A Study On Sister Carrie’s Urban Identity

Theodore Dreiser is known as the pioneer of American urban novels in the 20 th century,who revealed American urban life in detail in his novel Sister Carrie.The author of the present dissertation aims to analyze the construction of Sister Carrie’s identity through her urban experience and explore Dreiser’s view of the city.This paper mainly divides Carrie’s identity construction into three phases.First of all,Carrie comes into the urban space as an outsider.She builds an ideal city with her rich imagination.But the wide gap between ideal and reality makes her only a homeless seeker for livelihood.The encounter with Drouet changes her life.Being tantalized by sensory appeal and disillusioned with life dilemma,she decides to get rid of moral restraint.Then she successively becomes Drouet’s and Hurstwood’s mistress in exchange for a better material life.During that period,Carrie’s material life is much improved but she suffers from a guilty conscience,thus facing the contradiction between physical and spiritual identity.Later,Carrie makes a hit in acting career in New York,and then ruthlessly abandons Hurstwood.In a secular sense at that time,Carrie has achieved an upgraded identity and climbed up to the top of the urban pyramid.However,she fails to build an intimate relationship due to her long-term addiction to material desires.Though she successfully adapts to the urban life,she lacks a sense of belonging all the time.So her spiritual identity is still not settled and her urban identity can hardly be universally recognized in the city.The author makes use of some concepts of urban space theories to divide the city into real and fictional space,physical and spiritual space.Urban images such as streets,windows,and commodities are used to analyze the influence of urban environment on an individual’s identity construction.Besides,Dreiser’s view about desire and reason is also explored in the dissertation.