叶芝戏剧文学研究

【作者】 马慧；

【导师】 王化学；

【作者基本信息】 山东师范大学 ， 比较文学与世界文学， 2014， 博士

【摘要】 威廉·巴特勒·叶芝（1865-1939）作为著名诗人，他的诗歌受到充分重视，获得世界性赞誉。相比之下，对其戏剧作品的研究较为薄弱。诗歌和戏剧作为不同的文学形式，承载的是其不同的文学理想和情感抒发。叶芝的戏剧创作是象征主义戏剧的实绩之一。他的戏剧理论与梅特林克静态剧理论一样，是象征主义剧论的重要组成部分，共同开创了现代主义戏剧思潮的先河。本文以叶氏的戏剧文本为主要研究对象，从文本出发，采用历史主义批评、原型批评和女性主义批评等多种研究方法，结合当时的社会、文化、历史及生活背景，探究其戏剧作品的思想特点和艺术特色，以期对其戏剧创作全貌做一描述，并作出较为客观的评价。除绪论部分外，全文分为八章。绪论部分主要论述四个问题：一是本文选题的理由和意义，确定叶芝戏剧研究的价值。二是国内外的研究现状和趋势，分国内研究综述和国外研究综述两个部分，每一部分均包括剧本翻译情况、主要研究内容和研究趋势分析。三是本文的研究目标和内容。欲对叶芝戏剧的创作轨迹、主题、人物、结构、戏剧性及理论等做出结合文本的分析。四是研究方法和创新点。对本文做一个方法论的归纳，且明确创新之处。第一章为叶芝戏剧创作的背景。依次对爱尔兰历史概况、文化氛围及其戏剧概况进行归纳，将叶氏戏剧放到关于社会、历史、文化及艺术的大氛围中去，以便于对其思想和艺术进行溯源，从而更好地把握其特质。创作背景突出了英国和爱尔兰复杂的历史关系和17世纪初之后英国对爱尔兰的文化殖民，这种客观状态促成了叶芝拯救传统文化重塑民族精神的初衷。第二章为戏剧主题流变。梳理了叶芝三个阶段的思想动向和戏剧创作特点，将其整个戏剧创作分为三个阶段：早期（1885年-1907年），中期（1908年-1922年），晚期（1923年-1939年）。在每个时期，其戏剧都有着重表达的主题。早期主要是神话传说主题和民族主义主题。他或者将爱尔兰丰富的民间神话传说直接作为作品的构架，或者在作品中直陈民族主义情绪，统领之的是其彼时浓厚的文化民族主义思想。叶芝希望以传统文化为载体，实现提高大众民族意识实现民族独立的目的。随着与民族主义者裂痕渐生，他逐渐疏离了激进的民族运动，继续追寻很早就接触到的神秘主义思想，由此进入中期创作，主要探讨神秘思想主题和艺术使命主题。随着时间推移，他的神秘思想已然体系化，形成了关于人格类型、历史规律和宇宙秩序的哲学体系，晚期剧作成为其哲学思想的图解，主要探讨了贵族文明主题和死亡-复活主题。前者表达了其贵族文明将在下一个阶段重临的历史循环观，后者则是作者对生之大限的思考，他的基本观点是生死转化灵魂不灭，并将这一观点植根于原始信仰之中。通过此章，可以勾勒出叶芝戏剧创作的整个过程和思想流变。他在这些主题中表达的观点与其对社会、环境和宇宙的理解息息相关，又总随着后者的变化在变动之中。第三章论述作品人物。叶芝戏剧人物较少，越到晚期这一特点越明显。随着人物数量逐渐减少，其象征意义愈加增强。其戏剧系列主要塑造了三类人：英雄（以库丘林为代表）、理想女性（以艾玛为代表）和符号化人物。库丘林式英雄，代表了叶芝所崇尚的英雄气质，同时也与所受尼采哲学的影响有关。女性的品质一般比较隐忍，对英雄人物基本是服从的表现，从女性主义批评的角度进行解析，可以看出叶氏对女性的看法，并从其真实生活中对女性的态度得到印证。符号化人物更多是其某些思想观念的形象化，包括象征预言者的符号化人物、象征精神世界的符号化人物及象征生死转化的符号化人物。