【作者】 苏莹莹；

【导师】 王新球；

【作者基本信息】 上海师范大学 ， 英语语言文学， 2009， 硕士

【副题名】论《晃来晃去的人》和《赫索格》中的流浪母题

【摘要】 荣膺1976年诺贝尔文学奖的索尔·贝娄(1915-2005),以“对当代文化富有人性的理解和精妙的分析”而折服了世界。作为犹太裔美国作家,贝娄的作品受到极大的关注。他所描绘的社会生活是对美国“熔炉文化”的反应,也揭示了现代人所承受的精神危机。仔细阅读可以发现,流浪特征呈现于贝娄的作品之中。在第一部小说《晃来晃去的人》中,贝娄就提出了“好人应该如何生存?”这个问题,继而又塑造了为了走出生存困境不断探求,渴望人类走向美好未来的精神流浪汉的形象。贝娄成功地将现代西方人普遍的生存困惑与犹太人特有的文化内涵巧妙地结合起来。犹太民族因历史境遇积累下来的的失落感和对精神家园的无限向往与美国所代表的现代社会的精神危机的碰撞,为贝娄小说中的流浪主题提供了深厚的文化和现实意义。论文将以《晃来晃去的人》和《赫索格》为研究范例,尝试对贝娄小说中的流浪母题进行分析。本论文由六个部分组成:第一部分的前言简单介绍了流浪母题在文学中的表现,以及贝娄的生平和文学成就。流浪母题是文学的一个基本母题,流浪汉小说是流浪母题的载体,是文学作品中较能真实反应社会状况的一种体裁。贝娄的人生经历也为流浪意识提供了文化底蕴和现实土壤。第二部分详细介绍了贝娄作品中的流浪意识。贝娄作品中呈现的流浪母题决不是一种巧合。因为历史的原因,流浪意识已经积淀为犹太和美国的民族意识。作为犹太后裔的贝娄深受犹太文化的影响,但在美国的数十载生活让贝娄认识理解美国精神的同时,也给他丰富的视角审视这个代表现代文明社会的典型。对现代社会生活的观察引发了贝娄对现代人生存困境的思考。流浪的民族意识和现代社会精神危机的存在构筑了贝娄小说中的流浪意识。因没有归属感,对生活失望以及面临生存困境而困扰的现代人,内心世界复杂而痛苦,急切希望寻求到个体的价值和生活的意义。第三部分分析了贝娄的两部精神流浪汉小说《晃来晃去的人》和《赫索格》。传统的流浪汉体裁小说成为贝娄承载流浪母题的载体,并突破传统流浪汉小说外在流浪的局限,通过塑造精神流浪汉来突出现代社会中的精神危机。两个主人公的精神探求是对奥德赛探险历程的继承与突破。此外,贝娄创造性地运用传统的日记体裁和书信体裁描绘了流浪汉的内心世界。第四部分细致分析了约瑟夫和赫索格的精神探求之旅。从混乱的开始到平静的回归现实,既是流浪汉自我审视世界的过程,又是他们重新认识人生、人类命运的的过程。无论是回归到现实,打破隔离走进社会,还是对个人价值的赞扬,都是贝娄希望通过流浪汉给人类生活指出的道路。第五部分介绍了流浪汉回归的动因。贝娄是一个具有人文情怀的作家,他汲取了犹太文化中的乐观精神,认为人类世界应该是真善美的世界。同时,贝娄也强调了个人的价值与意义,也就是美国传统文化精神的影响。可以说贝娄对人类命运的关怀反映了犹太传统文化精神和美国传统文化精神。最后一部分是总结。贝娄以社会历史家的角度,通过流浪汉的精神困境和精神探求描绘了现代文明社会中所存在的精神危机。他关注的不仅仅是犹太人在美国主流社会中的命运,而是对整个人类的前途命运的思考。更多还原

【Abstract】 Saul Bellow (1915-2005), Nobel Laureate and winner of numerous other awards, astonished the reading public by“the human understanding and subtle analysis of contemporary culture that are combined in his work”(Brucker 892). As a noted Jewish-American writer, Bellow’s works have received great concerns worldwide. Bellow portrays wide social life to reflect the“furnace”property of American culture and reveal the spiritual crises of modern people.Closely reading Bellow’s works, we will see there is a sense of wandering in his full-length novels. Bellow raises the question“how should a good man live?”in his Dangling Man, his first novel, and portraits the images of the spiritual wanderers who take spiritual journey in order to find a way out of the existential predicament and into a better future of human beings. Bellow succeeds in connecting the living predicament of modern westerners with Jewish cultural connotation so that he can make use of the Jews to represent the loss of foothold, the sense of unbelongingness and the eagerness for a home of spirit that affect the modern human. In this thesis, the novels Dangling Man and Herzog will be chosen as the cases for the study of the motif of wandering in Bellow’s works. The thesis consists of six parts:Part I gives a brief introduction to the motif of wandering in literature and Saul Bellow’s life and critical attentions from the world. Wandering has been abstracted into literature as one of the basic motives. The picaresque novel, as a medium of the motif of wandering, is traditionally used to reflect the situation in which the picaros live. Bellow’s rich life experience provides cultural backgrounds and the realistic materials for his wonderful works.Part II emphasizes on the introduction of the sense of wandering in Bellow’s works. It is not a coincidence that the motif of wandering goes into almost all of Bellow’s novels. The sense of wandering has become the race concept of Jews and Americans that has developed during the long history. Bellow, as a Jewish descendant, is under the great influence of the Jewish culture that is hard to break up. Living in America since a teenager, Bellow has gotten a deep knowledge of American spirit. His American experience also provides him perspectives to view the society that symbolizes modern civilization.In Part III, the thesis focuses on the introduction of Bellow’s two spiritual picaresque novels Dangling Man and Herzog. The traditional narrative type of picaresque novel is used to reflect the motif of wandering. The thesis introduces the inheritance of Odyssey in Bellow’s in order to outline the process of spiritual restoration of the picaros. Moreover, the writing devices employed by Bellow to analyze the inner quest journey of his heroes will be discussed. The traditional narrative type and the innovative employment of writing devices help in delineating the dangling imprisonment of Joseph and Herzog’s thoughts about the fate of human beings.In Part IV, the thesis concentrates on the analysis of the mental journey of Joseph and Herzog. The quest and the returning to community are involved in the wandering process of the spiritual picaros. This process, which is similar to Odysseus’, witnesses their self-examination and change of heart which brings them to the final integration with the community.The two influences that motivate Joseph and Herzog’s returning will be explained in Part V. A humanistic writer, Bellow inherits optimism toward life from Jewish culture and shows the life full of love and goodness to human beings. The emphasis on individuality is also a point in his worldview. The significance of individuality is what Bellow gets from the American cultural tradition. These two motivations direct Bellow’s picaros’return to the community with the essence of self.The last part is a conclusion. As a sensitive historical observer, Bellow represents the spiritual crisis to people in modern society through the wanderers’spiritual predicament and spiritual pilgrimage. What he is concerned not only is the existence of the Jews in American mainstream society, but also covers universally the fate of all human beings.更多还原