The Art Of Psychological Depiction In George Eliot's Major Novels

George Eliot is a well-known female realistic novelist whose writing is distinctive in her detailed exploration of the reality, typical illustration of the characters and truthful depiction of psychology and reflects the turbulence and vicissitudes of the common people in the nineteenth-century England. In her works, she insists on the combination of the artistic form and the ethical education, advocates the spirit of fraternity and altruism, inherits and develops the tradition of the realistic fiction. She focuses on the depiction of the frustrations, hardships and striving of the ordinary people under the influence of the English Industrial Revolution, analyzes the essence of the character's psychology and reveals the conflicts between the individual desires and social morals. Through writing, she expresses fully her life values and provides precious materials for the further researches on the 19th-century English countryside. Eliot gains great fame for her psychological insight, the depth and width of her profound knowledge, and is considered as a master of depicting the life, the mind and the spirit of her characters. Her successful application in psychological description has made a great contribution to the rise and development of psychological realism in novel writing. Hence, the research on the art of psychological depiction in George Eliot's novels is both significant and necessary in the advocacy of the humanistic spirit.As a forerunner of the English psychological novels, George Eliot wins much attention from the later scholars and writers for her brief, exact, sagacious and humorous language and for her detailed psychological depictions. Yet up to now, there is no systematic study on her art of psychological description and only some related articles and statements are found. Therefore, this dissertation intends to have a systematic study on Eliot's depiction of the character's psychology in the perspectives of the environment, the action and the discourse by means of the documental and textual analysis. The study takes Eliot's three major novels as case studies, namely, The Mill on the Floss, Silas Marner and Middlemarch and discusses her artistic effects through the integration of the narrative theory and the theory of kinesics with the textual analysis. Especially, she embeds the discourse modes and non-narrative discourse in the representation of the character's inner life and attempts to gain a penetrating survey of the psychological analysis which appears as interconnected multiple vocal chains of the characters, the narrator and the author to achieve her writing aim of purifying the mind and enlightening the spirit of the human beings.Chapter One, taking Silas Marner as a case study, deals with the functions and influences of the social and physical environments in the formation and changes of the character's psychological activities. Existence determines consciousness. Since malign social environment can make the personal relationship estranged, strange and tense, generate the classes antagonistic and even incompatible. In the novel, the exploration of the social environment which mirrors the reality of the character's psychological conflicts enables not only to demonstrate the characters'inner worlds which are solitary, depressed, strange, despaired, weak, greedy and evil, but also to mock at the betrayal of love, kinship and belief, in an attempt to criticize the egoism and to promote the spirit of fraternity. The physical environment which contains the natural environment and the built environment embodies vividly and truthfully the character's inward activities by means of simile, metaphor and personification. Dark and bright colors in nature are used to reflect the character's painful or joyful state of mind. The varied states of Silas's stone cottage record his psychological changes from loneliness to happiness. The implied meanings of the mountains, trees, hedgerows, grass and the windy, snowy, foggy nights indicate the characters'depressed, miserable, disappointed and desperate worlds; the blue sky, the green grass and the flowering garden are the symbols of the hope for a new life. The buried gold is a metaphor of Silas's inward pressure and solitude; the fate of Silas's earthenware pot indicates his hopes for equality and respect; the open door symbolizes the changes of Silas's and Eppie's fates in their lives. Eliot also endows rivers, animals, plants, lights and fire with the character's inner activities to represent the character's joys and sorrows, to express her desire for a warm and harmonious family life.Chapter Two applies the theory of kinesics to the demonstration in The Mill on the Floss that the character's facial expressions and the body actions can present authentic emotions of inwardness. On the one hand, these facial expressions, such as the eye expressions, tears, cries, sobs, smiles, laughs, pouting and biting the lips, can embody the observable emotions and the imperceptible psychological state of mind which shows the characters'innermost fear, hatred, pressure, despair, miseries, dissatisfaction, self-criticism and self-examination as well as joys and happiness. On the other hand, the actions of the character's hand, arms and legs, especially the combination with the facial expressions, more faithfully and more effectively, express the character's love and hate, cheerfulness and restlessness to prove that body language is both a verbal signal to enrich feelings and an effective way to present the charm of the personalities. In addition, the integration of facial expressions, body actions and discourse gives prominence to the truthfulness and objectiveness of the character's psychological depiction, achieves the harmony and unity of the character's mind, action and the discourse and conveys Eliot's ideas of humanism.Chapter Three delineates the functions of the discourse modes and the non-narrative discourse in the revelation of the character's psychological activities in George Eliot's masterpiece, Middlemarch. In the novel, the direct discourse records the character's interpretation of thoughts and explores the character's inner life by the adoption of the communicative and mixed dialogues, dramatic and confessional monologues. The indirect discourse, whose narrator functions as the third person, provides a brief and clear illustration of the character's thoughts. The free direct discourse in which the interior monologue is spoken in the first person point of view and contains no sign words and quotation marks offers the detailed records of the connotations, styles and moods to represent the character's psychology. The free indirect discourse which narrates in the third person point of view and with no quotation marks or sign words, involves the voices of the character and the narrator, which states freely more ideas and expresses more complex emotions, develops a multi-voice condition, enhances the semantic density of the discourse. The non-narrative discourse consists of the open commentary and the hidden commentary. In Middlemarch, by means of the explanation, discussion as well as the rhetorical and dramatic commentaries, the non-narrative discourse explicates, analyzes and evaluates the characters'inner worlds to achieve the successful communication between the character and the reader. The application of the discourse modes and the non-narrative discourse draws closer relation to the character's psychology and reflects the Victorian social ideology, through the multi-voices of the character, the narrator and the author.The study proves that the character's environment, action and discourse are the three important elements which George Eliot uses in her successful depiction of the character's psychology. Eliot applies her emotions and thoughts to her character's psychological description, forming an effective combination of her life with the character's experiences, her thoughts with the character's consciousness. Such combination is her significant medium to present the character's mind, to criticize the social abuses and plays an important role in educating and enlightening the readers in their lives.George Eliot's art of psychological depiction makes great contribution to the development of the English realistic psychological novels. However, as Eliot lives in the time of male-dominated society and under the control of the religious authority, her psychological description remains certain limitations. In her novels, she overstresses the self-sacrifice of the females and attempts to get rid of the psychological obstacles by means of the religious authority. Even though, Eliot's art of psychological description provides new ways for the study on English psychological novels.