摘 要

1. Introduction 1

1.1 Research background 1

1.2 Need for the study 2

2. Literature Review 3

2.1. The development of female consciousness 3

2.1.1 Female consciousness in the west 3

2.1.2 The influence of awakening of female consciousness 4

2.2. Previous studies on Gone with the Wind and A Doll's House 5

2.3. Contributions and limitations of existing research 5

3. The Change of Nora’s and Scarlett’s Character 7

3.1. The change of Nora’s personal character 7

3.2. The change of Scarlett’s personal character 8

4. The Comparisons of Nora’s and Scarlett’s Growth 9

4.1 The similarities of their experiences 9

4.2 The differences of their experiences 10

4.2.1 The influence of the heroines’ personality 10

4.2.2 The influence of environment 10

4.2.3 The role of love in their growth 11

5. Conclusion 13

References 14

Acknowledgments

Having completing this thesis, I would like to express my deep appreciation to all the kind persons who helped me during my thesis writing. Without their generous help, the thesis would not have been finished.

First of all, I would like to express my sincere thanks to my supervisor Guo Ping, who has given me best consultant during my thesis writing. Without her suggestion and constant revision of my thesis, I can not finish the thesis successfully.

Secondly, to my roommates, my classmates who I had sought for help when I got in trouble, I am thankful to have them in my school life.

My genuine gratitude would also goes to my dear parents, without their cultivation, I can not be who I am today. During the time I finished this thesis, they also became my spiritual backing.

Lastly, I would like to show my appreciation to our school and the faculty of foreign languages, they offer me the opportunity to study here and I’ve learned a lot from all the people and things here.

Abstract

Gone with the Wind and A Doll’s House are typical literature works of feminism. The two works were created respectively in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, exposing the human liberation of women in the patriarchal society. The awakening of female consciousness has caused extensive debate in the history of literature. Many scholars have carried on research on this topic in different samples. This thesis analyses the growth of the two heroines, with the social background and personal encounters as clues. It first explores the setbacks and trials of the life that the protagonists have encountered and then studies how their characters have changed, attempting to explain such a change from external and internal causes. Through the comparative research methods, the two characters are analyzed in two periods: before and after the change. Such contrasts are meant to exhibit the heroines’ awakening of female consciousness and its important influences on the character formation and personal choices.

Keywords: Gone with the Wind; A Doll’s House; female consciousness; the Growth of character

中文摘要

《玩偶之家》和《飘》是典型的女性主义文学作品，两部作品分别创作于十九世纪末和二十世纪初，揭露了男权社会下妇女的人性解放。女性意识的觉醒在文学史上引起的讨论广泛，许多学者曾以不同样本就这一话题展开研究。本文主要从斯嘉丽与娜拉两位女主人公的成长路径入手，以当下社会背景及个人遭遇为线索,分析主人公所遭遇的生活的挫折与磨砺以及她们的人物性格如何进行了转变，造成这样转变的内因与外因。将个人性格、成长背景以及社会经历等多角度进行研究后，从两位主人公的爱情经历入手，通过对比的研究手法对两个人物在遭遇变故前与变故后的性格进行解析,得出女性意识觉醒后在人物性格塑造以及个人选择上产生的重要影响。

关键词：《飘》；《玩偶之家》；女性意识的觉醒；人物成长

1. Introduction

1.1 Research background

Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906), well-known as a Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet, is honored as “the father of realism”. It is said that his works are frequently adapted to performance, and he might be one of the most prolific dramatist. During that period of time, the theatre in Europe was expected to show the life people lead and what they were supposed to obey. Meanwhile, Ibsen’s works examined the realities hidden behind what people can easily get, with his critical eye on the family life revealing the hidden issue at his era.

In the first half of 20^th century, A Doll’s House was considered one of the most prominent plays in the world. Under the background of the upsurge of the women’s liberation movement in Norway, Ibsen was inspired to write this significant play which is mainly about the fate of a married woman, Nora. It tells a story of a traditional woman’s awakening and struggle to break out of the authority of husband. In 1879, the drama was staged in Denmark when it was published just two weeks ago. Then it was performed in Oslo, Norway, Germany, England and many other countries. As for China, people were not able to watch it till the May 4^th movement. A Doll’s House dose not only have a profound impact on the European feminist movement but also greatly promoted the development of feminist literature. (He, 2018)

In the early 20^th century, there is another world-renowned novel entitled Gone with the Wind. Margaret Mitchell（1900-1949), an American novelist and journalist，wrote and published only one novel the whole life. Gone with the Wind won the National Book Award for Most Distinguished Novel of 1936 and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1937. The novel depicts the life in Southern United States in the background of American Civil War and narrates the entanglement of love and hate among Scarlett and other characters. Scarlett is the crucial character in the novel, a complex and unique figure. Her greatest feature of her is the coexistence of femininity and masculinity. Different from the other women at that time, she is charming not only for her appearance but also her independent personality which makes her dare to love and hate. (Li, 2016)

Compared to what Ibsen shows us in A Doll’s House, we can easily find that Nora and Scarlett are totally different in terms of their characters at the beginning, but finally they both choose a path which leads them to come out of the cage and find their true self. The thesis will make a thorough study of the different growth trace in their life and analyze what urges them into the awakening of female consciousness.

1.2 Need for the study

Practically speaking, feminism is always regarded as an eternal theme in literary circle. Both A Doll’s House and Gone with the Wind are the magnum opus of feminist literature. No matter what their ending is, those two characters inspired lots of women in that period, and its influence even spreads to countries and centuries far from them. Although Nora and Scarlett have different life experiences which shape their different individuality, what their stories covey is a kind of positive energy. Therefore, the study of female consciousness in these novels will offer a deep understanding of the feminism under the specific background, making it easier to compare them with the former Women’s study in a dialectical eye. What’s more, several scholars have researched on this topic for many years and done lots of works in order to enlighten the people to further their studies. Thanks to their contributions, it is viable and significant to do an in-depth study in this field.

Literature Review

This chapter will review the previous studies on A Doll’s House and Gone with the Wind that scholars around the world have done. Thanks to these scholars’ effort, this thesis is enlightened on the theoretical foundation for further exploration in this field.