A Study Of The "Meaning Of Life" In The Waves From The Perspective Of Aesthetics Of Existence

The Waves is completely of Virginia Woolf's own style. The book abandons the aesthetic and narrative mode of traditional novels, embodies Virginia Woolf's own philosophical thinking of universal propositions like life and death, and challenges readers'reading limit. Since its publication in 1931, The Waves attracts ceaseless analysis and research, which still appears a trend of seriousness and diversification today. Based on predecessors'study, this thesis attempts to further analyze the "meaning of life" in the book by applying Michel Foucault's theory of aesthetics of existence.The thesis consists of four chapters. Chapter one provides a brief introduction of Virginia Woolf and The Waves and raises the layout of the thesis. Chapter two is a discussion of the origin, development and major points of aesthetics of existence, which builds a solid theoretical foundation for the further study. Chapter three is an exploration of the "meaning of life" in three steps by respectively applying three major points including "care of the self", "technologies of the self" and aesthetic existence. The three steps are grip on the inner reality, resistance to preexistent norms and realization of aesthetic existence. In the first step, three pairs of binary opposition are designed according to traits of the six characters, in an effort to analyze the inner reality of the six. The "meaning of life" is primarily illustrated by combining the six characters together through(Percival, the voiceless seventh character. The second step is an exploration of how the six characters fight with preexistent norms like nature, time, and death. The author believes that the fight here is about how human beings deal with the relationships with other persons and other things instead of direct violent clash. The third step is a summary of how the characters accomplish aesthetic existence and achieve final freedom through self transcendence. Conclusions are drawn in chapter four as follows: Firstly, the feminine characters in The Waves could better take care of the self and pay close attention to their inner needs. Compared with them, masculine characters are much more alienated by the modern society and have incomplete personalities, so they should further practice ideas of aesthetics of existence. Secondly, the characters in the book apply different means to fight against norms. The reasonable solution might be:keeping in harmony with the nature; seizing "moments of being" as much as possible by increasing the density of life so that one can fight with time in another sense; and eliminating the barrier of the ego to achieve sublimation of the life by merging individual life into the joint life of the universe. Thirdly, only through a series of creative activities and constant self transcendence, can one finally realize aesthetics of existence.