美国文学史论文

第一篇：美国文学史论文

以《乞力马扎罗山的雪》为例浅谈海明威作品的悲观主义

2009级英语专业 黄娜

从《老人与海》,《太阳照样升起》,《永别了，武器》到《丧钟为谁而鸣》,我都能隐隐约约的感觉到海明威在作品中透露出的悲观。

在帮助海明威获得罗贝尔文学奖的《老人与海》中，海明威极力地把圣地亚哥塑造成一个百折不挠、坚强不屈、敢于面对暴力和死亡的“硬汉子”形象，但是圣地亚哥最终还是没有获得大马哈鱼，仍然是悲剧的。又例如海明威在1940年发表了以西班牙内战为背景的反法西斯主义的长篇小说《丧钟为谁而鸣》。作品描写了主人公美国青年乔顿，他志愿参加西班牙人民的反法西斯斗争，奉命在一支山区游击队的配合下，在指定时间炸毁一座具有战略意义的桥梁。这本来是英雄史诗般的行为，读者大多盼望这样一个伟大的英雄能够高唱凯歌回到祖国，受到英雄般的待遇，人民需要英雄。但是小说的结果又是悲观的。乔顿虽然成功完成了任务，炸毁了桥梁，但他自己也身负重伤，在敌强我弱的情况下阻击敌人，毋庸置疑等待他只有死亡，结局侨顿确实死了。

这样的情节在海明威的作品中很多。但是笔者今天重点谈谈在《乞力马扎罗山的雪》中海明威这种悲观主义。

1.故事中透露着对死亡的悲观。首先声明我是个乐观主义者。虽然小

时候这种价值观的作文，老师一般会发回重写。因为这和歌颂美好的生活的主题严重不搭调。为什么说故事透露出对死亡的悲观呢？这部《乞力马扎罗的雪》是海明威晚年的一部短篇小说。故事大致上是对于一个临死前的人的精彩描述。主要讲述一个作家哈里去非洲狩猎,途中汽车抛锚,皮肤被刺划破,染上坏疽病。他和他的妻子在等待一架飞机来把他送到医院治疗。故事围绕“死亡”和“即将死亡”来写,但根本的主题是哈里回到过去,从过去走到现在的历程回顾。哈里热爱这个世界,他有很多经历,跟不同女人的经历,以及自己所从事的不同职业的经历,他都想写下来但却没来得及写,他最终没有能达到心中的目标,死前,他悔恨至极。虽然故事说的是哈里，但是可以看出也体现了作者真实情况的反应。他和故事主人公有很多相似之处。例如都是作家，都经历了不同的女人，也都是喜爱狩猎，敢于冒险。但是在面对死亡的时候都充满了恐惧。道出了所有人与生俱来的害怕死亡的事实。

2.文章开始就体现了对生活的悲观。生活本来可以很美好的。可是《乞力马扎罗的雪》一开篇就把猎队的所有人送入到绝境，小说的主人公哈里的坏疽危及生命，烦躁不安的他认为自己就要死了，而且是由于一点点的小小的疏忽酿成此悲剧。他觉得这样悄无声息的，毫无价值的死太冤了。这种故事情节的设计固然增加了故事的可看性，但是把生活描述太过于坎坷和悲剧。

3.对人的描写过于悲观和狭隘。人本来是伟大的，我喜欢正面描写的人，堂堂正正，光明磊落。死而后已的形象。但是在故事中哈里由于害怕死亡，所以他恨不得毁掉一切以换取自己的生存，无法容忍别人还在健康的活着，他不停的找机会和海伦吵架，用各种各样的难听的、攻击性的话去刺激她，把自己遭受的一切不行强加在她的身上，而其实这种内心的愤怒与发泄又都源于内心的对于死的恐惧，死亡的忧惧扰得他五内俱焚。他想以写作掩饰心灵惊颤，想借酒浇灭精神痛苦，想以往日的荣耀抵平今日的失误，其实这些都没有用，只是更加使得自己遭受着百般的折磨，坠入毁灭自己的深渊。不可否认，任何一个垂死的人，都同哈里一样，知道死亡近在咫尺的时候，有着无法抗拒的恐惧和对人世间的留恋。

