Behind Rita Hayworth

With the title Behind Rita Hayworth,the target of the thesis is to study famous American contemporary popular fiction writer Stephen King's short fiction Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption. With archetypal criticism and semiotics as the theoretical framework, the thesis analyzes and discusses several aspects of the fiction with details, namely the major character, the theme and the structure.Under the guidelines of archetypal criticism and semiotics as the theoretical instruction, the thesis is developed into five parts. Part one Introduction is a brief background and literary review to the fiction Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption for the further analysis in the following chapters. In addition, it has provided a general and summarized presentation of major theoretical standpoints and analytical methods of archetypal criticism and semiotics, which are the theoretical guidelines in the thesis. Chapter I to Chapter III have given a detailed analysis of the fiction Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption under the instruction of archetypal criticism and semiotics. Chapter I has analyzed the major character Andy Dufresne, which starts with a semiotic analysis on two images in the fiction that lead to 3 major features of the character Andy Dufresne in the fiction. Subsequently, the character has been paralleled with a popular literary image James Bond in the modern cultural fields and the most agelong and influencing cultural character Jesus Christ respectively. The comparison between Andy Dufresne and James Bond has made the idealist heroic traits on the character Andy Dufresne clearer, and the discussion on the comparability between Andy Dufresne and Jesus Christ finally has pointed to the view that the archetype of Andy Dufresne-the hero in the fiction is Jesus Christ or the Christian God. From the analysis in Chapter I, the religious or Christian traits in terms of characters in Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption has been located. On the basis of the first chapter, Chapter II has analyzed the theme of the fiction from several aspects. Firstly, the keyword of the theme "redemption" has been discussed with details from the aspects of Andy's redemption story, Red's redemption story and the character relation between Andy and Red. After interpreting the theme of the fiction, the thesis has further compared the theme with two other important themes in the western culture, namely the "American Dream" complex in the American culture and the deep theme of Christianity. The parallel between the theme of the fiction and the "American Dream" has better identified the cultural features of the fiction's theme and its relation with religion; and the comparison between the theme of the fiction and Christianity has led to the standpoint that the thematic archetype of Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption is Christianity, or in other words, the theme of the fiction is deeply Christian related. Chapter III has given an analysis on the structure of the fiction, which refers to the location of the fiction's structural archetype. This chapter is divided into three parts. The first part is a comparing analysis of the superficial structure of the theme with the plot format of popular literary works, which targets to better locate the features of the fiction in terms of structure. The second part is a detailed analysis on the deep structure of the fiction. The Christian Bible is compared carefully with the structure of Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption. The general comparability points to the view that the deep structure of the fiction is based on the Christian Bible, or in other words, the Christian Bible is the structural archetype of the fiction Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption. Conclusion supplies the summing-up drawn from the analysis in the previous chapters. In this chapter, it is concluded after reviewing the major analyzing process and the respective results in the thesis that the fiction is closely related to Christianity, which with the Christian God and the Christian Bible, serves as the archetype of the fiction Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption.Generally speaking, with archetypal criticism and semiotics as the theoretical framework, the thesis analyzes with details the major character, the theme and the structure of the fiction Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption. Through the detailed analysis and discussion, the thesis concludes that the fiction is with a strong Christian color, or in other words, the literary and cultural archetype of the fiction is Christianity with its Christian Bible and the Christian characters.