to the British literary world a new looks, but also to the development of world literature. With the money he earned, he was able to get married to a lady called Catherine Hogarth. Dickens had not forgotten his childhood hardships. He became famous, and had children. Because the continued impact of past experience had an effect on his family life and his childrens education. From 1837 to 1852, Dickens couple gave birth to 10 children, 9 survived. To their children, Dickens could be regarded as a strict father. He developed strict house rules and receive the help of his sister, requiring that each child must be obey orderly. For example, he always managed to find time to check whether the house was clean and tidy or not every morning. In addition, He also checks the small room furnishings, accessories are put in place. In English literature, novel is a brilliant stars peak times in nineteenth-century. In these great novelists, Dickens is a most brilliant star. Dickens had suffered a difficult childhood world, so he was sympathetic for the working class people and the most helpless children. Dickens is a prolific writer; he was depended on hard- work and talent to create a large number of classics. He is a master of humour, often use the language with humour and romance, to tell the truth of the world, so that Marx also had praise him as an outstanding novelist.” He became an editor of a monthly magazine called Bentleys Miscellany which he made instantly success by his serialization of Oliver Twist, which is probably his most famous novel. Oliver was born in a Workhouse, and Dickens used this novel to show how bad these places were and how they were often run by corrupt and cruel people. He is a renowned English writer all around the world. He was a critical realist of the Victorian Age. In 1837, the first installment of Oliver Twist appeared in the magazine Bentleys Miscellany, which Dickens was then editing. It was accompanied by illustrations by George Cruikshank, which still accompany many editions of the novel today. Even at this early date, some critics accused Dickens of writing too quickly and too prolifically, since he was paid by the word for his serialized novels. Yet the passion behind Oliver Twist, animated in part by Dickenss own childhood experiences and in part by his outrage at the living conditions of the poor that he had witnessed as a journalist, touched his contemporary readers. Greatly successful, the novel was a thinly veiled protest against the Poor Law of 1834, which dictated that all public charity must be channeled through workhouses.” Oliver Twist is Charles Dickens second novel. The only 20-year-old writer determined to learn from the British novelist of realism painter William Hogarth（1697 1764）, who had the courage to face life and realistically express the tragic life of the London slums. He held a high moral purpose: to protest social injustice, and to arouse public opinion, the implementation of the reform, so that the poor are in dire straits in the rescue. Because of this, Dickens has always been praised by Chinese and the former Soviet scholars as the British literature, critical realism and the representatives of the founder and greatest（何文安译.雾都孤儿）. Dickens was a lifelong champion of the poor. He himself suffered from the harsh abuse visited upon the poor by the English legal system. In England in the 1830s, the poor truly had no voice, political or economic. In Oliver Twist, Dickens presents the everyday existence of the lowest members of English society. He goes far beyond the experiences of the workhouse, extending his depiction of poverty to Londons squalid streets, dark alehouses, and thieves dens. He gives voice to those who had no voice, establishing a link between politics and literature with his social commentary.2.2 Critical Realism2.2.1 Social BackgroundOliver Twist is written by the British novelist Charles Dickens in the Victorian age. Ruled by the Queen Victoria, it was the Britains most brilliant periods in history. In the mid-19th century Britain became the worlds economic superpower. But in this prosperity and wealth is the working class under the cover of poverty and misfortune, in order to make a living, women and children should be hired to dangerous, dirty factories and mine. Increasingly sharp class conflicts finally triggered from 1836 to 1848, which was the famous British charter movement. United working class pushed Peoples Charter and sought for governments help to protect human rights, improve living and working environment. Movement swept almost all cities. Although the movement waned in 1848, it made some achievements, especially in waking up the working class. At the end of the 19th century, the British Empire and Victorian values are gradually declined. Although the UK is the largest overseas colonists, the enemy can not win with the economic and military strength, but its leadership has begun to face the challenges of a rising Germany, and U.S. competition hurt the British economic dominance. At the end of the century, Victorian values lost its color; the original modest, decent way of life was replaced by indulgence and extravagance. Victorian literature, as a product of the times, has symbolized as diversity of natural features. It was multileveled and complex, including the romantic and the reality which reflect in peoples lives. This era gave birth to a large number of indomitable literary giant.The critical realistic writers, on the one hand re-initiated realism in the 18th century, on the other hand they took up the criticism of society, safeguarded the peoples interests. Although their point of view and style of writing varies, they were all concerned about the majority of people in common life and destiny, hated the inhuman social institutions, and