The Appreciation of Pride and Prejudice《傲慢与偏见》鉴赏.doc

傲慢与偏见鉴赏The Appreciation of Pride and PrejudiceABSTRACTPride and Prejudice is a representative masterpiece written by Jane Austen. This fiction with social scenic style not only attracted vast readers long ago, but also brings with a unique artistic taste even by today. The application of irony is one of characteristics in the fiction. The author has vividly described five different kinds of loves and marriages by skillfully using irony and his witty and humorous language. Moreover, for the first time throughout the history of English literature, Jane Austen has completely researched and discussed about the issue of womens circumstance and social status. She proposed and insisted that women should fight for their independent dignity and equal rights. It represents an advanced thinking of feminine consciousness.Keywords：Pride and Prejudice Irony Love Marriage Feminine Consciousness摘 要傲慢与偏见是简.奥斯丁的代表作。这部社会风情画式的小说不仅在当时吸引着广大的读者，时至今日，仍给读者以独特的艺术享受。反讽手法的运用这部小说的一大特色，作者在小说中通过反讽手法的运用，以诙谐幽默的语言生动地刻画了四种不同模式的爱情和婚姻。并且，英国文学史上第一次全面探讨了妇女的处境和地位问题，主张妇女人格独立，争取平等权利，表现了女性意识的进步思想。关键词：傲慢与偏见 反讽 爱情 婚姻 女性意识CONTENTS AbstractI摘要II1 Introduction12 Irony22.1 What Is Irony?22.2 Irony In Pride and Prejudice 63 Feminine Consciousness103.1 What Is Feminine Consciousness103.2 Feminine Consciousness In Pride and Prejudice113.2.1 Era Background Of Pride and Prejudice113.2.2 Feminine Consciousness Of Elizabeth In Pride and Prejudice124 Love And Marriage164.1 Brief Introduction164.2 Five Different Marriages In Pride and Prejudice175 Conclusion21References22Acknowledgements231 IntroductionPride and Prejudice is one of the greatest masterpieces written by Jane Austen, the “Most Perfect Female Artist”. In this great work, irony can be found throughout. The author has lively described the ordinary lives of several families in the town to provide the readers with unique artistic taste of relaxation and comedy by using irony and his witty humor.Moreover, in Pride and Prejudice, for the first time in the history of English Literature, Jane Austen has made a breakthrough to shout out her own voice to the world for women. While amusing but significant irony being felt in the work, helplessness and sigh were lying everywhere in it, ringing out unique notes of women. She cared about inner world of women, brought out and insisted on women independence. Feminine consciousness is represented deeply in this work.Last but not least, Jane Austen has displayed her marriage value by describing five different kinds of marriages. Among them, the marriage between Elizabeth the hostess and Darcy the host is the most successful one, it is also the perfect pattern of love and marriage that Jane Austen had dreamed of in her entire life. In her eyes, a happy marriage should be combined with material, morality, sense and sensibility. All of them constitute perfect love and marriage. 2 Irony2.1 What is Irony?Generally, Irony is the difference between what someone does or says in relation to what is understood about what is done or said. Often there is a bit of confusion over what is ironic and what is merely coincidental. The two ideas can be easily confused, however, there is a very distinct difference between what is ironic and what is merely good or bad luck. Irony takes on five main forms, all of which have more very well defined characteristics: (1) Verbal Irony:Verbal irony is the use of words to convey something, especially the opposite of the literal meaning of the words, to emphasize, aggrandize, or make light or a circumstance or subject. A common example of this use of verbal irony is the scenario of a man staring out a window looking at a shiny day and remarking, "Lovely day for skating." This remark is ironic because it expresses the opposite of the circumstances.You hear verbal irony in conversations all the time. The simple comment, "Oh Great" after something very bad happens is verbal irony. Verbal irony is by far the most accessible, far-reaching, and heavily utilized form of irony (and also of sarcastic humor) because of its simplest form - it just involves the equation of two people talking to one another (whereas other forms of irony require a "third" party, generally an audience of some sort to interpret that scenarios as ironic). Of course, as commonplace these days as it may be, verbal irony is an art form to many, requiring the most studied and theatrical of deliveries to achieve peak humorous affect and/or poignancy. With verbal irony, timing is everything. If an ironic comment comes too late or too early in a conversation, is spoken without the correct tone or in an inappropriate circumstance, it may be taken as offensive, or simply as confusing. If, for example a person steps in big puddle of water by mistake, and his/her friend smiles kindly, starts to help his friend up and remarks, "well now, don't you have all the luck!" The comment will probably be taken as funny and ironic and the two will laugh the mishap off. If however, the friend scoffs at his wet, fallen friend, laughs, and says "Ha lucky you!" and yells it really loudly and annoyingly, it may not be as funny. Verbal irony in its essence requires an understanding of situation, attitude, and most importantly, timing.