4.把死亡描写的过于恐惧。恐惧来源于人的内心。虽然我们都知道：无论我们如何抗争，作为生命、希望，只有死亡具有终结一切的意义。但是只要我们活着，能做些有意义的事情，死亡就不可怕。故事中哈里等待死亡一步步逼近的时候，他惧怕的过分敏感，毛骨悚然，不禁让人觉得心疼他，可是死神不管你是否愿意或者是如何挣扎，怎奈恐惧，终将如期降临在哈里的身上。哈里这样去对待死亡是完全没有意义的。

5.反映了海明威的世界观的局限。从全文的思想意义上看，里面的人物都带有一定的悲观主义色彩。主人公哈里，是写作生涯取得一定成就之后在奢靡中迷失自己的人。但作为一个作家的警觉，他意识到了自己的迷失。他企图回到非洲，那个曾经给过他历练的地方，找回自己。但其实他明白，过去的自己，再也找不回了。伤口生坏疽而死不是真正的原因，“哀大莫过于心死”，但好在，死的时候他已清醒认识了自己，认识了人生。

悲观主义也许就是海明威想要表现的思想之一，也是海明威独具风格的艺术形式。若干年以后，以硬汉形象著称的海明威把双筒猎枪塞进自己的嘴里但求一死，也许海明威早在许多年前就借哈里的相同身份体验了美丽而残酷的死亡。并以这样的方式诠释了其悲观主义。

第二篇：美国文学史名词解释

It were flourishing from the beginning of 17th to the middle period of 18th.They stressed predestination, original sin, total depravity, and limited atonement from God‟s grace.They went to America to prove that they were God‟s chosen people who would enjoy God‟s blessings on earth and in Heaven.Finally, they built a way of life that stressed hard work, thrift, piety, and sobriety.Both doctrinaire and an opportunist.Its Influence on literary were as follows:（影响）(1)American Literature is based on a myth------the Biblical myth of the Garden of Eden.(2)The American Puritan‟s metaphorical made of perception----symbolism.The representatives were Edwards(The Freedom of the Will), Franklin(On the Art of Self-improvement), Crevecoeur(Letters from an American Farmer).代表作家及代表作：Captain John SmithTrue Relation of Virginia(1608)

Anne Bradstreet“To My Dear and Loving Husband”

Benjamin Franklin:The Autobiography of Benjamin FranklinRomanticism was a complex artistic, literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Europe, and gained strength in reaction to the Industrial Revolution.Elements of Romanticism

1.Frontier: vast expanse, freedom, no geographic limitations.2.Optimism: greater than in Europe because of the presence of frontier.不要这么多，我就删掉了3、4、5条。。

Romantic Attitude

1.Appeals to imagination;use of the “willing suspension of disbelief.”

2.Stress on emotion rather than reason;optimism, geniality.3.Subjectivity: in form and meaning.Characteristics of Romanticism:

a.Romanticism was a rebellion against the objectivity of rationalism.(subjectivity)

b.For romantics, the feelings, intuitions and emotions were more important than reason and common sense.c.They emphasized individualism, placing the individual against the group, against authority.d.The affirmed the inner life of the self, and wanted to be free to develop and express his own inner thoughts.e.Typical literary forms of romanticism include ballad, lyric, sentimental comedy, problem novel, historical novel ,gothic romance, metrical romance, sonnet.Representatives:

• New England Poets: William Cullen Bryant;Henry Wadsworth Longfellow;

• Writers: James Fenimaore Cooper, Washington Irving“The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Grayon”

• 浪漫主义的影响： The romantic exaltation of the individual suited the nation‟s revolutionary heritage and its

frontier egalitarianism.As a philosophical and literary movement, transcendentalism flourished in New England from 1830s to the Civil War.Its doctrines found their greatest literary advocates in Emerson who published „Nature‟ in 1836 which represented a new way of intellectual thinking in America and presented„The Universe is composed of Nature and the Soul, Spirit is present everywhere.‟ and romantic idealism on Puritan soil as well as Thoreau.Emerson‟s Nature has been called the “Manifesto of American Transcendentalism”.As a philosophy, transcendentalism was neither logical nor systematical.It exalted feeling over reason, individual expression over the restraints of law and custom.Yet transcendentalism was a powerful expression of the intellectual mood of the age.What is Transcendentalism?

