A Comparative Study Of The Country Wife And Tess Of The D’Urbervilles From A Psychological Perspective

This thesis attempts to make a comparative study of the Country Wife,the popular novella of the contemporary Chinese writer Jia Pingwa and Tess of the D’Urbervilles,the most varied and rewarding novel of the British novelist Thomas Hardy from a psychological perspective by using Freudian Psychoanalysis.The two heroines share a lot of similarities, especially, their choices of lives and fate. Tess in Tess of the D’Urbervilles is one of the most controversial figures that Hardy has ever created. Both Tess and Darky have suffered from feelings of failure, however, when they encountered true love, they made very different choices which led to totally different fates. There has been plenty of criticism on Tess of the D’Urbervilles, and most of them focus on the natural feature of his work. However, a comparative study of the Country Wife and Tess of the D’Urbervilles from a psychological perspective is rare.Sigmund Freud defines id, ego, and super-ego as the three parts of the psychic apparatus. Freudian Psychoanalysis provides a radically new insight to the analysis of human beings’ psychological activities. By using this method, this thesis explains the behavior of protagonists and reveals the purpose behind their behavior from the aspect of psychological.