(2) Socratic Irony:Socratic Irony is when a person pretends to be ignorance of something or someone in order to expose the weakness of another's position. Utilized in a debate or argument, one party may feign a lack of knowledge about a topic and thus will make the other party explain his/her position in great detail. In this way one is forced to explain in great details of the topic that is supposedly so foreign to the other person. It is in explaining the topic, that hopefully the person will expose the fallacy or weakness in the position. Socratic irony can be seen as a tactical maneuver of sorts. It's most practical iteration is in the "Socratic method" of teaching, which has been adopted by many prestigious universities throughout the world as a method of student-facilitated education. The professor, the supposed possessor of knowledge, never answers questions, nor does he out-rightly explain the concepts required to understand the course material, but rather poses questions to his students that revolves around the course material, and as such, the students are expected to have arrived in class after having studied the required reading to be able to provide the information to others in their class. The feigned "ignorance" on the part of the professor becomes a means to an end. The class gains the necessary information to learn the course material. On the other hand, Socratic irony can be used for far less noble means than intellectual edification. One sees Socratic irony used quite often to get one's way, or to avoid discussing an uncomfortable topic. Ignorance is bliss so they say, and sometimes pretending that you don't have information can give you the upper hand in an argument, or it can be your getting out of jail free card (For Example, "Well oops, I have no idea who put the bad apples back into the bracket"). There are, however, common and beneficent ways people use Socratic irony. If for example, a child asks his parents about the present underneath their Christmas tree and the parents exclaim, "I have no idea how those gifts got there!" one can see how Socratic irony can play a very important purpose in many American traditions.(3) Tragic Irony:Tragic irony or dramatic Irony is employed to heighten the suspense in a given situation. In this form of irony the words and actions of the characters, unbeknownst to them, betray the real situation, which the spectators fully realize. The character speaking may realize the irony of his words while the rest of the actors may not; or he or she may be unconscious while the other actors share the knowledge with the spectators; or the audience may alone realize the irony. A perfect example is in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, when Romeo commits suicide when he believes Juliet to be dead. Similarly to dramatic irony, tragic irony requires an audience and so you see this type of irony exclusively in the realm of the performative - theatre, movies, books, etc. In this form of irony the words and actions of one character or more betray the real situation and tragic results ensue from those words and/or actions, about which the spectators are aware before the actors. The character speaking may realize the irony of his words while the rest of the actors may not; or he or she may be unconscious while the other actors share the knowledge with the spectators; or the audience may alone realize the irony. Probably the Greek play “Oedipus the King” by Sophocles is the play most wrought with tragic Irony. Oedipus becomes the king by unknowingly murdering his father and marrying his mother. So when Oedipus vows to comprehend and punish the man who murdered the former king, only the audience knows that he is vowing to punish himself. The tragic truths of the play's events are known only to the audience until the play's final conclusions. At that time it is revealed to Oedipus and the rest of the characters. As the Oedipus example so perfectly exemplifies, tragic irony is any circumstance in which dramatic irony is rampant and leads up to a final and tragic event or realization.