In the realm of art and literature it meant the shattering of pseudo-classic rules and forms in favor of a spirit of freedom, the creation of works filled with the new passion for nature and common humanity and incarnating a fresh sense of the wonder, promise, and romance of life.Major Concepts(main ideas)

1, „transcend ere‟: to rise above, to pass beyond the limits

2, Believe people could learn things both from the outside world by means of the 5 senses and from the inner world by intuition.3, It placed spirit first and matter second

4, It took nature as symbolic of spirit or God.5, It emphasized the significance of the individual

6, Religion was an emotional communication between an individual soul and the universal „oversoul‟.Major writers and Literary Works

Ralph Waldo Emerson(1803----1882)Self-Reliance

Henry David Thoreau(1817----1862)Walden

超验主义的影响：it could exercise a healthy and restorative influence on the human mind.The natural implication that things in nature tended to become symbolic, and the physical world was a symbol of the spiritual.This in turn added to the1

tradition of literary symbolism in American literature.the ideas it represented have remained a strong influence on great American writers from the days of Hawthorne and Whitman to the present.——latter half of the nineteenth century

American Realism: In American literature, the Civil War brought the Romantic Period to an end.The Age of Realism came into existence.It came as a reaction against the lie of romanticism and sentimentalism.Realism turned from an emphasis on the strange toward a faithful rendering of the ordinary, a slice of life as it is really lived.It expresses the concern for commonplace and the low, and it offers an objective rather than an idealistic view of human nature and human experience.Major Features:

1）Realism is the theory of writing in which familiar aspects of contemporary life and everyday scenes are represented in a straightforward or mother-of-fact manner.2）Open ending(means real life is complex and cannot be fully understood)

3）Focuses on the lives of the common people

4）Emphasize objectivity

Representatives:

Howells, Henry James

代表作：William Dean HowellsThe Rise of Silas Lapham

Henry James“The American”、“Daisy Miller”、“ in the Portrait of a Lady”

现实主义影响：Realism was a reaction against Romanticism and paved the way to Modernism。

thlocal colorism is a type of writing that was popular in the late 19(1860s—1870s).Local Color Fiction:

Local colorism as a trend became dominant in American literature in the late 1860s and early 1870.The frontier humorists who had been popular with their “tall tales” before the Civil War paved the way for local color fiction.Basic Features

Local color fiction presents a locale which is distinguished form the outside world.Local color fiction describes the exotic and the picturesque.It describes things that are not common in other regions.Local color fiction also attempts to show things as they as they are.Local color fiction glorifies the past.(nostalgic about the past)

Local color fiction stresses the influence of setting on character.Masters：

Mark Twain（笔名）

Samuel Langhorne Clemens

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

6.American naturalism

American naturalism was a new and harsher realism, and like realism, it had come from Europe.Naturalism was an outgrowth of realism that responded to theories in science, psychology, human behavior and social thought current in the late nineteenth century.Background:

In the last decade of the nineteenth century, with the development of industry and modern science, intelligent minds began to see that man was no longer a free ethical being in a cold, indifferent and essentially Godless universe.In this chance world he was both helpless and hopeless.Major Features:

Humans are controlled by laws of heredity and environment

The universe is cold, godless, indifferent and hostile to human desires.Representatives:

The pessimism and deterministic ideas of naturalism pervaded the works of such American writers as Stephen Crane,Crane‟s is the first American naturalism work.Norris‟s McTeague is the manifesto of American naturalism.Dreiser‟s is the work in which naturalism attained maturity.These writers‟ detailed description of the lives of the downtrodden and the abnormal, their frank threatment of human passion and sexuality, and their portrayal of men and women overwhelmed by blind forces of nature still exert a powerful influence on modern writers.Influence:

