Transcending "The Anxiety Of Influence": A Study Of Ian McEwan's Atonement

In his The Anxiety of Influence, Harold Bloom holds that any poet will be influenced by his precursors,"the strong poets". The precursors bring not only the resources and inspiration of writing, but also"the anxiety of influence"to the"latecomers". Ian McEwan's Atonement carries some obvious traces of Jane Austen from the characterization and the narrative style. Facing the strong influence, as a"latecomer", McEwan has to overcome the anxiety of influence and to build up his status as"the new strong poet"through innovations. This thesis will analyze the artistic value of Atonement from a rather new angle of"The Anxiety of Influence"and explore the process of McEwan's transcending the anxiety of influence and becoming"the new strong poet"from three aspects: Austen's influence, McEwan'anxiety and his innovations.Introduction includes McEwan's life and the plot of Atonement, the critical review at home and abroad, and the research significance and organization of this thesis.Chapter One presents the influence and traces in Atonement from"the strong poet"---Jane Austen. The novel is influenced by Austen on the characterization, theme and narrative style. First, on the design of character, Briony is a girl who imagines an innocent man as a criminal, like the heroine Catherine Morland in Northanger Abbey. Then the maturation of protagonists is the theme for both Atonement and Austen's novels. What's more, Austen's writing skill, which combines the omniscient narration and the limited third-person narration, and ironic style have exerted great influence on McEwan.Chapter Two discusses McEwan's anxiety of influence. First, this thesis demonstrates his anxiety toward his consistent realist style. Second, it analyzes McEwan's anxiety to his writing range and themes. Under the influence of Austen, his literary range and themes are limited in the life of middle-class, trivia in families, the relationship between men and women and the maturation of individuals, cornering him into a predicament. How to get rid of the shadow of the precursor consistently bothers him. What's more, McEwan mirrors his anxiety on Briony who loves writing.Chapter Three explores the process of McEwan's becoming of"the new strong poet". For overcoming the anxiety of influence and building up his status as"the new strong poet", McEwan has done some innovations on characterization, structure and narration. He devises Briony as a writer who atones by writing. In the use of the authorship of Briony, he discusses the novel-writing in the text. Besides, the complicated structure and metafictional narrative style make Atonement different from Austen's novels. In this aspect, McEwan transcends the anxiety of influence.In conclusion, for one thing, Ian McEwan's Atonement has some traces from his precursor, Jane Austen. For another, confronting strong influence from the precursor, McEwan transcends"the anxiety of influence"and finally becomes"the new strong poet"by rethinking and innovations, and wins a place in the literary history for himself.