| As a literary genre, the British fiction reached unprecedented submits in the 19th century. The 19th century British fiction cast away the shade of the 18th century Romanticism and its subject matters began to stretch into more realistic social problems, such as class struggle, religious conflict and so on. And a number of female novelists swarmed out in the 19th century. In the meantime many male novelists took women's life and fate as the subject matter. The most remarkable male writer was Thomas Hardy, who showed great sympathy to the miserable and humble women in the 19th century. These novelists sketched women image more vividly and delicately, and their works reflected women's ideology and life from various perspectives. Therefore, among the numerous 19th century British novels, those involving the matter of feminism became extremely prosperous and popular.This thesis mainly studies four novelists and their masterpieces, including Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, the Bront? Sisters'Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, and Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles. This research not only compares the female writings but also the male writings, which broadens the scope of the study on feminism. Part 1 is a general introduction of the background information of the thesis. Part 2 summarizes the foreign and domestic researches on the 19th century British fiction from the perspective of feminism. Part 3 is the theoretical framework and methodology of the thesis. Part 4 and Part 5 respectively discuss the view of love and marriage, and view of society, which are reflected by the four novels and their heroines. Part 6 draws the conclusion and states the limitation of the thesis. Based on Elaine Showalter's theory of feminist literature development, the thesis discusses the features of the early feminist literature by comparing and analyzing the four masterpieces and the female protagonists'view of love and marriage, and their view of society. |
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