Although naturalist literature described the world with sometimes brutal realism, it sometimes also aimed at bettering the world through social reform.This combination of grim reality and desire for improvements is typical of America as it moved into the twentieth century.A poetic movement of England and the U.S.that flourished from 1909 to 1917.The movement insists on the creation of images in poetry by “the direct treatment of the thing” and the economy of wording.“poetic techniques to record exactly the momentary impressions”

Major features:

---it was one of the most essential technique of writing poetry in modern period.---with a spirit of revolt against conventions, imagism was anti—romantic and anti-victorian

---In a sense, imagism was equivalent to naturalism in fiction

---it produced free verse without imposing a rhythmical pattern.---Imagism tried to record objective observations of an object or a situation without interpretation or comment by the poet.---it produced free verse without imposing a rhythmical pattern.---Imagism tried to record objective observations of an object or a situation without interpretation or comment by the poet.The most outstanding figures:

Ezra Pound Amy Lowell Hilda Doolittle

The form of free verse(Ezra Loomis Pound)

影响：.its influence

1)the imagist theories call for brief language, describing the precise picture in as few words as possible.This new way of poetry composition has a lasting influence in the 20th century poetry.2)the second lasting influence of Imagism is the form of free verse.There are no metrical rules.There are apparent indiscriminate line breaks, which reflects the discontinuity of life itself.That is art of the poem.The poet uses the length of the lines and the strange groupings of words to show how life itself can be broken up into somehow meaningless clustersFree verse was originated by a group of French poets of the late 19th century.Poetry that is based on the irregular rhythmic cadence(韵律)of the recurrence, with variations, of phrases, images, and syntactical(依照句法的)patterns rather than the conventional use of meter（音步）.Rhyme may or may not be present in it, but when it is , it is used with great freedom.Their purpose was to free themselves from the restrictions of formal metrical patterns and to recreate instead the free rhymes of nature period.Walt Whitman„s leaves of grass is perhaps the most notable example.thIt has since been used Ezra Pound, T.S.Eliot and other major American poets of the 20 century.Walt Whiteman‟s Leaves of Grass is, perhaps , the most notable example.9.The Lost Generation is a group of expatriate American writers residing primarily in Paris during the 1920s and 1930s.The group was given its name by the American writer Gertrude Stein, who used “a lost generation” to refer to expatriate Americans bitter about their World War I experiences and disillusioned with American society.Hemingway later used the phrase as an epigraph for his novel The Sun Also Rises.It consisted of many influential American writers, including Ernest Hemingway, F.Scott Fitzgerald, William Carlos Williams and Archibald MacLeish.The lost generation is a term first used by Stein to describe the post-war I generation of American writers: men and women haunted by a sense of betrayal and emptiness brought about by the destructiveness of the war.2>full of youthful idealism, these individuals sought the meaning of life, drank excessively, had love affairs and created some of the finest American literature to date.3>the three best-known representatives of lost generation are F.Scott Fitzgerald, Hemingway and John dos Passos.10.The Hemingway hero is an average man of decidedly masculine tastes, sensitive and intelligent, a man of action, and one of few words.That is an individualist keeping emotions under control, stoic and self-disciplined in a dreadful place.These people are usually spiritual strong, people of certain skills, and most of them encounter death many times.The heroes in his book are all have something in common which Hemingway values: they have seen the cold world and for one cause or another, they boldly and courageously face the reality;whatever the result is, they are ready to live with grace under pressure.The Hemingway code hero has an indestructible spirit for his optimistic view of life, though he is pessimistic that is Hemingway.Ernest Hemingway‟s “iceberg theory” suggests that the writer include in the text only a small portion of what he knows, leaving about ninety percent of the content a mystery that grows beneath the surface of the writing.If a writer of prose knows enough about what he is writing about he may omit things that will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them.The dignity of movement of an iceberg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water.A good writer does not need to reveal every detail of a character or action

The Jazz Age describes the period of the 1920s and 1930s, the years between World War I and World War II.Particularly in North America.With the rise of the great depression, the values of this age saw much decline.Perhapsthe most representative literary work of the age is American writer Fitzgerald‟s The Great Gatsby.Highlighting what some describe as the decadence and hedonism, as well as the growth of individualism.Fitzgerald is largely credited with coining the term” Jazz Age”.

