| Susan Sontag (1933-2004) worked diligently from1960s to realize her dream ofbeing a great American writer. No matter how many literary genres Sontag had triedher hand in, it must be noted that fiction writing was always her favourite. She startedout as a fiction writer and fiction marked a perfect end of her creative career. FromThe Benefactor (1963), Sontag’s debut on the New York intellectual stage, to InAmerica (2000), her last novel which won the US National Book Award, her workswitnessed her consistent and ambitious endeavours to achieve success in the genre.Therefore, it is undoubtedly worthwhile to do a comprehensive research on Sontag’swriting so as to make further explorations of her literary ideas. French Existentialism(whose major contributors are Sartre, Camus and Beauvoir) plays an important role inSontag’s literary works, which is due to the writer’s background and educationalexperience. This dissertation argues that Existentialism is the key to a betterinterpretation of Sontag’s works and the window for the readers to see Sontag moreclearly as a person. Firmly grounded in existentialist thought, most of Sontag’s storiesare directed at describing, observing, analyzing and criticizing what happened inAmerica.This dissertation falls into six parts.The “Introduction” looks at the status quo of Sontag research home and abroadand points out the problems with the critics’ contradictory interpretations of Sontag’sworks. This dissertation seeks to identify the very centre that Sontag’s writingrevolves around by tracing her seldom noticed or mentioned philosophicalbackground and studying the existentialist ideas in her literary works to make a wayout of the confusing views on the much disputed “dark lady” of letters.Chapter One focuses on The Benefactor and Death Kit (1967), Sontag’s twonovels in the1960s, analyzing the writer’s meditation on “existence”, the most important element in Existentialism, while referring to the social events and Sontag’spersonal experience. In The Benefactor Sontag presented bad faith as a form ofexistence, and in her efforts to avail of unreliable narration and dizzy dreams toportray a man of bad faith she expressed a kind of self-mockery as well as her ownunderstanding of the special existentialist concept. In Death Kit, the protagonistattempts to kill himself to cast off his existential absurdity, but faced with death, heimagines himself killing a worker to identify his own existence. Behind themysterious suicide and murder committed by a lonely man, however, hides a grandnarrative of the Vietnam War which took away too many lives. Sontag seemed towrite about an individual’s absurdity, but her target was the destructive war, which is ahidden scar of the1960s’ America. Apart from paying close attention to man’scondition of existence, both of these two early novels had a mission of heraldingSontag’s coming into the literary arena as a serious novelist. She underwent thespiritual catharsis and announced her belief in the parodied quotation of “I write,therefore I am”.Chapter Two offers an analysis of I, Etcetera (1978), a collection of short storiesand “The Way We Live Now”(1986) to explore Sontag’s changing emphasis on theidea of “freedom”, the key concept of Existentialism, in the1960s,1970s and1980s.Published in the1960s and respectively based on the technology of “duplication” andWomen’s Liberation Movement,“The Dummy”(1963) and “American Spirits”(1965)allegorically demonstrate how two typical middle class protagonists, a man and awoman, pursue their freedom in the name of free will. The first story satirizes themodern urbanite’s bewilderment in the simple daily life while the latter offersreflections on the then popular Women’s Liberation Movement and the opinion thatsexual liberation is the right way for women to shake off the patriarchal yoke.“DoctorJekyll”(1974), written in the1970s, is a rewriting of Robert Louis Stevenson’sStrange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886). This story describes a man who loseshimself in the wartime anguish. For the sake of so called freedom, he turns to amysterious religion to gain individual power, only to find himself disillusioned, whichleads to his next attempt to transform into an evil figure so that he can be redeemed with the sins he may commit. By closely analyzing the leading character’s twofreedom-searching journeys, we may find that they both end up in vain becausenobody is to enjoy freedom without any moral concerns. In fact, people can taste thesweetness of freedom as long as they bravely face their personal situations and trulyunderstand the restrictions of freedom.“The Way We Live Now”, published in the1980s when AIDS began to be known and stirred a public panic, bears the mark of itstime. Sontag’s close relationship with Existentialism makes it clear what she wantedto communicate in the story the two interdependent existentialist themes of freedomand responsibility. The story bespoke Sontag’s later essay “AIDS and Its Metaphors”(1989) where she elaborated on the AIDS topic. While tasting the bitterness broughtby the pseudo-freedom without any sense of responsibility, people in the storyovercome their fears and bravely shoulder the difficult tasks of looking after eachother. In doing so, they defuse the psychological crisis caused by AIDS and walktowards true maturity.Chapter Three offers an existentialist feminist reading of Sontag’s two works inthe1990s. One is The Volcano Lover (1992), and the other is Alice in Bed (1993), aneight-act play that is the only full-length drama in her play writing. Although the titleof The Volcano Lover refers to the male character in the novel, the main focus is onthe women who live as “the Other” under male influence. Based on the traditionalnarration of the historical novel, Sontag marked her innovation by making the lastchapter a women-only space so that those wordless women can have their own voice,if posthumously. They argue for their existence and speak out their existential pains.In Alice in Bed, Sontag parodied Alice in Wonderland and created a crazy tea party inwhich she invited several well-known women characters to get together, expressingtheir anger towards the sexual oppression imposed on them. However, the party turnsout to be a meaningless small talk. Alice, heroine of the play, imprisons herself in aroom, refusing to get up. She imagines a great victory over a burglar in theirconfrontation, but the so-called imaginary triumph is nothing but a weak excuse forthe heroine to escape the sorrow of her failure. The sexual resistance only rests on theconsciousness. Vividly delineated in these two1990s’ works is a list of impressive images of “the Other” who, to the reader’s disappointment, appear one by one just asindividual female sufferers but not a united and fighting group of angry women.Chapter Four is a study of Sontag’s last novel, In America, which is abouthistorical figures and events. Transcendence is an important theme in this novel. Withall three elements she favored, namely, women, theatre and America, the noveldisplays Sontag’s interest in self-fashioning and discovering America. Self-fashioningexpresses the author’s persistent concern for women as “the Other” while discoveringAmerica offers a possible solution to the conflict between the New World and the OldWorld. Women need to transcend their identity as “the Other” to find new selves; theEuropean immigrants need to transcend their prejudice against America to identifywith the new land and to live a harmonious life there.The Conclusion of this dissertation points out that while Sontag reflected on thecore existentialist concepts of existence, freedom,“the Other” and transcendence, herwriting always puts the social functions of literature and the social responsibilities ofthe writer first，and in this sense she was a writer of “engagement” who involvedherself in social life. Her literary works written in different periods are the naturaloutcome of her consistent observations of real life. It is therefore fairly safe to say thather own actions and literary works are the best declaration of her deep apprehensionof Existentialism. She was not free from errors, but she deserved the honour andrespect that readers and critics have paid to her for her indefatigable defending andguarding of the spiritual life. |
PDF Full Text Request