英美文学史 要点.doc

The 20th Century Literature I. Background information 1. the crisis of faith 1) Charles Darwin (British naturalist): the publication of The Origin of Species (1850) 2) Friedrich Nietzsche (German philosopher): his declaration of the death of God 3) Bertrand Russell (British philosopher mathematician): A Free Man’s Worship (1918) 2. many manifestations of a weakening of traditional stabilities 1) the aesthetic movement 2) the rise of pessimism 3. the influence of psychology, anthropology and philosophy 1) James Frazer (British anthropologist): The Golden Bough (1911-1915) 2) Sigmund Freud (Austrian psychiatrist): The Interpretations of Dreams (1913) 3) Henry Bergson (French philosopher psychologist): his new concept of time — the psychological time Sigmund Freud: Austrian psychiatrist, the creator of psychoanalysis A. his theory of psychoanalysis: a science with an incalculable effect both on literature and on literary theory, offering the latitude for writers to explore and describe the new area of experience — the human subconscious, and leading straight to the advent of the “stream of consciousness” literature of the 1920s B. his contributions to knowledge: his studies of the development of the sexual instinct in children; his descriptions of the workings of the unconscious mind and of the nature of repression; his examinations and interpretations of dreams. C. his familiar concepts: the Oedipus Complex; the Electra Complex; the id, the ego and the superego Henry Bergson: French philosopher and psychologisthis philosophy of time: The psychological time provided a new mode of representing human experience, and helped pave the way for the rise of modernism or “stream of consciousness” literature. A. Time is continuous, an indivisible continuity. B. Psychological time is time in mind, subjective in nature, indicating the incessant flow of the consciousness.