"British Literature·John Fowles·The French Lieutenant's Woman" Author's Introduction|Content Summary|Work Appreciation
Author's Introduction John Fowles (1926—) British novel Home. Born on March 21, 1926 in Essex, England, he lived in the countryside outside London since childhood, cultivating his love for nature and a reclusive mentality away from the crowd. His years at Bedford High School had an important influence on the formation of his outlook on life. He received a good orthodox education in this very aristocratic boarding school, but on the other hand, due to the barbaric management methods of senior students punishing junior students in such schools at that time, he himself served as a student secret organization for a long time. As the leader, the social role he must play has a painful and fierce conflict with his personal psychological temperament. This life experience made him deeply familiar with the essence of hierarchical system and legal control. From his youth, he developed a strong hatred for all those in power and organizers. During World War II, he served for two years as a lieutenant in the Royal Navy, but did not actually perform combat duty. From 1947 to the end of 1949, he studied at Oxford University and received a bachelor's degree in literature. During this period, he mainly studied French and French literature, and was deeply influenced by French existentialist writers. After graduation, he taught for a year at the University of Poitiers in France, and then went to teach in a boys' high school on the Greek island of Spedesi for a period of time before returning to England. Fowles believes that his spiritual temperament and cultural background are mainly rooted in Britain, France and Greece. In comparison, he believes that he is more influenced by European culture than the British mainland. In the early 1950s, Fowles officially began his career as a writer. He said that he engaged in literary creation because it allowed him to indulge in fantasy and fictionalize characters, scenes and dialogues as he pleased, in order to escape from the various external lives he disliked. His first novel "The Collector" (1963) tells the story of a vulgar, cruel orc who kidnaps and possesses Miranda, an artistic girl. It shows the author's consistent belief that there are few real people in the world. The allegorical meaning of living beings being ravaged by the barbaric "majority" masters. After the novel was published, Fowles immediately attracted the attention of critics and was hailed as a "master storyteller". His second novel "The Magician" (1966) is a legendary fable set on the island of Spedesi. It describes the bizarre experience of a British middle school teacher with unenlightened moral consciousness on this Greek desert island. The novel is based on the ancient The mythical archetype weaves a colorful illusory world, reflecting themes about the value of life, ethics and moral awareness. Fowles believes that the English language is a language that has a natural connection with experience. He believes that this language can be used to reconstruct historical reality. "The French Lieutenant's Woman" ("The French Lieutenant's Woman"), which won the 1970 W. H. Smith Literary Award, 1969), which is his efforts in this regard.
Summary of content Charles Smithon is an archaeological naturalist. After the death of his parents, he inherited an inheritance and the title of baronet. His old uncle had no heirs, so he Will be the heir to another considerable estate. Years of studying in Paris and traveling around Europe have given him a suave, unconventional, aloof and indifferent temperament. In 1867, he was 32 years old. Perhaps years of traveling had made him tired, and he began to think about marriage. At a social party, he met Eristina (Tina). Tina is young and beautiful, with a wealthy family. From appearance to temperament, she is a typical middle-class lady of the Victorian era. The young couple fell in love at first sight and held an engagement ceremony two months later. Tina's parents asked their only daughter to leave London every year and spend some time at Aunt Trant's house in the seaside town of Lyme, which was said to be good for her health. This year, she was sent away particularly early in order to recuperate her energy for the big event of marriage. Therefore, Charles also came to this remote mountain and sea town and stayed at the "White Lion" Hotel. On the one hand, he accompanied the lonely and bored Tina, and on the other hand, he happened to be able to conduct some professional inspections in the nearby mountains and forests. One cold and windy morning, Charles and Tina were walking along the seawall and accidentally discovered a woman wearing a black cloak standing on the top of the seawall, staring intently into the misty distance. As they approached, the woman glanced back. What Charles saw was a sad and moving face, and an uncontrollable curiosity arose in his heart.
