An Analysis Of And The Mountain Echoed From The Perspective Of The New Historicism

As an Afghan-American writer,Khaled Hosseini is a well-known novelist who is determined to unmask the veil that covers the ordinary people in Afghanistan and show the true soul of ordinary people to the world.And the Mountain Echoed is the third novel of Hosseini that was published in 5th May,2013.It gains a good reputation since its publication.It tells a story about brother and sister that went through vicissitudes of life for sixty years.The novel revolves around the parents,siblings,friends and stepmother,depicting they how to love others,how to be hurt,how to betray each other,how to sacrifice for each other.Taking the Afghanistan as the historical background,author aims to show the lives and the hidden souls of ordinary people in Afghanistan to the world.The author has completed three novels,among of which And the Mountain Echoed is explored by the scholars and researchers from the perspective of Spatial Narrative Criticism,Trauma Criticism,Ethical Criticism,Eco-criticism,Polyphony and Postcolonialism in China.This thesis will interpret the novel by combining the special immigrants experiences and the dual cultural identity of author and the unique culture history of Afghanistan from the perspective of the New Historicism.The New Historicism emerged in the 1980 s which catered the need for the critic of literature and gradually came into the stage of the world.At that time,people got tired about the Formalism which separated the relations between literature and the text.However,the New Historicism emphasizes the relationships between history and the literature.The New Historicism emphasizes that we should interpret the literature from the context of history,stresses the historical dimension of the literature.The New Historicism thinks we should interpret the characters by putting them into the power structure of cultural context.At the same time,the theory also stresses the influences which the text exerts on the cultural context.In the eyes of the New Historicist,the literature not only reflects the history but also takes part in the reconstruction of new history.The thesis aims to study the novel within framework of the New Historicism by using the core conceptions of New Historicism.Firstly,by using the conception of “the historicity of text” and “the textuality of history”,the thesis interprets the historicity of the text of novel and the textuality of the history.Then,the thesis analyzes the characters in the novel under the conception of “subversion and containment”.Finally,with the help of the core conception of “self-fashioning”,the thesis explores that the characters grew up and reconciled with themselves after a series of sufferings.The thesis concludes three parts: introduction,body and conclusion.The main parts as follows:In the first chapter of the thesis,it expounds the origin and theoretical background of the New Historicism and introduces the core conceptions: “the historicity of text” and “the textuality of history”,“subversion and containment” and “self-fashioning”.Only when you master the literature theory can you lay a solid foundation for further interpretation of the novel.In the second chapter,the thesis will discuss the “the textuality of history” and “the historicity of text”.From this perspective,the thesis analyzes the historical,cultural and political factors which influence the creation of the novel and conducts the interpretation of the representation of history in the novel.In the first part,in the analysis of “the historicity of the text”,the thesis mainly discusses that the creation of the novel is deeply linked with author’s binary identity and special experience.At the same time,it is also linked with the historical background.In the second part,the thesis discusses the “the textuality of history”.The thesis analyzes that the novel represents the Afghan history through the description of the history of immigrants of Afghanistan,the miserable life of the ordinary people in Afghanistan and the history of international aid for Afghan.In fact,the readers know the history which was reconstructed by the author of the novel.In the third chapter,with the help of the conception of “subversion and containment”,the thesis discusses that the character’s subversion and containment in the novel under the mainstream ideology.In the first part,the thesis discusses that the novel subverts the typical terrorist image that is propagandized in American political discourse.The novel depicts a different Afghan image.The people in there are full of love.Although they are suffering from poverty,miserable war,they all live a life adamantly.In the second part,the thesis discusses that the characters subvert the mainstream ideology in Afghanistan.For example,Nila,is brave to chase her love and does not care secular bound.In third part,the thesis discusses the containment to the subversive power.For example,the author as an Afghan-American,his works are acknowledged by the American power discourse.In his works,the author also depicts the goodness of America and the happy life of Afghanistan in America.The Afghans are also under the control of social ideology in the novel.In the fourth chapter,by using the conception of “self-fashioning”,the thesis analyzes the formation of the self identity of the characters in the novel.The characters learned to reconcile with themselves and strengthened their consciousness of identity after a series of struggles.From the perspective of the New Historicism,the thesis draws the conclusion: the thesis summarizes the mutual influences of the creation of the novel and the cultural,historical factors,the author reconstructs a positive image of Afghans and the novel subverts the mainstream ideology of the Afghanistan.