狄更斯的《远大前程》和萨克雷的《名利场》的人物比较研究

1、A Comparative Study of Figures in Dicke ns Great Expectati onsand Thackerays Vanity FairAbstractGreat Expectations and Vanity Fair are the two masterpiece works in 19th century in Brita in. They are the work of Dicke ns and Thackeray respectively. There are a large scale similarities and differe nce

2、s betwee n the two works. Both of them have a detailed concerned about society and civilians by the comprehensive analysis on the fate of characterism the novel. As to the figures chosen, the figure of Great Expectations is an innocent child who are easily to be affected by the outside en vir onment

3、 of society; the figures of Vanity Fair are come from the upper ten and the author showed his n egative attitude to them. This paper tries to have a comparative study of figures from the perspective of critical realism .In additi on, the paper tries to figure out the various causes of the fate of di

4、ffere nt characters. The limitati ons in the aspect of of social, cultural and political are the fun dame ntal causes for the differe nt life of figures.Key words: Great Expectatio ns; Van ity Fair; figures; critical realism; causes摘要远大前程和名利场作为 19世纪英国的两部旷世之作，是分别由狄更斯和 萨克雷两位大师级的作家完成的。两部作品存在着大量的相似点和差异。

5、两部作品都不 约而同的通过对主人公命运的展示表现了对平民和社会深沉的关注。至于角色选定，远大前程用容易受到社会环境影响的天真儿童作为作品的主人公；名利场所选择的的任务大部分来自于上流社会，萨克雷对这类群体采取十分消极的态度。本文将尝试从评判现实主义的角度对两部作品中的不同人物进行对比分析。同时本文将探析造成文中角色不同命运的多种原因。并得出在社会，经济和文化方面的限制才是造 成不同任务的不同命运的根本原因。关键词：远大前程；名利场；人物；评判现实主义； 原因ContentIntroduction4Brief In troduct ion to the Author4Brief In trodu

6、ct ion to the Work5Sign ifica nee of the Thesis6Orga ni zati on of the Thesis61. The Critical Realism61.1 Critical realism in econo mics61.2. Critical realism and Marxism71.3. Con temporary critical realism72. The Tragic Lives of Main Characters92.1 Estella Havisham: Impris onment of Marriage, Slave

7、 of Money92.2 Sharp: Break of Dream.103. The Causes of the Formation for Difference Figures113.1 Self-destructi on Caused by the Deficie ncy in Pers on ality113.1.1 Estella Havisham s Selfness and Superficiality113.1.2 Sharp s Vanity and Ignorance123.2 The Victim of Patriarchal Society133.2.1 Pirrip

8、 s “ MaterializationH”viohamtelJa133.2.2 Compeyson s Imprisonment of Estella Havisham143.2.3 Osborne s Toying with Sharp143.2.4 Crawley s Indifferenee to Sharp154. Conclusion15References16IntroductionBrief Introduction to the AuthorCharles Dicke ns was an En glish writer and social critic. He create

9、d some of the worlds most memorable fictional characters and is gen erally regarded as the greatest no velist of the Victoria n period. During his life, his works enjoyed un precede nted fame, and by the twen tieth cen tury his literary genius was broadly ack no wledged by critics and scholars. His

10、no vels and short stories continue to be widely popular. Although he had little formal education, his early impoverishme nt drove him to succeed. Over his career he edited a weekly journal for 20 years, wrote 15 no vels, 5 no vellas and hun dreds of short stories and non-fiction articles, lectured a

11、nd performed extensively, was an indefatigable letter writer, and campaigned vigorously for childrens rights, education, and other social reforms. His novels, most published in monthly or weekly in stalme nts, pion eered theserial publicati on of n arrative fictio n, which became the dominant Victor

12、ia n mode for no vel publicati on. The in stalme nt format allowed Dicke ns to evaluate his audie ncesreact ion, and he ofte n modified his plot and character developme nt based on such feedback.William Thackeray was an English novelist of the 19th century. He was famous for his satirical works, par

