A Comparative Study of Charles Dickens and Eileen Chang

Jilin Institute of Chemical Technology,Jilin,China Email:wenjianlan9631@163.com

[Abstract]This paper aims to make a comparison between Charles Dickens and Eileen Chang for the following three aspects:writing style,writing skill and writing themes.By understanding these,we can learn more about literature of realism,and have new experience and insights.

[Keyword]realism;feminism;humanity;marriage

Introduction

Charles Dickens is one of the representatives of British writers in the 19thcentury.His works cover a wide range of themes including society,children labor,law,moral and love.He pays special attention to describing the life experiences of poor people at the bottom of society,reflecting the complicated social reality of England at that time.Dickens makes a great contribution to the development of critical realism and the development of British literature.

If Charles Dickens is a bight light in the dark society of England in the 19th century,the Eileen Chang is a pure land in the turbulent times of modern China.She is a charming woman writer in the modern history of China.Her novel embodies her personal characteristics in terms of material selection,intention,character creation,narrative structure and language expression.She has made outstanding achievements in the history of modern Chinese literature.Her novels can not be classified into any school,but a unique existence.She has expanded the new view of feminist criticism and writing style.

Both Eileen Chang and Charles Dickens are realistic writers.They live in different social backgrounds and different life experiences,but they all appeal for social fairness and justice,advocating the spirit of equality and harmony.They criticized the old customs of the society and the indifference of people.They use their own writing to covey their complaints and dissatisfaction with that society.

The Comparison of Writing Style

Dickens’works are incisive in language,profound in thought,strong in appeal and criticism.The key for his works to catch the reader’s heart and attract the reader’s attention lies in his distinctive writing attitude,unique writing skills and characterization.First of all,critical realism is Dickens’consistent writing attitude.In the novelOliver Twist,Dickens uses the writing technique of facing the reality directly,exposes the vicious thoughts hidden in people’s hearts.Besides,Dickens’works have different periods.In his early days,Dickens had an optimistic idea of capitalist society.The theme of his works was not so profound,and he often uses humorous satirical techniques.In the middle period,his works has a deeper understanding of the social reality.In the late period,Dickens’creative thoughts were mature.

Eileen Chang’s works use the technique of flashback to construct the whole article with the tone of story telling.The simple sentences naturally bring the reader into a quiet environment created by her words.In the novel18 Spring,Shi Jun talks about Man Zhen’s life after meeting Mu Jin,and finally writes that he thinks about how to promote their affairs.Eileen Chang has a thorough understanding of life and society,so she pays more attention to woman’s marriage and love.Eileen Chang has written directly the important role of money in woman’s life and status.For example,Qi Qiao,a character in theGolden Lock,as a victim who was caused by money.Later,she became a villain,which was also caused by money.She used characters to reveal the huge temptation and corrosive effect of money on human nature,and the profound changes of human nature under the temptation and corrosion of money.We all know that Eileen Chang and Dickens are realistic writers.The same is that they all criticize the society and fight against some dark phenomena.Dickens mostly writes about the tragic fate of small people from the perspective of society.Eileen Chang reinterprets the characters in her works from a personal point of view,with distinct personal characteristics.

The Comparison of Writing Skill

One of the reasons for the success of Dickens’novels is his excellent writing skills.First of all,he is good at using rhetoric to render and enrich the expression of his works.Whether it’s metaphor,personification or comparison,it’s very marvellous.The rhetorical device of contrast was used at the beginning ofA Tale of Two Cities:This is the best time,this is the worst time,this is the age of wisdom,this is the age of stupidity.InGreat Expectations,metaphor is used to enrich the story.When he wrote about begging for food and eating,he said that where it’s like eating,is to put the meat into a can.Such a figurative image shows the ugliness of the fugitive reflected in his life.Dickens is also good at using satirical techniques to make the story more worthy of readers’taste.When describing the image of Dombey in the novelDombey and Son,he said that he is clean and tidy like a newly issued banknote.Dickens’characters are full of soul.People can realize the truth that friendship and love are more important than money,and call on people to understand the value of money rationally.

The biggest characteristic of Eileen Chang’s novels is not a strong contrast,but a kind of harmonious and uneven contrast.Therefore,the characters in her novels often show a life attitude of no resistance,no struggle or even weakness to reality.They compromise with their own destiny in order to achieve the stability of life.Eileen Chang said in her own article.Power is happy,but beauty is sad.They can’t exist independently.The heroism is only powerful,without beauty,and seems to lack human nature.Tragedy,like the supporting role of the red and green,is a strong contrast.But it is more stimulating than inspiring.The reason why desolation has a longer aftertaste is that it looks like green and peach red,which is a kind of contrast.Eileen Chang is also good at using rhetoric.Generally speaking,Eileen Chang and Dickens are very impressive in terms of language expression.The characters they portray are deeply rooted in people’s hearts.