(4) Dramatic Irony:Dramatic irony is contingent upon a third party witnessing the actions of others and interpreting them as ironic, thus you see it most regularly in artistic productions. Dramatic irony is a big bundle of miscommunication, manufactured by a character or circumstance clandestine to another character, and revealed to the audience. Having this type of concealed action be available to the audience gives it the ability to know more than what certain characters know. The ideas of being unbeknownst and under the wrong impression are ideas that surround dramatic irony. It is the disconnection, or the contrast between what the character says, thinks, or does and the true situation that is being faced. Often times, the character, or characters, cannot see or understand the contrast, but the audience or reader can. For example, in Othello, Othello addresses Iago as "honest Iago." Of course, Othello does not know that Iago is the conniving villain who leads him to believe through trickery and deception that Othello's wife, Desdemona has been unfaithful. The audience has witnessed Iago's high jinks in a way Othello cannot, since he has not been "watching" the rest of the play as the audience has. For this, Othello unjustly kills his wife, believing the whole time in Iagos honesty, which makes this instance in literature both an act of dramatic irony and an act the leads to tragic irony.(5) Situational Irony:Situational Irony occurs in literature and in drama when persons and events come together in improbable situations, creating a tension between expected and real results. An example of this would be a scene where a man and woman are sitting at a bus stop and start to converse. The woman divulges some of her deepest darkest secrets. The man listens and advises her, and the woman thanks him and gets on her bus. After she is gone the man takes off his heavy coat to reveal that he is in fact wearing the garb of a priest. The irony lies in the fact that the woman never knew that the man she was talking to was a priest, but the audience does and the reality of what the audience knows about why the man was so helpful and understanding is different from the reality the woman experienced. Situational irony results from recognizing the oddness or unfairness of a given situation, be it positive or negative. Even though a person typically cannot justifiably explain this unfairness logically, the coincidental nature of the situation is still very obvious to those evaluating it. For example, if the president of Microsoft, Bill Gates, were to win a contest whose grand prize was a computer system, the irony would be situational because such a circumstance would appear ridiculous or "funny" for a number of reasons. Bill Gates doesn't need a computer, he runs the world's largest software company, and he's filthy rich, so winning a computer seems silly and "ironic". This list of half-justified reasons for the oddness of the situation could go on and on but on a very basic level of reasoning all these reasons do really add up. All can be logically rebutted. Bill Gates has just as much chance of winning a contest like that as anyone else who entered. A computer is a great prize to wins, etc. The true "oddness" cannot be explained logically, even though everyone would find that particular situation weird, funny, and "ironic". This sense of being "unfair" or "unfortunate" is a trademark of situational irony. The unusual nature of the circumstances is obvious to everyone and yet, they are not wholly clear when you try to explicate them. Typically the justification for situational irony boils down to someone declaring, "Well, it just is!"2.2 Irony in Pride and PrejudiceAs we all know that the reason Pride and Prejudice can exceed the ordinary fictions and rank the top in the world is that Irony is used lively throughout the whole story. While reading this novel, readers can get feelings of relax and funny through Irony and the authors sense of humor. Moreover, some hints of life and marriage can also be got from it. Now, lets discuss and enjoy irony used in this novel together. (1) The beginning sentences of the novel:From the very beginning of the story, the author uses a so-called truth to start expressing his ironic attitude towards marriage in the society of that time. “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.” “However little known the feelings or views of such a man may be on his first entering a neighborhood, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families, that he is considered as the rightful property of someone or other of their daughters.” Jane Austen in “Pride and Prejudice” Chapter 1From the sentences above, readers may firstly get information that any single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife, which is apparently conveyed by the author. However, read and think deeply, this is just an irony that the author used in order to convey an opposite meaning. The real meaning of these sentences is that women educated well but without a good fortune would always want to marry a husband that has a good fortune, they