13、ticularly Vanity Fair, a panoramic portrait of English society. On reaching the age of 21, he came into his in herita nee but he squa ndered much of it on gambli ng and by funding two un successful n ewspapers, The Nati onal Sta ndard a nd The Con stituti onal for which he had hoped to write. He als

14、o lost a good part of his fortune in the collapse of two In dia n ban ks. Forced to con sider a professi on to support himself, he turned first to art, which he studied in Paris, but did not pursue it except in later years as the illustrator of some of his own no vels and other writ in gs. He achiev

15、ed more recog niti on with his Snob Papers but the work that really established his fame was the novel Vanity Fair, which first appeared in serialised installments beginning in January 1847. Even before Vanity Fair completed its serial run, Thackeray had become a celebrity, sought after by the very

16、lords and ladies whom he satirised; they hailed him as the equal of Dicke ns. In 1860 Thackeray became editor of the n ewly established Corn hill Magaz ine , but was n ever comfortable as an editor, preferri ng tocon tribute to the magaz ine as a colu mni st, produc ing hRo un dabout Papersfor it.Br

17、ief Introduction to the WorkVanity Fair: The books title comes fromJohn Bunyans allegoricalstory The Pilgrims Progress Vanity Fair refers to a stop along the pilgrims progress: a never-ending fair held in a town called Vanity, which is meant to represent mans sinful attachment to worldly things. The

18、 story ope ns with Miss Pin kert ons Academy for Young Ladies, where Becky Sharp and Amelia Sedley have just completed their studies and are preparing to depart for Amelias house in Russell Square. Becky is portrayed as a stron g-willed and cunning young woma n determ ined to make her way in society

19、, and Amelia Sedley as a good-n atured, lovable though simple-min ded young girl. Had he outlived his brother by eve n a day he would have become Sir Rawd on Crawley and Becky would have become Lady Crawley, a title she uses any way in later life. There is also a final appearance for Becky, as cocky

20、 as ever, selling trinkets at a fair in aid of various charitable causes. She is now liv ing well aga in as her son, the new baron et, has agreed to finan cially support her however he decli nes any further relati on ship or com muni catio n.Great Expectati on sis a bild un gsroma n, or a comin g-of

21、-age no vel, and the story genre is Victorian Literature. It is set among the marshes of Kent and in London in the early to mid-1800s. From the outset, the reader is treated by the terrifyi ng encoun ter betwee n Pip, the protago ni st, and the escapedc onv ict, Abel Magwitch. Great Expectati ons is

22、 a graphic book, full of extreme imagery, poverty, prison ships, the hulks, barriers and chains, and fights to the death. It therefore comb ines in trigue and un expected twists of autobiographical detail in different tones. Regardless of its narrative technique, the novel reflects the events of the

23、 time, Dicke ns concerns, and the relati on ship betwee n society and man. Great Expectations has a colorful cast that has remained in popular culture: the capricious Miss Havisham, the cold and beautiful Estella, Joe the kind and gen erous blacksmith, the dry and sycophantic Uncle Pumblechook, Mr J

24、aggers, Wemmick and his dual personality, and the eloque nt and wise frie nd, Herbert Pocket.Significance of the ThesisBecause of the limitation of cultural and social factors, there are some difficulties in having a comprehensive understanding of Great Expectations and Vanity Fair. The fate of char

25、acters is the core point of no vel. Critical realism is the theory that some of our sen se-data can and do accurately represe nt exter nal objects, properties, and eve nts. The research from the perspective of critical realism can reveal the true essenceof human beings as to manifest human beings co

26、nsciousness and fantasy and explore the truth of human s inner worldmeans of analyzing the figures in Great Expectations and Vanity Fair, and the clear un dersta nding about similarities and differe nces can be build.The figures in Dicke ns Great Expectatio ns and Thackerays Va nity Fair reminds us

27、that under the prosperity of material life, we still need to be aware of the moral degradation. This paper will give readers, who fancy Dicke ns and Thackeray, develop ing un dersta nding of the warni ng sig nifica nee of these two fictions in moder n society.Organization of the ThesisSo far, it has

28、 prese nted the brief in troduct ion about Dicke ns and Thackeray, and Great Expectationsand Vanity Fair. The second section will discuss about critical realism. The third part is the similarities and differences of figures in Great Expectations and Vanity Fair. Fin ally, it will in troduce the caus