Charles later learned from various rumors that this mysterious woman was named Sarah Woodruff, who was the local Mrs. Pulteney's life companion, but people called her "the French lieutenant's woman" behind her back. Obviously, in In the eyes of everyone, Sarah is a woman with a bad reputation. Every day off, or when she had the opportunity to go out for Mrs. Pulteney's distribution of religious leaflets, Sarah would always go for a walk alone in the uninhabited mountains and forests. Once, Charles and Sarah met in the woods, and then the two met again. Charles couldn't help but strike up a conversation, and Sarah's indifference aroused his curiosity even more. From then on, whenever he had free time, he would involuntarily set foot on the deserted path leading into the mountains. On this day, Sara suddenly appeared in front of him, took the initiative to hand over two fossils, and asked to go on a date with him to reveal her own life experience to him. Sarah's initiative made Charles panic. After a fierce ideological struggle, he agreed to walk into the deep forest with Sarah. According to Sarah's own account, she once took care of and fell in love with a French lieutenant who was injured in a shipwreck. She dedicated everything to him, but the Frenchman never returned and was never heard from again. Although she was abandoned by others, she was always infatuated, completely ignoring the gossip of the world, and went her own way to close herself in a fantasy world. For what motive, Charles himself could not explain, he decided to save Sarah and suggested that she leave Lyme Town and seek a new life elsewhere. At this time, Charles learned that his uncle was planning to remarry, which meant that he would lose his inheritance rights to his uncle's property. Mrs. Pulteney is an old widow with a surly temperament and rigid behavior. She discovers that Sarah frequently goes out alone and decides to fire her. Sara ran away alone, causing an uproar in the town. Before she left, she sent a message to Charles, hoping to see him one last time. According to the analysis of Charles' friend Dr. Grogan, people like Sarah are likely to suffer from some kind of mental illness. Charles stayed up all night, thinking about it, but finally couldn't hold it in anymore, so he put on his clothes and went into the mountains. At dawn, he found Sarah in a hut in the mountains. If Charles had realized at first that he should be careful with his words and control his behavior, then when he faced Sarah, who had tears on her face and couldn't help herself, the emotional wall collapsed, and the moment in front of him was overwhelming. The whole time, he held Sarah tightly in his arms. But at this moment, Charles' servant boy came to the mountain to meet his lover and accidentally bumped into them. Charles forced himself to calm down, dismissed the servant boy, hurriedly gave Sarah a small bag of gold coins, and gave her a few instructions about her future, and the two parted ways. After that, the relationship between Charles and Tina changed subtly. His future father-in-law wanted him to change his studies and go into business, which greatly bruised his self-esteem. He was in a dilemma. He went out drinking with friends, and then wandered the streets alone. One day, when he accidentally learned that ***'s name was also Sara, he suddenly felt an unbearable spasm... He turned back to the "White Lion" Hotel and returned to Eristina. However, this is only one possibility for the end of the story. Charles probably received a note from Sarah from the city, giving the address of the inn where she was staying. He hesitated again and again and finally drove there. Sarah sat alone in the guest room with a sprained ankle. After Charles entered the door, the two looked at each other for a moment. Their long-suppressed feelings erupted like a volcano, and all words became redundant... However, Charles never expected that Sarah was actually a virgin, and everything she told him in the past, from the French lieutenant to the sprained ankle, were all lies. She did this out of loneliness, resentment, and jealousy. Now that she had gotten her wish, she sent Charles away. Charles confessed in the church, returned to Lyme Town to tell Tina everything, and asked to dissolve the engagement; he accepted the punitive sentence imposed on him by the court, and never showed up again, only wanting to find Sarah again. In the next one year and eight months, he searched almost all cities in Europe, but found nothing, so he went to the United States; he felt that Sarah's shadow flashed on the faces of many Americans, but Still didn't see the real Sarah, so she had to return to London. One day, his lawyer told him the address of Sarah, who had changed his name, and Charles came to see him.
Two possibilities arise here. One is that he not only regained Sara, but also unexpectedly met his daughter; the other possible ending is that Sara became the painter Dante Gabriel. Rossetti's secretary and model, she rejected Charles's advances because these years of experience have made her understand the true meaning of happiness in life. She has become accustomed to and will always cherish a lonely world, and she will never need anyone to share her life.
Work Appreciation On the surface, "The French Lieutenant's Woman" seems to be just a common popular novel, narrating a love triangle story between a male protagonist and two different women. However, the actual significance of the novel is far more than that. The unique narrative angle and narrative method adopted by the author make it somewhat avant-garde, which is very different from most novels of the same era, and has been widely valued by academic critics. It has not only been translated into more than a dozen languages, adapted and filmed for television, and widely circulated, it has also become a selection of contemporary novel courses in British and American universities. In this novel, the author adopts a narrative style that parodies the traditional British novels of the 19th century, embedding many well-documented historical facts into a fictional story frame, and projecting the thoughts, words and deeds of the fictional protagonist into a seemingly " "real" social and historical background. It must be emphasized that all these historical facts have been carefully selected by the author and interpreted from a contemporary point of view. Such a narrative perspective that blends fiction and reality and blurs reality can undoubtedly greatly enhance the credibility of the story for general readers. However, on the other hand, for the author, it greatly expands the scope of new interpretations of historical reality. the possibility of interpretation and reconstruction of historical texts. For example, today’s feminist movement in the Western world has undeniably become a social presence. Regarding the historical origins and ideological background of this movement, feminists are reconstructing history from all possible angles. It is worth noting that the final destination of the fictional character Sarah in "The French Lieutenant's Woman", her association with the "Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood" and the famous female poet Christina Rossetti, illustrates the author of the novel Trying to respond to the efforts of feminists in the form of literary fiction, readers can get a glimpse of the spiritual pursuit and independent personality consciousness of early feminists through the fictional literary image of Sarah. Although the protagonist of this novel is Charles, the focus of the reader's attention is Sarah, whose fate is obviously the driving force for the development of the entire story. The author adopts two different narrative perspectives for these two characters: For Charles, the narrative of the text is comprehensive. With the help of the narrator's narration, readers can not only understand his experiences, words and deeds, but also get a glimpse of his most hidden heart. However, for Sara, the narrative of the text is not only external. Readers cannot construct a real Sara based on the information provided by the text. Moreover, the narrator's narrative is often directly modified by the author, who suddenly announces The previous narrative about Sarah is invalid, and all those are just fictional hypotheses. There may be another possibility like this. Obviously, due to these two different narrative methods, there is a contrast between the two characters, Sarah and Charles, one virtual and one real. Readers must always maintain a high degree of vigilance and consciously interpret all narratives about Sarah. Construct the character of Sarah yourself from indirect discourse that is itself questionable. Such a narrative technique in the novel makes the character of Sarah even more confusing and mysterious. This also greatly increases readers' reading ***.