第三篇：美国文学史梗概

美国文学史梗概

一、殖民地时代和美国建国初期

最早来自这片新大陆的欧洲移民主要是定居在新英格兰的清教徒和马萨诸塞的罗马天主教徒，二者虽然在教义上有很多不同之处，但他们都信奉加尔文主义：人生在世只是为了受苦受难，而他们唯一的希望是争做上帝的“选民”，死后进天国，相信“原罪”。这时的文学作品也主要反映了这些思想，和欧洲文学一脉相承。

代表作家：考顿·马瑟，乔纳森·爱德华兹，安妮·布拉兹特里特，爱德华·泰勒。

二、18世纪独立战争胜利后，美国经济社会进入稳步发展时期

这一时期是启蒙主义文学运动的时期，主要文学指导思想是“自然神论（”Deism），强调理性，认为“宇宙的运动始于上帝”；自然万物是“神的体现”，人生在世，不再是受苦受难以换取来世的新生，而是要消灭种族、性别和信仰的不平等，建立自己的“人间乐园”。

主要特点：作家多是美国独立战争的积极拥护者和参加者；文学指导思想除了自然神论之外还有“唯理主义”和“新古典主义”，18世纪末还开始萌发了“早期浪漫主义”；文学种类主要有历史、日记和政论，也有诗歌，讽刺小品和劝人向善的故事，18世纪末还产生了话剧。

启蒙运动中出现大量优秀的散文作品，并多出自开国元勋之手，如本杰明·富兰克林，托马斯·潘恩，以及托马斯·杰斐逊。

三、19世纪南北战争时期

这一时期的文学先后发展了浪漫主义，现实主义和自然主义。

浪漫主义：18世纪70年代－19世纪30年代是浪漫主义发展的初期，南北战争前30年（1830－1860）为极盛时期，南北战争后10年逐渐衰微并向现实主义过度。浪漫主义注重“想象”、“激情”和“个性解放”，认为人本质是善良的，铲除邪恶和拯救人类的手段是抛弃一切传统束缚，摧毁一切陈规陋习而回归到“自然的原始状态中去。超验主义是其一分支，强调“天人合一”，认为上帝、人类和自然都是“超灵”的组成部分。

代表作家及作品：爱默生《自然》，索罗《瓦尔登湖》，霍桑《红字》，麦尔维尔《白鲸》，惠特曼《草叶集》。

现实主义：是美国政治、经济发展的必然产物，西部开拓运动、工业化、科学技术的进步都促进了其发展。现实主义的作家一般为实用主义和民主主义的信徒，他们追求和反映的是具有显而易见效果并被经验证实了的相对真理，他们创作题

材的是普通人平常事，是中产阶级艺术的最高表现。

豪威尔斯是现实主义的奠基人，他发现了马克·吐温，鼓励和帮助了亨利·詹姆斯，影响了自然主义作家弗兰·克诺里斯和斯蒂芬·克莱恩。

自然主义：是现实主义的发展和继续，是现实主义与19世纪科学所强调的“分析法”和“因果律”互相结合的产物，有时被称为“悲观的现实主义”，认为人是一种软弱无能的动物，被置于机械化的世界汇总而成为这一世界中难以驾御的几种势力（包括环境、自然、遗传等）的牺牲品

其里程碑是：19世纪70、80年代左拉的小说的出版，90年代克莱恩的《红色英勇徽章》，1900年德莱塞《嘉莉妹妹》，1912年《金融家》，1925年《美国的悲剧》。