29、es of the formatio n of differe nt fates in this play.The Critical Realism1.1 Critical realism in economicsAccordi ng to critical realist econo mists, the cen tral aim of econo mic theory is to provide expla nati ons in terms of hidde n gen erative structures. This positi on comb ines tran sce nden

30、tal realism with a critique of mainstream economics. It argues that mainstream economics (i) relies excessively on deductivist methodology, (ii) embraces an uncritical enthusiasm for formalism, and (iii) believes in strong con diti onal predict ions in econo mics despite repeated failures. The world

31、 that main stream econo mists study is the empirical world. But this world is out of phase (Lawson) with the underlying ontology of economic regularities. The mainstream view is thus a limited reality because empirical realists presume that the objects of inquiry are solely empirical regularitiestha

32、t is, objects and events at the level of the experie need.The critical realist views the doma in of real causal mecha ni sms as the appropriate object of econo mic scie nee, whereas the positivist view is that the reality is exhausted in empirical, i.e. experie need reality. Tony Laws on argues that

33、 econo mics ought to embrace a social on tology to in clude the un derly ing causes of econo mic phe nomena.12 Critical realism and MarxismA developme nt of Bhaskars critical realism lies at the on tological root of con temporary streams of Marxist political and economic theory. The realist philosop

34、hy described by Bhaskar in A Realist Theory of Scie nceis compatible with Marxs work in that it differe ntiates between an intransitive reality, which exists independently of human knowledge of it, and the socially produced world of scienee and empirical knowledge. This dualist logic is clearly pres

35、ent in the Marxian theory of ideology, according to which social reality may be very different from its empirically observable surface appearance.Notably, Alex Callinicos has argued for a critical realist ontology in the philosophy of social science and explicitly ack no wledges Bhaskars in flue nce

36、 (while also rejecti ng the latters spiritualist turn i n his later work). The relati on ship betwee n critical realist philosophy and Marxism has also bee n discussed in an article co-authored by Bhaskar and Calli ni cos and published in thJour nal of Critical Realism13 Contemporary critical realis

37、mCritical realism is prese ntly most com mon ly associated with the work of Roy Bhaskar. Bhaskar developed a general philosophy of science that he described as transcendental realism, and a special philosophy of the huma n scie nces that he called critical n aturalism. The two terms were comb ined b

38、y other authors to form the umbrella term critical realism.Tran see nden tai realism attempts to establish that in order for scie ntific in vestigatio n to take place, the object of that inv estigati on must have real, man ipulable, i nternal mecha ni sms that can be actualised to produce particular

39、 outcomes. This is what we do whe n we con duct experime nts. This sta nds in con trast to empiricist scie ntists claim that all scie ntists can do is observe the relati on ship betwee n cause an deffect and impose meaning. Whilst empiricism, and positivism more gen erally, locate causal relati on s

40、hips at the level of eve nts. Critical Realism locates them at the level of the generative mechanism, arguing that causal relati on ships are irreducible to empirical con sta nt conjun cti ons of David Humes doctri ne; in other words, a con sta nt conjun ctive relatio nship betwee n eve nts is n eit

41、her sufficie nt nor eve n n ecessary to establish a causal relati on ship.The implication of this is that scienee should be understood as an ongoing process in which scie ntists improve the con cepts they use to un dersta nd the mecha ni sms that they study. It should not, in contrast to the claim o

42、f empiricists, be about the identification of a coincidenee between a postulated independent variable and dependent variable. Positivism/falsificatio n are also rejected due to the observati on that it is highly plausible that a mecha nism will exist, which results in its hav ing un predictable effe

43、cts. Thus, non-realisati on of a posited mecha nism cannot be take n to sig nify its non-existe nee.Critical naturalism argues that the transcendental realist model of scienee is equally applicable to both the physical and the huma n worlds. However, whe n we study the huma n world we are study ing

44、someth ing fun dame ntally differe nt from the physical world and must therefore adapt our strategy to studying it. Critical naturalism therefore prescribes social scie ntific method which seeks to ide ntify the mecha ni sms produci ng social eve nts, but with a recog niti on that these are in a muc

