| Published in1925, Mrs. Dalloway is the masterpiece of Woolf’s stream-of-consciousness novels. At that time, the advancement of science and technology and the Industrial Revolution ushered in unprecedented material prosperity. However, the material affluence resulted in modern people’s spiritual vacuum, especially after the World War I. The imbalance situated in humans’inner heart, in the relationship among humans, community and nature seriously influenced humans’existence. As a writer who cares about humans’soul, Woolf tries to explore the meaning of humans’existence through describing the characters’mental activities, and then to build a harmonious wholeness, which happens to be similar to Heidegger’s early existentialism and his ecological aesthetics in the later period. Thus, the thesis tries to read Mrs. Dalloway from the perspective of eco-aesthetics, so as to reveal the thinking about the quaternity of heaven, earth, man and god implied in the novel, and to further discuss the importance of keeping the harmony among humans’ inner heart, humans and community, humans and nature.The first chapter investigates the importance of keeping a harmonious inner world. According to Heidegger’s elucidation of fallenness, humans’existential states are clarified into authenticity and inauthenticity, both of which are fully represented by Clarissa Dalloway. Young Clarissa dares to love and hate in spite of the secular customs, and exists as her own self or she obtains the authentic being. After getting married, Clarissa is known as Mrs. Dalloway who dissipates in family trivia and social communication. Finally, she falls to the inauthentic being. At the end of the novel, Septimus’s suicide awakens Mrs. Dalloway into rethinking of the meaning of humans’existence, and she realizes only the authentic being can help her reach the harmonious inner world.The second chapter analyzes the importance of building the harmonious relationship between humans and community. In the definition of "Mit-dasein", Heidegger advocates that the world should be the one that one shares with the others. Woolf’s criticism of the unfair treatment the character receives also indicates her longing for a harmonious community. Back from the battlefield, Septimus was troubled by serious postwar shell-shock. However, instead of obtaining due respect and love from the society, he is isolated by the public, especially by Dr. Holmes and Sir William, the representatives of the ruling class, who stand for isolating him from others and even preventing him from having children. With no sense of belonging, Septimus loses his faith in human nature and chooses to get "rebirth" in order to build the harmonious community he longs for.The third chapter discusses the importance of realizing the harmonious existence between humans and nature. Heidegger believes that the technological age makes humans no longer the shepherd of being. They consider nature merely as the machine for producing resources. Humans ask nature endlessly, which results in the imbalanced ecology and also ruins the harmony between humans and nature. Therefore, Heidegger proposes the judgment that the fourfold of heaven, earth, man and god. In the novel, Woolf depicts many pictures about the co-existence between humans and nature. However, humans’ violation of the natural law has already threatens their survival in reality. Thus, Woolf calls on the public to show respect for nature and to harmoniously exist with nature by presenting the harmonious scenes including humans and nature.Based on the predecessors’studies, this thesis tries to reveal the eco-aesthetic meaning implied in Mrs. Dalloway through the analysis of characters and the textual reading. The three chapters interpret the longing for a harmonious existence expressed in the novel from three levels:humans’inner world; humans and community; humans and nature, with an aim to offer some enlightenment and warning for modern people’s building of a harmonious society. |
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