叶芝正是通过象征方式图解其哲学著作《幻象》中的抽象理念，所以要理解其人物形象必须与《幻象》相结合。第四章论述作品结构。叶芝戏剧篇幅不长。有限的篇幅里，他对结构的安排经历了一个从有序到无序的过程，打破了常规清晰的戏剧结构范式。结构可分为深层结构和表层结构，前者表现为情节极度弱化，后者表现为场面呈片段式和时空模糊不清。这样的特点决定其戏剧是一种开放式结构，观众可以有多个解读视角，使戏剧营造出多向语义空间的模糊性。非逻辑的开放结构的内在支撑点是神秘主义思想，对世界直觉的理解方式决定了其会采用整体含混的结构形态，而象征正是这一艺术过程中最恰当的思维模式。从戏剧演进过程看，叶芝促使戏剧结构由说明性的方式过渡到了直接表现的方式，对于其后的现代主义戏剧发展有着相当的启发作用。第五章论述作品的戏剧性。叶芝的戏剧作为诗剧，本身动作性不强，与惯常意义上的“激烈”、“遽然”、“夸张”、“离奇”的“戏剧性”相异，不以事件变化和情节突转见长，属于“抒情”和“情境”戏剧性，而非传统的“动作”与“冲突”的戏剧性。通过人物的诗性语言，去捕捉情绪暗示情感，蕴含着丰富的抒情性。叶氏戏剧不是没有冲突，只是将其内在化，压抑于人物情绪中；看似静态的场面，隐含着深层的精神世界和情感世界。此外，在有些戏剧中，作者意图着力通过情境表现出来，更加深入到内在的心灵世界和形而上的人生意义，将很多难以言表的观念准确而丰富地展现出来，使情境走向前台和中心，揭示了很多以往难以表达的主题和内涵。第六章论述其悲剧精神。叶芝的戏剧几乎全是悲剧，尤其喜好以高贵人物所受到的挫折和灭亡来表现其悲剧情感。主人公在戏剧一开始就处于难以逾越的困境，预言所预示的命运无法改变，无法逃脱它的掌控。在经过种种徒劳的挣扎和努力之后，悲怆而坦然地接受悲剧性困境。虽然必定是失败，但坚强的精神状态、自由的自我意识和坚决的反抗意志才构成生命的意义。叶芝的悲剧精神以人为出发点，是一种人本主义思想，一种现代悲剧精神。作者秉承神秘主义思想，汇通理性世界和感性世界，否认经验主义和实证主义，认为只有直觉可以到达真正深层的生命本体。第七章论述戏剧理论。作为一位富有独创的剧作家，叶芝有着自成体系的戏剧观，其戏剧理论有一条较为明晰的流变轨迹，分为三个阶段——早期：建立神秘象征的民族戏剧以教化大众的理论；中期：寻求象征新方式增强仪式性的摹仿能剧理论；后期：将戏剧作为抽象宇宙哲学和理想模式图解的仪式化戏剧理论。这一发展链条上，戏剧的民族化色彩由浓厚变为淡然，而仪式化痕迹则由隐蔽到彰显，理论和创作相辅相成，理论为创作的导向和纲领，创作是理论的实践和具体化，两者具有一致性的特点。应该说，他的理论贡献绝不仅限于象征主义，还连接了其后的表现主义，并孕育出荒诞派戏剧的某些要素，为其后戏剧的合规律发展指引了方向。第八章论述叶芝戏剧的接受史。在欧洲，从19世纪80年代末叶芝的戏剧作品发表开始到21世纪，各界的评论随时间呈现出不同特点。变化趋势可以这样归纳：评论的范畴由重内容到重形式，研究的方法由单一到多元，接受的情绪由极端回归理性。叶芝戏剧与日本能剧有很深的渊源，是有鲜明特点的跨文化戏剧实践。他在内容和形式上对能剧进行了积极的借鉴和化用，创造出崭新的戏剧形式。对仪式化、神秘化、象征化、悲剧化的崇尚是叶芝对能剧进行指向性审美注意和目的性选择的出发点。中国对叶芝戏剧的接受高峰集中出现在20世纪20年代。在叶芝领导的爱尔兰文艺复兴运动的直接启发下，中国发起“国剧运动”，回望历史的得失，可以为我们当下的文化建设提供借鉴和参考。更多还原

