An Allegory Of Modernity

Ian McEwan is one of the best-known contemporary British novelists. He is as famous as Martin Amis, Julian Barnes and Kazuo Ishiguro, and is still playing an active role in the literary circles. Works by McEwan are notable for the terse style and the vivid descriptions of the inward world. In accordance with the subject matters, McEwan's writings have been divided into two periods: the first period is from 1974 to 1981. Works in this period are usually labeled as "literature of shock" and "art of unease" because they are frequently involved with incest, transvestitism and sado-masochism. Since 1987, McEwan's writing style has undergone a great change, and his creation has entered the second period. In this period, McEwan has published many famous works. Some critics hold that compared with McEwan's early works, the works in the latter period are closely related to the social realities and demonstrate a wider social space because they are frequently involved with WWâ…¡, Fascism, Cold War and terrorism.Due to this classification, many critics focus on McEwan's works in the second period. Some critics even claim that McEwan's early works are not worthy of studying because of their morbid subject matters. In spite of the various negative comments on McEwan's early writings, the author of this thesis chooses The Cement Garden, one representative of McEwan's early works, as the object for study. In this thesis, the author does a close reading of the text of The Cement Garden on the basis of allegory theory, particularly the modern allegory theory put forward by Walter Benjamin. Through the analyses of the language, the characters and the plot in the novel, the author firstly testifies that there is a truth content beneath the literal text which is permeated with Oedipus complex, patricide, incest and transvestitism. Then, the author proves that the truth content has allegorized the cultural phenomena and social problems of the modern society, including fragmentation, the alienated human relationship, the identity crises and the barren spiritual state of human beings. Finally, a conclusion is drawn that The Cement Garden is not "a revolting book" as some critics claimed. Under the literal text of The Cement Garden, McEwan has allegorized various problems of modernity, and therefore, this novel can be interpreted as an allegory of modernity.Through the allegorical interpretation of The Cement Garden, the author elucidates that McEwan is always concerned with the social problems at the initial stage of his creation, and there is great significance in the morbid guise of McEwan's early works for the reader to explore.