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【标题】 论托妮莫里森《宠儿》中的女权主义意识 【作者】艾 智 利

【关键词】托尼?莫里森；《宠儿》；黑人妇女；女权主义意识 【指导老师】刘 敏 【专业】英语

【正文】

I. Introduction

In October, 1993, the Nobel Prize for Literature was granted to a black American woman writer----Toni Morrison．It marks both a new stage of black literature and a new position of women writers in the literary world. As the first black woman writer who is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, Toni Morrison helps develop the 20th century novel writing.

Toni Morrison’s master work Beloved is regarded as a milestone in the history of the Afro-Americans. It represents certain aspects of Morrison’s unique creative motivation and literary technique. Through narrating a story in which a black mother kills her own daughter, the novels takes us into the rarely-known black female’s inner world, revealing the twists and turns during the process of their arduous exploration of self with fresh and poetic language and multilayer structure and narration. As a spokeswoman of her race, a female and a mother, Morrison shows her sympathy and loving care to the black slaves, especially to the black women by using her incisive tone of writing.

This thesis mainly analyzes the feminist awareness in Toni Morrison’s masterpiece Beloved. First it introduces Toni Morrison’s life and literary achievements, as well as her masterpiece Beloved; then it discusses on the female Afro-Americans’ social position and feminism in America. The major part of the thesis is the analysis of feminist awareness of the characters in Beloved. The writer of this thesis appeals people to eliminate the ethnic oppression and gender discrimination; advocates the equality of the sexes and encourages women to have self-reliance, to act in a loving way toward themselves, and to be brave enough to chase their dreams.

II. Toni Morrison and her Novel Beloved

Toni Morrison displayed an early interest in literature. She made her debut as a novelist in 1970, soon gaining the attention of both critics and a wider audience for her epic power, unerring ear for dialogue, and her

poetically-charged and richly-expressive depictions of Black America. The novel Beloved is a new milestone in Toni Morrison’s literary life. Because

of this novel, she won the Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1988. “Beloved is one of Morrison’s best books, it is of great achievements and it will become a most attractive book in 10 years.” said John Leonard in the “Los Angeles Times”.1 It is based on the impact of slavery and of the emancipation of slaves on individual black people. A. Toni Morrison’s Life and Literary Achievements

Toni Morrison was born by the name of Chloe Anthony Wofford in Lorain, Ohio on February 18, 1931. She was born in a Black family which has deep racial hatred. Her grandfather was a slave during the U.S Civil War. He didn’t trust the white at all, and he thought that the white was a race of depravation. Her father was a physical laborer who had to take three different jobs at the same time to support the family, and such kind of situation lasted for seventeen years. In 1949, she entered Howard University in Washington, D.C., the America’s most distinguished black college. Her grade was excellent and she was an active member in dramatic activities. She continued her study for master’s degree in English in Cornell

University in 1953 and received her M.A. degree in 1955. After graduation, she spent nine years teaching English, first at Texas Southern University and later at Howard University, where she met and married Harold Morrison, a Jamaican architect. They had two sons. However this marriage only lasted for six years and Toni Morrison never marry again. She started to write at the beginning of 1960s.

As an outstanding representative of American contemporary black woman writer and also a spokeswoman for her race, Toni Morrison concerns herself with American social realities and destinies of common Americans. She describes the lives of black communities, valuable black culture and traditions, researches black people’s struggle against the oppression and inequality upon them. Meanwhile, Morrison deeply sympathizes black women. In her works, she shows the black women’s awareness in self-consciousness and the value for existing independently, and she considers that black women are human beings with their own thoughts and characteristics, and they aspire for freedom and equality like normal people.

Her first novel—The Bluest Eye (1970) is about the story of a black girl who is called Pecola. She is longing for blue eyes which she thinks symbolizing pride and dignity, so she prays every night. Later on, her dream comes true miraculously, and she is so delighted that she wants to fly. Unfortunately, the blue eyes haven’t brought her happiness, instead, she sinks into a more painful abyss after being raped by her father. Morrison’s second novel Sula (1973) introduces a black female called Sula who has a resistant personality. This novel caused a great shock in American literary world, and it was nominated for the National Book Critics Award in

1975.2 In 1977, Morrison won the National Book Critics Circle Award for her book Son of Solomon. Tar Baby, another novel of hers was published in 1981. It describes a racial problem by using symbolism. Her other novels

included Beloved in 1987, Jazz in 1992, Paradise in 1998, and Love in 2003. Morrison always tries to quest her own artistic style in writing. Not like some other writers who follow the method of social realism in creating, she often adds mythology and folklore into works, and to reveal the racial issues in American society by using symbolism. B. Toni Morrison’s Master Work—Beloved

Beloved is based on a true historical event: In the 1850s, a black woman slave Margaret Garner ran away from a slave house in Kentucky to Cincinnati, Ohio, but was caught by the slaveholder at last. In order to protect her children from living a life like hers, she decided to kill them with an axe. However she had just killed a baby girl because of the limited time. When Toni Morrison came across this story while she was undertaking the editing of The Black Book published in 1974 — an anthology reflecting 300 years of African-American lives, she had a strong motivation to write it into a novel, in which she wanted to explore the psychological state of the litigants. She hoped that she could write a history of soul for the black slaves who were severely tortured by slavery. After ten years’ reflection and three years’ writing, Beloved eventually came into being. Morrison gave the main female character the name Sethe who was Margaret Garner in the true story, and the dead baby became Beloved.

The story is set in 1873, in Cincinnati, Ohio. Sethe, a woman slave who has fled from the plantation called “Sweet Home”, lives with her

mother-in-law Baby Suggs, her two sons—Buglar and Howard, and her little daughter Denver. However, the ghost of the baby girl who was killed by Sethe years before also appears in the house, which makes the life of the family abnormal. Later the two sons leaves the house forever secretly, then Baby Suggs dies. The house is haunted by the ghost of the baby girl. Paul D, one of the fellow slaves at Sweet Home who wants to live with Sethe comes to Bluestone 124. and drives the ghost out of the house. Later, a girl about nineteen years old, who calls herself Beloved, appears mysteriously in front of their house. Sethe takes the girl in and regards her as a member of the family. Denver likes Beloved very much, but Paul D has a bad feeling about her. Beloved sticks to Sethe and always asks for her past stories. Unwilling to share Sethe with others, Beloved wants Paul D to leave, so she seduces him, makes him betray Sethe. After knowing that Sethe had killed her own baby girl, Paul D leaves. When Sethe finds that Beloved is her daughter who was killed by her, she wants to compensate her, so she treats her quite well, but Beloved tortures Sethe by blaming Sethe of having killed her. Later Denver realizes the dangerous situation of Sethe whose spirit is about to collapse, and she begins to look for jobs to support the family and tries to save Sethe with the help of the neighbors. At last Beloved disappears from their sight.

III. Feminism in America