四、20世纪美国文学经历了两次世界大战，跨越了三个时代

a)斯文时代（1880－1914，The Genteel Age）：这是一个跨世纪的，美国经济繁荣的时代。此时的美国文学与欧洲文学之间有着某种暧昧关系，本质上是欧洲式的和美国的小欧洲新英格兰式的。此时以西奥多·罗斯福为代表的民族主义在文学上有着强烈的反映，人们还念念不忘美国与欧洲的文化联系与差异。

b)爵士时代（1918－1929, The Jazz Age）：一战后，产生了一代不受约束，幻想破灭了和玩世不恭的年青人，被格特鲁德·斯坦因称为“迷惘的一代”。

c)经济萧条时代（1929－1941，The Depression Era）：20年代的玩世不恭的态度在此时转化为一种愤愤不平的悲观主义，30年代美国文学转向了“社会抗议文学”，“心理之学”和追求人的精神世界。

美国文学先后经历了现代主义，和后现代主义思潮：

现代主义：一战后到50年代，是一场自觉地反传统的文学艺术运动，表现无意识的荒谬心态，如斯坦因，乔伊斯的小说，运用意识流的手法，如福克纳的《喧哗与骚动》和《我弥留之际》；在组织构架上偏爱用神话，如艾略特的《荒原》，庞德的《诗章》，乔伊斯的《尤利西斯》；风格上以“意象”为主，语言上主张简洁、准确；题材上主要反映一战参与者的生活、思想、感情和前途命运，如多斯珀索斯的《三个士兵》，海明威的《太阳照样升起》，《永别了，武器》，描写了精神崩溃与幻想破灭的一代人。

邪恶是这是文学的主要题材之一，艾略特、弗罗斯特、奥尼尔、卡明斯、埃利森的作品中都有体现。

后现代主义：在二战后，纳粹极权主义大屠杀、原子弹、自然环境的破坏、世界人口过剩和饥荒造成西方人的精神摧残与危机，作家继续进行现代主义反传统的文艺实验，而且企图与当时业已形成规范的现代主义文艺形式决裂。后现代主义

主张否定社会秩序，表现支离破碎的世界，认为文艺批评就是现象学形式的理论。此时，美国黑人文学，犹太文学，南方文学，反战文学和女权主义文学竞相发展。

小说家托马斯·品钦，诗人西尔维亚·普莱斯，戏剧家艾玛穆·阿米里·巴拉卡为典型的后现代主义作家。

索尔·贝娄，艾伦·金斯伯格，拉尔夫·埃里森，田纳西·威廉斯，阿瑟·密勒和爱德华·阿尔比是从现代主义向后现代主义过渡的著名作家。

20世纪美国文学的两个特征：

1.现代主义作家一般是反对传统观念而提倡“个人主义”的或者说他们打破了美国社会、道德和文学的常规。

2.现代作家潜心探索一种真正属于美国人民的写作手法和语言风格，他们试图以纯美国的方式进行创作。

第四篇：中国近代文学史论文

假期的时候看了《骆驼祥子》，它讲述了一个祥子在旧中国想要通过自身奋斗而创造新生活却最终堕落的悲剧故事。祥子从农村来到城里，作为一个城市贫民的代表，他在奋斗的过程中遭遇了许多的挫折。从洋车被乱兵抢走到被迫与虎妞结婚，是他一步步度走向堕落，到最后他甚至会出卖人命来换取钱财。祥子的梦想其实并不难实现，他只是想要一辆车，一辆自己的车。可是社会的黑暗是他一次次的绝望，他用不知多少汗水换来的一辆洋车，最终却也还是落得被乱军抢走。

祥子的婚姻也是他的一次悲剧。祥子想要娶一个可以和他一起奋斗的女子，温柔而且可以和他一起吃苦。可是他最终却被虎妞算计了，而不得不与她成婚。虎妞——泼辣而有心计的中年妇女，生就一副男儿性格，很会打理事物，将人和车场管理的井井有条。颇有心计的她安排好了一场骗局，却没料到早早的被父亲——刘四爷——拆穿，但他还是骗取祥子和她结了婚，但却没料到父亲会狠心抛下她不管，卖了厂子到外地去了。虎妞就是不想劳动而靠资本获得钱财的人，这与祥子的理想生活相差太大，而且虎妞是何等厉害的角色，她想了许多办法来改变祥子，这也使祥子对他婚姻的厌恶感大大加强了。最终由于虎妞的好吃懒做引起难产而死去为祥子婚姻的结局，这一切结局都是又虎妞自己一手造成的，用伎俩换取了婚姻，却算来算去结果把自己的命也算了进去。