【Abstract】 William Bulter Yeats is well-known as a poet world-wide, his poems are highlyaccounted valuable in the literature history. However, researches on his theatrics arecomparatively feeble. Poems and theatrics are two different forms of literature, whichcarry his different literary dreams and emotional express. Yeats’ theatrics is one ofsymbolism plays, together with Maeterlinck static drama theory, which is the start ofmodern thinking of drama. This doctoral thesis is mainly on Yeats’ theatrics, throughusing various research methods, such as new historicism criticism, archetypalcriticism and feminist criticism, taking account of the society, history and livingbackground of his time, exploring his plays’ ideological and artistic characteristics,hoping to draw the panorama of his works, and also making the objective evaluation.Besides introduction part, this thesis is composed of eight chapters.For the Introduction Part, there are four questions are discussed. Firstly, thereason why this thesis chooses Yeats’ theatrics as the research field and what is thesignificance of the research about him. Secondly, the current research trend both fromthe point of views of Chinese research and from the world is discussed, every pointfocuses on the analysis of translation, research content and research trend. Thirdly, thethesis is about aims and contents, explaining his production track, theme, characters,structure, dramatics and theories. Fourthly, this thesis talks about the researchapproaches and innovativeness, concluding this article in methodological andinnovative way.Chapter One is about Yeats’ creation background. Irish history, culture and playsare summed up. Only in such background, could we trace back his thoughts and act inorder to know the features. Creation background highlights the complex historyrelation between England and Ireland colonial culture, which makes him try to saveIrish traditonal culture so that national spirit could be re-formed. Chapter Two is about theatric theme transforming. It lists ideological trends andcreation characteristics of Yeats’ three production periods. They are the early period(1885-1907), the mid-term period (1908-1924) and the late period (1925-1939). Eachperiod has its own standing point. The early period is about both legend theme andnationalism theme. Yeats’ nationalism position dominated these two themes. The otherway to show his nationalism emotion is to base his works on the fruitful Irish folktales.At the same time, he also expressed this kind of emotion directly in his works. Yeats’snationalism emotion is a kind of cultural nationalism. The mid-term period is aboutthe mysterious thought theme and artistic theme. Due to conflict with somenationalists, Yeats gradually quit from the national movement, giving up the idea thatplays are to educate the people. He then puisuit the mystic belief. The late period isabout noble civil death and resrrection theme. The ideal culture age is the medievalByzantium civilisation. It has the neat orders, poems and artists are on the top ladderof the whole society. What he tried to achieve is to restore the noble civilisation.Besides, the death and resrrection theme reflected Yeats’ thinking when he was gettingolder. The basic idea is the death and life turnover and eternal life, this belief wasrooted in primal belief. In this chapter, Yeats’ whole creation process and thinkings areoutlined.Chapter Three is mainly on the characters in his plays. The later stage of hisproduction, the fewer characters came out in plays. Meantime, when the number ofcharacters is getting smaller, symbolic meanings are being enhanced. Three types ofcharacters are molded in the series of his plays, they are heroes, females and the fools.These three types of characters are very much symbolic. Cuchulain heroes who areinfluenced by Nietzsche philosophy stands for the heroically temperament. Emmafemales have taken an attitude forbearance and they always obey heroes. Yeats’ viewstoward female could be understood from the standpoint of feminine criticism and thisis further confirmed by his real life opinion towards women. Conceptualisedcharacters are about his visualised thought, including conceptualised predictioncharacters, spiritual characters and death-life characters. Yeats explained the abstractidea in his work, A vision. Chapter Four is about theatric structure. It is seen that most of Yeats’ plays arenot quite long, quite a number of his plays are One Act play. However, Yeats’arrangements of structures had gone through a process where it is from unorderlymanner to orderly manner. Strcucure has surface layer and deep layer. The formerweakens plot very much, the later appears episodic and blur. This characteristic givehis play very open structure. The audience could view it from many angles, whichmakes play much more blur.The standpoint of non-logical open structure ismysterious thoughts, instict understanding makes him use the ambiguous structureand a symbol of art is used in thinking model. From the evolution process, Yeatschanges his play structure from illustrative to direct way.Which enlightens the latermodernism plays.Chapter Five discusses the theatricality. His choreopoem is not good at suddenchanging plot but more about lyrics and scenarios. It’s different from the stringing,sudden, exaggerated, odd drama. It’s also different from the traditional plays whichhave lots of actions and conflicts. In contrast, conflicts are behide the characters’emotions so that it seems like static scence but the deeper spiritual and emotionalworld are inside. Moreover, in some plays, the writer trys to disclose the obscurethemes accurately and wealthily by emphasising on the scenarios expression, whichare more deeply rooted in human spiritual world.Chapter Six talks about tragedy spirit. Yeats’ plays are all about tragedy, he likesto express this kind of emotion by descriping how the noble men had gone throughfrustration and extinction. Protagonist was in dilemma from the very beginning, whichsignifies the unchagned future destiny. Protagonist had to accept the tragedy dilemmaafter all the struggles. Even though failure, life’s true meaning is all about tough spirit,free self-awareness and firm rebellious spirit. Yeats’ tragedy spirit is based onhuman, which is humanism and modern tragedy. The writer held on mysticlsm,merges perceptual and rational worlds. He denied experimentalism and positivism.Only deep truth inside human could be touched by intuition.Chapter Seven talks about theatric theories. There is a clear changing track,which could be divided into three periods. The early period is the theory of civilising the public with mysterious, national drama. The mid-term period is the theory offinding a newer and enhanced symbolistic way to ritually imitate Noh play. The lateperiod views drama as the abstract universal philosophy and ideal mode of illustratingdrama ritually. On this changing track, his plays’ nationalism color is fading and ritualtrace is emerging. The theory and production are combined together, which reflectssame characteristics, theory is the guideline for production. On the other hand,production provides theory with practice and embodiment. Indeed, his contribution isnot only symbolism but also the expressionism in later history of drama. Hiscontribution also gives some elements of absurdism and giving directions for thedevelopment of drama.Chapter Eight is about the course of acceptance of Yeats’ plays. In Europe,comments differ from the1880s when Yeats’ plays were firstly published. To sum itup, the trend of change is from content to form by assessment domain, from unilateralto multilateral methods of research, from irrational to rational emotion by acceptance.Yeats’ plays have many origins with Japanese Noh plays. He came up with brand newplay style by using Noh plays’ set design, props, lights and sounds. The standpoint isto create his own ideal new play style which is suitable to himself. In China,nationwide acceptance of Yeats’ renaissance came in the time of1920s. At that time,The Nationalistic Drama Movement of China, was enlightened by the on-goingdevelopment of Irish play movement.The current construction of culture could usehistory as mirror in order to know what we gain and lost.更多还原