摘 要

2007年诺贝尔文学奖获得者，曾被誉为女性经历的史诗作者，以其怀疑态度，才华激情和远见，审视被割裂的文明的英国伟大女作家多丽丝·莱辛，在当代英国文坛占据重要地位，并以其作品人物个性鲜明而备受关注。她的作品风格多变、思想深邃、见解新颖，涉及女性主义、两性关系、阶级冲突、种族矛盾等社会问题和政治事件。小说《屋顶丽人》就是其中的代表作。

愤恨是人们生活中的一种普遍情感。一般被用来表达对某人或某物的极度厌恶。文学作品中对愤恨这种情感的描写往往有着丰富的象征性含义和引申意义。所以对“愤恨”的解析通常能够帮助读者更好地把握文学作品的故事脉络及其思想主旨。本文通过对《屋顶丽人》中三位男主人公各自“愤恨”的分析，结合对他们内心及其对丽人反应的描写，探寻他们“愤恨”的自然原因、社会原因和心理原因。此外，本文还分析了小说中的愤恨描写对人物刻画、氛围渲染、推动情节发展和主题深化等的作用，以期加强读者对故事中各种矛盾冲突和两性关系的了解，揭示了小说的多重主题并展现了莱辛对下层劳苦大众的关怀和同情。

关键词：《屋顶丽人》；愤恨；阶级矛盾；两性关系

Abstract

The 2007 Nobel Prize in literature winner, the great British female writer —Doris Lessing, is once honored as the epicist of the female experience, who with skepticism, fire and visionary power has subjected a divided civilization to scrutiny. She occupies an important place in the contemporary British literary arena and attracts readers’ much concern for distinct characters in her works. Her works broadly involve social problems and political issues like feminism, gender relation, racial tension and class conflicts, and they are characterized by the flexible style, profound thought and innovative ideas. The novel A Woman on a Roof can be counted as a vivid example among her works.

Hatred is a common feeling in people’s daily life. In general, it was used to express an angry feeling of extreme dislike for somebody or something. The descriptions of hatred in literary works usually contain abundant symbolic meanings and implied meanings. Therefore the analysis of “hatred” becomes very significant for it can usually help readers quickly master the plot and theme of literary works. This paper attempts to analyze the hatred of three male characters in A Woman on a Roof, combining with the descriptions of their varied thoughts and responses to that lady—the female character of the story, and to explore the natural, social and psychological reasons of their anger. Moreover, the paper probes into the functions of hatred in characters’ descriptions, atmosphere rendering, plot development and theme promotion, so as to enhance readers’ understanding of various conflicts and gender relation of the then society, and to reveal the multiple themes as well as Lessing’s concern about the underclass people.

Key Words：A Woman on a Roof；hatred；class contradictions；gender relation

Contents

1 Introduction 1

1.1 Doris Lessing and A Woman on a Roof 1

1.2 Literature Review 2

1.3 The Significance of the Paper 3

1.4 The Layout of the Paper 3

2 Harry’s Hatred 4

2.1 Natural Environment’s Factor of Hatred’s Formation 4

2.2 Social Environment’s Factor of Hatred’s Formation 5

2. 3 Psychological Factor of Hatred’s Formation 6

3 Stanley’s Hatred 7

3. 1 Natural Environment’s Factor of Hatred’s Formation 8

3. 2 Social Environment’s Factor of Hatred’s Formation 8

3. 3 Psychological Factor of Hatred’s Formation 9

4 Tom’s Hatred 11

4. 1 Natural Environment’s Factor of Hatred’s Formation 12

4. 2 Social Environment’s Factor of Hatred’s Formation 12

4. 3 Psychological Factor of Hatred’s Formation 13

5 Conclusion 14

References 15

Acknowledgements 16

The Study of Hatred in the Novel A Woman on a Roof

1 Introduction

• 1. Doris Lessing and A Woman on a Roof

Doris Lessing, (1919—2013), is a British female writer. She won the Nobel Prize for literature in 2007. Her major works include The Grass is Singing, The Golden Notebook, The Fifth Child, This Was the Old Chief's Country, Particular Cats and A Woman on a Roof. She is considered as the ivy of literary circle as well as the greatest female writer in England after Virginia Woolf. As a prolific writer, her works cover poetry, prose, play and novel (Radha, 2007). Her writing style and themes can be simply divided into four parts：Works on the background of  the people’s life in African colonies and the themes are mainly about the struggling for national independence, freedom and equality. Works are about the modern women’s plights and their process of seeking self-liberation. Works use allegories and illusions to describe the crisis human beings are facing and make a forecast of the future world. Realistic novels are about some serious social problems. Over her life, Doris Lessing has discussed various themes, like colonialism, the gender relation and of old age (Pickering, 1990). Although some people regard Lessing as one of the founders of feminism, unlike other feminists who lay one-side emphasis on the contradiction between male and female, Lessing believes that both male and female have their own defects and only by intercommunication and unification can we achieve win-win. She also highlights that intercommunication must be based on the principle of equality and mutual benefit. Otherwise, we may not deal with those social crises successfully (Pang, 2012). A Woman on a Roof is one of Lessing’s famous works. It was accomplished in 1963, and was taken from the collection of short novel named One Man and Two Women (Yuan, 2011, p.50).