祥子对这个强加的婚姻感到委屈耻辱，如果他对虎妞，对这个家也不是只有恨而没有留恋，那样的话虎妞的死应带给他解脱的兴奋，但实际上他是痛苦的。因为虎妞也带给了他温暖，一回家就可以吃到温热可口的饭菜，虎妞拿私房钱维持生活，给他买车，圆了他买车的梦，在他生病时照顾他。祥子也觉得“不管怎样，他觉得自己已足有了家，一个家总有他的可爱处”，“生命的延续不过是生儿养女——只要有个小孩，生命便不会是空的”。虎妞其实也是喜欢祥子的，只是她对祥子的喜欢演变成了一种占有，她想不断的改变祥子，让祥子时时刻刻都陪着自己，远离车夫这种低贱的行业。但可惜的是虎妞不理解祥子，她不知道祥子真正向往的是什么样的生活，这也是祥子这场婚姻的失败之处,在那样的时代，没人能理解他。

尽管婚姻带给祥子痛苦，他也不想毁掉它，可现实连这么低微的要求都不能满足他，是多么的悲哀!祥子与虎妞的婚姻悲剧又是性格悲剧祥子是来自农村的城市个体劳动者，农村的生活在他的性格以至于他的形象的各个方面都留下了深刻的印记。无论是他的健壮、木讷或者勤快、朴实，还有他的狭隘、保守或者谨小慎微，即从外表，生活习惯，到心理状态，精神气质，无不带有浓厚的泥土气息，显示出来自乡间的特点。祥子性格上最大的特点，是通过个人奋斗改变自己祥子的婚姻的社会地位和生活命运的强烈愿望。他所承受的是来自整个社会的沉重压迫，孤立的零散的个人奋斗自然难以取得成功；即使有了自己的车子并且始终保有，又何尝能够摆脱这些压制而成为真正可以独立自主，幸福生活的劳动者?他自身的身份地位是他的这种想法不切实际。这种不切实际的打算，使他一开始就陷入了盲目性，一切真诚的努力都是毫无意义的，等待他的只能是失败和悲剧，攒钱买车是祥子理想的全部，他拼命拉车，生活节俭，无不良嗜好。靠自己的双手买了车，日子好一些，他才会考虑娶亲，而这强加的婚姻使他要靠双手立业成家的愿望成了泡影，他感到委屈和耻辱。祥子本打算，假如有了车，生活好一些，“而且愿意娶亲的话，他必定要到乡下娶个年轻力壮，吃得苦，能洗能做的姑娘。”虎妞不是合适的人选，她想要靠资本过活，而且又会耍手段，祥子正是因为自制力不强，才中了虎妞设下了圈套。虎妞想要占有祥子，她对祥子和对别人比起来真是好上百倍。祥子被军阀逃兵抢去心爱的车，逃出回到人和厂时“虎妞仿佛是招待个好朋友”，当他病未好利索就拼命拉车，心疼他的也是虎妞，“她真是一百一的客气，爱护”，这对于无亲无故的祥子，是温暖的，所以祥子认为虎妞是做朋友的不错人选。可她不符合祥子的婚姻理想：好看些、年轻、和顺。从祥子不接受虎妞也是因为封建传统观念对祥子的影响。虎妞不但又丑又老，婚前还用欺骗手段得到丈夫，婚后还傲慢地支配丈夫，祥子在新房里转悠，他感觉整个生命就是一部委屈。所以祥子看虎妞是母老虎，怕她，又恨她，怎么能接受他呢?祥子不接受虎妞理应拒绝，但他又不能摆脱掉虎妞；虎妞的私房钱可以弄上的二三辆车，“不为要她还不为要那几辆车吗”?同时祥子又狭隘、爱面子，怕别人说他贪图刘四家财，怕别人笑他依赖虎妞生活，怕别人骂他不正大光明。祥子的矛盾不仅造成了自己的痛苦，也给虎妞带来了不幸。祥子与虎妞生活习惯与情趣及挣钱的方式方法上也有矛盾与分歧，这些矛盾与分歧是由各自的性格决定的，它使这场婚姻的悲剧色彩更加的浓重。

