A Comparative Study Of Gwendolen Harleth And Xue Baochai From The Feminist Perspective

George Eliot as a feminist is called in question with the development of feminism, because her heroines in Middlemarch and The Mill on the Floss are so discouraging. Gwendolen as a woman with strong feminine consciousness in George Eliot's last novel Daniel Deronda will label Eliot a feminist again. Cao Xueqin expressed his concern on women by describing many girls'life and destiny in the Grand View Garden in the novel A Dream of Red Mansions. Although the two novels are based on different cultural background and composed in different time, both of them reflect female self-consciousness, women's oppression under patriarchal society and women losing self-value in contemporary conventional norms.This thesis is intended to compare Gwendolen in Daniel Deronda and Xue Baochai in A Dream of Red Mansions from the feminist perspective. The thesis is composed of three chapters. Chapter One is mainly about feminine consciousness of Gwendolen Harleth and Xue Baochai. Gwendolen Harleth's feminine consciousness is awakened, while Xue Baochai lacks of feminine consciousness. Chapter Two focuses on their attitude toward the patriarchal system, Gwendolen shows the pattern: external submission and internal resistance; Xue Baochai's pattern: filial obedience and blind submission. The two images of women are also the victims of social convention, Gwendolen mainly surrender to financial crisis and professional dilemma without choice, Xue Baochai willingly follows feudal principles,the view is stated in Chapter Three.In short, no matter it is in the eastern or western culture, and no matter it is at the beginning of capitalism or the end of feudalism, women are the victims of patriarchal society and the conventional value system. Through studying two female characters'life experience, it is known that they have dreams, but the dream cannot be realized; they have gifts, but it can not be given full play, just because they are women.