The story happened on an apartment’s roof in London. A sexy lady wore nothing but the red bikini, lying on the roof to enjoy her sunbath. She attracted three male workers’ attention on the nearby roof. They whistled, jeered, stomped and abused. But no matter how hard they tried to accost her, the lady just ignored their provocation and treated them indifferently and dismissively. The plot is quite simple, but is full of profound messages. The lady’s responses show her great courage to fight against the oppression of patriarchal society; her rebellious spirit as well as the self-awareness in the then society reflects the need for females to pursue their own equality and liberty. However, her behavior has aroused three men’s resentment on account of the then patriarchal society’s judgment criteria, which is males are in the center of the whole society, while females just play some subordinate roles and should obey their male masters. To be specifically, women should behave properly under the constraints of morality and rules. Three workers’ hatred revealed their typical attitudes toward and prejudice against women too.

The background of the story is after World War Ⅱ. The British national economy was badly wrecked and the class struggle became sharper. The widely existent oppression and conflicts between different classes and genders made it normal for people to have double standards for morality. A Woman on a Roof was accomplished in 1960s, and it was the right time for the second western feminist movement’s climax, females’ status got remarkable improvement and they gained the property right and the right to vote. However, women had not got complete independence and equality in many aspects, and men still controlled the whole society and gender discrimination still broadly existed (Zhang, 2013, p.61). Such background knowledge will provide readers with essential information in better understanding the novel.

• 1. Literature Review

Scholars both at home and abroad, have already explored the novel and most of them analyze the novel from the perspectives of constructivism, feminism, gender relationship and binary opposition. However, they have rarely touched upon three male characters’ distinct hatred in the novel. For example, Waterman David talks about the binary opposition in his book Identity in Doris Lessing’s Space Fiction and he points out the symbolic meanings of the basement and roof and the opposite relation between them(Waterman, 2006), but he does not explore the reasons behind this phenomenon. Sun Kuo also highlights some obvious conflicts between dream and reality, and between the upper class and lower class in A Woman on a Roof(Sun, 2015), but he just lists several groups of opposite relationships and does not dig the causes of those conflicts. Wang Yan points out that to build the healthy and harmonious gender relation, both males and females should understand and respect each other in his paper named Viewing Lessing’s Gender Idea from A Woman on a Roof (Wang, 2009, p.238). He agrees to Lessing’s view of intersexual relationship. And Huang Meihong discusses the conflict between male characters and female character of A Woman on a Roof either (Huang, 2010). Other Chinese writers, such as Sun Guirong and Pang Yafei, analyze A Woman on a Roof from the perspective of feminism and speak highly of the female character’s great courage to fight against the oppression of the then patriarchal society and constraints from traditional rules.

We can see from above facts that there is little research on three male characters’ hatred, while their behavior is crucial for readers to understand the story’s themes because it reflects the basic tone of the whole story. Thus, based on the previous research, this paper studies their hatred for the female character and the then society, revealing the natural, social, and psychological reasons of those resentments, so that readers can foster a better and more comprehensive understanding of the story.

• 1. The Significance of the Paper

This paper analyzes three male characters’ hatred in the novel from a new perspective, and points out the natural environment’s factors, social environment’s factors and psychological factors of their hatred’s formation. The analysis provides readers with the vivid information of the then society and helps them foster a better understanding of several conflicts between different genders and classes. The paper can also be counted as a supplement to the study of Lessing’s works, and it offers readers a new method to appreciate the novel.

• 1. The Layout of the Paper

The layout of the paper can be divided into five parts. The introduction part includes the brief introduction of the story and its author, literature review and the basic structure of the paper. The body part analyzes Harry’s hatred, Stanley’s hatred and Tom’s hatred respectively. The body part also contains the natural environment’s factors, social environment’s factor and psychological factors of their hatred’s formation. The last part is the conclusion part, which briefly restates the main points of this paper and its significance.

2 Harry’s Hatred