The Unifying Strategies In Winesburg, Ohio

Sherwood Anderson (1876—1941) is a writer impossible to be ignored in the history of modern American literature. With the publication of his Winesburg, Ohio in 1919, he did cause a great stir in the world. Many young writers at that time such as Faulkner and Hemingway were his disciples. He was hailed as the father of his generation of American writers.In Winesburg, Ohio, instead of idealizing the American small town's gentle facade as most contemporary writers do, Anderson depicts the Winesburg town as a cold, dark and lonely place. With his delicate and incisive social perception, he probes intuitively and compassionately the twisted souls of the small town people at the country's transition from an agrarian society to an industrial one. Unable to adjust themselves to the changing world, the townspeople under Anderson's pen are rather frustrated, agonizingly lonely and unexplainably inarticulate. Consequently, Winesburg, Ohio is considered as the first modern American expression of the wasteland theme by many critics. In this way, Anderson gives a new impetus and direction to the future development of the American short story.There are many ways to interpret his text. Since its publication in 1919, Winesburg, Ohio has been studied from different perspectives: biographically, historically, geographically, thematically, and structurally, by critics both at home and abroad. Based on the studies done before, with a view to approaching Winesburg, Ohio as a unit, this thesis is intended to make a systematic study of the unifying strategies that Anderson utilizes in his work from the following three aspects, namely, unity in theme, unity in form and unity in writing techniques.Apart from the Introduction and the Conclusion, the main body of the thesis is composed of three chapters. Chapter One gives a view of the general characteristics of all the grotesques from three angles, namely, their frustration, loneliness and inarticulateness. Meanwhile, the common causes of their grotesqueness are revealed. The analysis of these...