degraded social morals, the prevalence of money worship and large areas of poverty. They worked on a true portrayal of peoples lives and the relentless criticism of the social system aroused public awareness and social development. Victorian literature, a true reflection of reality and the spirit of the times, reflected the high level of energy, down to earth spirit, good humor and unconstrained.Oliver Twist opens with a bitter invective directed at the nineteenth-century English Poor Laws. These laws were a distorted manifestation of the Victorian middle classs emphasis on the virtues of hard work. England in the 1830s was rapidly undergoing a transformation from an agricultural, rural economy to an urban, industrial nation. The middle class had achieved an economic influence equal to, if it is not greater than, that of the British aristocracy. In the 1830s, the middle class clamored for a share of political power with the landed gentry, bringing about a restructuring of the voting system. Parliament passed the Reform Act, which granted the right to vote to previously disenfranchised middle-class citizens. The middle class was eager to gain social legitimacy. This desire gave rise to the Evangelical religious movement and inspired sweeping economic and political change. The sentiment behind the Poor Law of 1834 reflected these beliefs. The law allowed the poor to receive public assistance only if they lived and worked in established workhouses. Beggars risked imprisonment. Debtors were sent to prison, often with their entire families, which virtually ensured that they could not repay their debts. Workhouses were deliberately made to be as miserable as possible in order to deter the poor from relying on public assistance. The philosophy was that the miserable conditions would prevent able-bodied paupers from being lazy and idle bums.In the eyes of middle-class English society, those who could not support themselves were considered immoral and evil. Therefore, such individuals should enjoy no comforts or luxuries in their reliance on public assistance. In order to create the misery needed to deter immoral idleness, families were split apart upon entering the workhouse. Husbands were permitted no contact with their wives, lest they breed more paupers. Mothers were separated from children, lest they impart their immoral ways to their children. Brothers were separated from their sisters because the middle-class patrons of workhouses feared the lower classs “natural” inclination toward incest. In short, the state undertook to become the surrogate parents of workhouse children, whether or not they were orphans. Meals served to workhouse residents were deliberately inadequate, so as to encourage the residents to find work and support them. Because of the great stigma attached to workhouse relief, many poor people chose to die in the streets rather than seek public aid. The workhouse was supposed to demonstrate the virtue of gainful employment to the poor. In order to receive public assistance, they had to pay in suffering and misery. Victorian values stressed the moral virtue of suffering and privation, and the workhouse residents were made to experience these virtues many times over. Rather than improving what the middle class saw as the questionable morals of the able-bodied poor, the Poor Laws punished the most defenseless and helpless members of the lower class. The old, the sick, and the very young suffered more than the able-bodied benefited from these laws.These social backgrounds helped us to know more about the characters in the novel. For examples, the character of Monks, who was a greedy, ruthless, shameless people, and yet was Olivers brother, had some special meanings. The Monks of this role is reflections to some of the noble sons unrestrained behavior at that time. Monks was a wise man, he knew how to access to his brothers property securely. However, the role of Oliver was so kind-hearted; his life was very plentiful, full of misery. At last, he got his wonderful life. His sufferings symbolized for the real British world. According to the social backgrounds, the story and main characters are fully realized. 2.2.2 Ideological Background Dickens used an orphans personal experience, condemned and criticized the hypocrisy of the law. In addition, the novel written by Charles Dickens also tried to show and expose the crimes to society at that time, in order to achieve the purpose of improving the hearts of mankind. This creation was, in the works describing the thief leader Fagin as the evil forces of social evil life, greed, erosion, and did harm to child. It was truly reflecting the reality, and that was the creation of the first principle should be followed. Traditionally, viewing that realistic writers of this period, critical realism writer described in general and focus typical of bourgeois society and the nature of things, they showed the typical environment of a typical character. In fact, according to Oliver Twist, it had described the social phenomenon of crime; Dickens is not in strict accordance with the above criteria to reflect the phenomenon of crime in British society.In Oliver Twist, Dickens has successfully used personalized language to build the characterization, which is an excellent instrument. The word of hooligans, thieves, prostitutes in the book, is appropriate for their status, even with the industry cant. Dickens used the processing, refining, and choosing instead of dirty, dirty word.In the excellent realistic novel, the story is often developed in the personality of the environment under the action of history that is Gorky called a character, the typical growth and composition of history. However, any cell Dickens informal sets how much you want to arrange the number of coincidence o