The Recurrence And Reconstruction Of History ——A New Historicist Interpretation Of Roots

Alex Haley（1921-1992）is an African-American writer.His representative work,Roots: The Saga of an American Family（1976）,is a novel which is based on his family history.The novel recounts the experiences of seven generations from Haley’s African ancestor’s experience of enslavement to Haley’s finding of his African ancestor’s origin by research,which represents history of African-Americans in the United States during the past two hundred years.Released in the 1970 s,the novel became well-known for its television adaptation.Haley won a special Pulitzer Prize in 1977 for Roots.Under the perspective of New Historicism,this thesis utilizes “historicity of texts”and “textuality of history” to probe into the recurrence and reconstruction of African American history of Roots.This thesis deems that the “historicity of texts” of Roots lies in that the historical context of the creation background of the novel and Haley’s personal experiences exert an influence on his creation and are reflected in the novel.The “textuality of history” of Roots lies in that by representing the history of Africa,the oppressed experiences of Kunta,Bell,and Kizzy during slavery,and the identity cognition of different characters in the novel,the novel reconstructed African Americans’ history.Analyzing Roots from a New Historicist perspective confirms the inextricable relationship between history and text,and offers an interpretation from a new perspective on the work,helping readers to deepen their understanding of this work.