祥子与虎妞最大的差别在于思想，他们的悲剧也源于此。无论祥子怎么忍让或者是试着和虎妞相处，他们之间总有隔阂甚至是矛盾。在现代的婚姻中已经没有了社会的逼迫，但是还是会有很多人因为钱财与权力的逼迫和诱惑选择不适合自己的婚姻。其实这样的婚姻又何尝不像祥子一般，想逃又逃不掉，相适应却又适应不了，最终只会是自己人生的一大悲剧。面对如此的婚姻，应该很清楚的认识到其中的利与弊，然后才可以做出正确的选择，避免人生陷入困境。

第五篇：美国文学史简述

A Short Summary of the History of American Literature

In American Literature, Colonial and Revolutionary period, American Romanticism, The Realistic Period and American Modernism are the four important periods.During 17C and 18C is the American colonial and Revolutionary Period.Puritanism is the main school of this period, which is the practices and belief of puritans.The American puritans accept the doctrine and practice of predestination, original sin and total depravity, and limited atonement through a special infusion of grace from God.But due to the grim struggle for living in the new continent, they become more and more practical.American Puritanism is so much a part of the national atmosphere rather than a set of tenets.Jonathan Edwards was one of the great writers of the Puritanism, his works include The Freedom of the Will, The Nature of True Virtue and so on.Philip Freneau is “a poet of the American Revolution” and “the father of American Poetry”.The Rising Glory of American and The Wild Honey Suckle are his famous works.Puritanism gradually declined at the end of 18C.As a result of the impact of European Literary Romanticism, there rapidly came into being the rise of romanticism in American.The American romanticism flourished from 1815 to 1865, which advocated importance to individual dignity and value, and they shared some characteristics— moral enthusiasm, individuality and intuitive perception.Transcendentalism, which appeared after 1830, marked the maturity of American Romanticism and the first Renaissance in the American literary history.It laid emphasis on spirit, individual and nature.Washington Irving is a writer of this period, who has been called “the father of American Literature”.He wins the international fame for The Sketch Book, which marked the beginning of American Romanticism.Ralph Waldo Emerson is the New England Transcendentalist.Nature, his famous work, is regarded as the “manifesto of American Transcendentalism”.American industrialization was one of the important factors of the development of American Realistic Literature, which was the beginning of what Mark Twain called “The Gilded Age” from 1865 to 1914.American Realism came as a reaction against the lie of romanticism and sentimentalism.It turned from an emphasis on the faithful rendering of the ordinary, a slice of life as it is really lived.It expresses the common place and the low, and it offers an objective rather than an idealistic view of human nature and human experience.A realistic writer is more objective than subjective, more descriptive than symbolic.Realists looked for truth in any place.William Dean Howells is the champion of realism.He writes about the rising middle class and the way they live.The Rise of Silas Lapham, his masterpiece, is a fine example of the American realism.Mark Twain is a great literary artist and social critic.He writes about the story of the low class and is famous for his colloquial style and localism.The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn is his famous fiction, which has been regarded as one of the greatest books of western literature and western civilization.After the WWI, some young writers wondered pointlessly and restlessly, while at the same time they were called the “Lost Generation”.Then, there came into being the modernism from 1914 to 1945, it is used to show the literary art possessing outstanding characteristics in conception, feeling, form and style after the WWI.It means cutting off history and a sense of despair and loss.It refused to accept the traditional ideological influences.F.Scott Fitzgerald is widely regarded as one of the 20th century’s greatest writers.This Side of Paradise is his first novel, it became immensely popular for the simple reason that it caught the tone of the age.Ernest Hemingway is the famous writer of this period.He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for The Old Man and the Sea.A Farewell to Arms is his masterpiece in which the author deals with the war directly.This is what I want to say about the history of American literature.