45、h greater state of flux tha n those of the physical world. In particular, we must un dersta nd that huma n age ncy is made possible by social structures that themselves require the reproduct ion of certa in acti on s/pre-c on diti ons. Further, the in dividuals that in habit these social structures

46、are capable of eon sciously reflect ing upon, and cha nging, the actions that produce them a practice that is in part facilitated by social scientific research.2. The Tragic Lives of Main CharactersThe success of Geat Expectati onsand Thackeray Van ity Fair have a close relati on ship with its femal

47、e images. The female images are the best reflect ion for the special social and cultural background. However, the main images did not lead a very happy life, all of them have a very tragic life. Although they have the similar fate, great differences can be found in their respective tragedies.2.1 Est

48、ella Havisham: Imprisonment of Marriage, Slave of MoneyEstella Havisham is an an gel, as well as evil. There is no doubt that Estella Havisham is the most important female role in Great Expectations She is the motivation why Pirrip can be so successful and be murdered at last. Pirrip was falling in

49、love with Estella Havisham at the first sight. In her teenage, Estella Havisham was so beautiful and innocent, that why she can always be the focus of others. In story, author always ties Estella Havisham and all the things related to her with beautiful flowers, which emphasiz ing her breathtak ing

50、beauty. However, she got no thi ng at last. Her tragic marriage and the misun dersta nding about money resulted in her tragedy.Marriage directly cha nged her life. She once had a beautiful thinking about her future. She did not take the physical matters into con siderati on, all she wan ted is to be

51、 with her family. But because of the special historical condition, She did not spend too much time in Pirrip and married Compeyson. It was not right wrong to put her fate in the unknown future. But she did not know clearly about her husba nd, either. The happ in ess life did not embrace her. Instead

52、, her husband still lived in his own lifestyle and did not pay too much attention to take care of Estella Havisham. She was still alone and did not find a man to rely on. In Compeyson sopinion, marriage means nothing to him, Estella Havisham is no more importa nt tha n his outside lover. Compeys on

53、could not step into the house more tha n one mon th, Estella Havisham can not attract the atte ntio n from him. There are a lot of sufferi ngs in her marriage. She was trapped in marriage. Because of the existence of marriage, Estella Havisham could not maintain the relati on ship with Pirrip whe n

54、he appeared in front of her.As to money concept, she was contaminated by money.” Then wear the giat| ifthat ill move her; if you can bounce high, bounce for her too, till she cry-hatted,lover,high bouncing lover, I must have you ” . We can not deny that there was a love relati on ship betwee n Estel

55、la Havisham and Pirrip, the reas ons for why they did not be the couples is that Pirrip is so poor that he could not afford the dreamed life of Estella Havisham. Therefore, she chose the cosy life whe n Pirrip went away. Compari ng with mon ey, the frie ndship and love ship mean nothing. Estella Hav

56、isham is not the image in Pirrip s mind, the changes have been take n place both in her face and her heart. It is very ridiculous to talk about inv isible things with her, money is the on ly sta ndard to weigh what is right and what is wrong. She could not get the happ in ess from Compeys on and mar

57、riage. Gradually, she realized that money can make possibilities for her to enjoy the“ in visible comfortable ” . That is the mai n reas(tragic life. The abno rmal relatio nship with Pirrip and the rese ntme nt to Compeys on and his lover are domin ated by her money con cept.2.2 Sharp: Break of Drea

58、mSharp is coming from the bottom of society who can not win too much atte nti on from the public. She had a lot of similarities with Pirrip, she had a strong desire for her future life. There was a dream in her mi nd. The dream was broke n whe n encoun ter with the tough reality, Sharp was con fused

59、 and did not know what to do to make her dream come true. Being troubled by reality and dream, Sharp could not keep bala nee betwee n two of them. That is the mai n reas on for her tragedy. The in equality in social status in dicates that there are thi ng will be done by Sharp if she wants to en ter the upper ten. Whe n Sharp firstly met Osbor ne,“ shewas falli ng