The Comparison of Writing Themes

There are many kinds of female characters in Dickens’works,which have their own characteristics.They are in contrast with the women around Dickens in real life,which makes the female characters in the works have strong distinctiveness.The author focuses on the description of character and image,so most of the characters in Dickens'works are vivid and can attract readers better.The female characters portrayed by Dickens are different.Some of them are gentle,some of them are shrewd and straightforward.His unique view of women is formed by ingenious writing in her novels.First of all,he acknowledged the differences between men and women.In his novels,most of the female characters are housewives,Dickens fully affirmed the status of women in the family.So is Lucy inA Tale of Two Cities.She creates a warm family with some small things.Dickens praises the gentle,kind-hearted family angels and also criticizes the irresponsible,indulged in fantasy women.Dickens also believed that women should have moral cultivation.So the female images he wrote are in line with the aesthetic of men.

Eileen Chang’s view of women is totally different from Dickens’.Her female images are quite tragic.Under the influence of the May 4th movement,the new woman’s thoughts and feudalism were against each other.In the novel,the realistic women who were oppressed by feudalism used the form of revolt to vent.This kind of lonely and arrogant female image realized the traditional bad habits and dared to revolt.One of her characters Bai Liusu started to revolt when she met Fan Liuyuan after being oppressed by her relatives from the beginning.She went out of the house to find her way to look for happiness and bravely walk out of the feudal system and control her own destiny in her own hands.The second is the image of a woman with weak woman character.The story of a beautiful girl dying from illness is interpreted in Flower Withering.Because the family is unwilling to take money,she has not been treated in time.Finally,she can only lie helpless in bed waiting for death,even love has dissipated.This is based on the status of women in traditional culture,a kind of satire of feudal thought.Next is the female image with incomplete character.Qi Qiao in Golden Lock is fascinated by lust and property after she married into a rich family.In the end,she became a terrible and sad person.These different female images are inseparable from her own experience.Secondly,the feudal tradition of society at that time made Eileen Chang’s female figures have the tragic fate.

We explore Dickens’humanitarianism fromA Tale of Two Cities.The progressive nature of Dickens’humanitarianism is mainly reflected in his real description,which reveals the inevitability of the French Revolution.InA Tale of Two Cities,the Marquis is the image of a devil.The novel depicts his various evils.His carriage killed the poor man’s son but only dropped a coin.In order to seize the beautiful woman,he used all kinds of means to destroy her family.The doctor was imprisoned for 18 years when exposing his crime.The Marquis’s actions are contrary to the humanitarian spirit advocated by Dickens.Such a cruel devil is bound to be abandoned by the masses and become a historical sinner.This is the progressive embodiment of his humanitarian thought.At the end,Dr.Manette,the representative of humanitarian thought,died in pain.In order to fulfill his commitment to Lucy,Carden,who was holding the spirit of self sacrifice,was executed by the revolutionary masses instead of Lucy’s husband.Although these characters are full of the spirit of sacrifice and benevolence,the sad ending of these characters also indicates that the humanitarian thought is difficult to achieve in the sharp social contradictions at that time.Dickens is a capitalist humanist who advocates justice and humanity.At the same time,he is also an idealist.He opposed all forms of violence and believed that love and goodness could lead people to a bright future.

In the exploration of human nature,Eileen Chang’s novels are full of deep sad feelings,which deduce life through the tragic characters.Eileen Chang’s novels reveal the distorted and hypocritical human nature in the Chinese urban society.They give people a unique psychological feeling.Eileen Chang is called by Fu Lei one of the most perfect gains in our literary world.Eileen Chang’s masterpiece,the Golden Lock,is the most thorough tragedy that shows the distortion,deformity and abnormality of human nature under the repression of ancient culture,material desire and sexual desire.Cao Qiqiao,the heroine,is a woman who locks herself in gold.She was born in a poor family,so her normal lust is hard to be satisfied,but repression does not extinguish the lust.On the contrary,the more repressed,the more abnormal way to find a way out.The unsatisfied lust leads to her crazy pursuit of money,which finally makes her lose her humanity.For Eileen Chang,to know life is to know the tragedy of life,and this kind of understanding can neither bring comfort to people nor help to change the real situation.On the contrary,it puts people under the pressure of emptiness and disillusionment.Therefore,Eileen Chang's novels are hopeless tragedies without much light.

Conclusion

Charles Dickens lived in a time when British capitalism was growing and the bourgeoisie had won.However,as Marx and Engels pointed out,with the rise of the bourgeoisie,the opposite of the bourgeoisie,the working class,has arisen,and the class struggle between the two classes has become increasingly acute.Some historians say that Dickens embodies the core spirit of the British people.He spoke for the lower class,pursued social justice,and explored the core values that could make human beings get along harmoniously.Eileen Chang left an indelible mark in the history of modern Chinese Literature.Reading her book,we can feel a new opinion about value.Reading other books may be able to know the truth,understand the knowledge and be shocked,but only reading Eileen Chang’s articles is happy.The most famous collection of Eileen Chang is called legend.Actually,it is the most appropriate to describe her life with legend.The experience of Dickens’family decline in his childhood left a shadow in his life.Later,she always spoke for the bottom people of this society.Similarly,Eileen Chang’s special experience also affected her character and her life.Many vernacular novels of that era are not available today,but Eileen Chang's novels still exist,which shows that there are some eternal things in her novels.