Understanding, Projection And World Of Love

The Issue and thesis statement: Eudora Welty, a well-known female southern writer, is distinguished by her intelligent short stories. The researches on Welty of the western world are not rare. From the 1960s, there are large amounts of research papers on Welty come into light. However, her southern ness and realistic meaning of her works appeal to the western scholars particularly. Meanwhile, her writing skills are also proved to be delicate and unique. Unfortunately, it still could not explain the world of Welty well and always simplify the values of her works. When it comes to the researches of Welty in China, the problem mentioned above is even much severe, because the research is only a simple summary to the western ones without any creation to some extent. The scholars of China just focus their attention on several female characters or give a brief introduction to Welty's thesis. The expansion of people's understanding on Welty, they come to realize finally that the feature of Welty's sentimental world is her seeking for meaning of existence, concerning about people's inner world and faith of love.. For example, the scholars find that Welty clearly exposes her understanding on the meaning of life,—people's need for love—to the readers in her short stories. However, with no theory as the foundation of research, scholars have to stop at the superficial reaches. Welty criticizes the industrialism of the modern society for it drives the human being into insane. However, do these people lose their desire for love and future totally? Are they still seeking for the love they have lost? Welty puts her emphasis on the state of understanding and projection, and her stories about falling and thrownness are also adjuvant to her theme: love and dream. In Welty's view, love and dream in the true meaning of life and understanding and projection are true meanings of existence.Rationale and methodology: Philosophy is considered as the foundational subject of all others knowledge. The profound understanding on the world and human from the view of philosophy is the most exact and deep one. Philosophy provides people with the ability of seeing through the superficial phenomenon to the essence of the world which includes human and other creatures. So philosophy could be the best foundation on which my research could be carried out. Heidegger's existential theory gives a deep understanding on the true meaning of existence, which is having a positive understanding on life and projecting for the future. He takes states of understanding and projection as the authenticities of existence. The theory of Heidegger is applied for the 17 short stories.Organization and Major Contents :Chapter one: Introducing Welty and the significance of my research.Chapter two: Providing a literature review from a whole aspect.Chapter three: Demonstrating Heidegger's theory of existence in which the major elements of existential theory, especially the states of understanding and projection.Chapter four: Analyzing A Curtain of Green and Other Stories. This chapter is divided into 4 states of existence with several short stories as explaining stuff in each part. State of falling has three stories to support it: A Piece of News, Clytie and The Whistles. State of thrownness consists of Why I Lived at the P.O. and The Hitch-Hikers. Death of A Traveling Salesman and A Curtain of Green belong to the state of understanding. And the last part is state of projection which is made up by Flower for Marjorie,A Worn Path and The Key.Chapter Five: Conclusion part. Welty puts her emphasis on the state of understanding and projection, and her stories about falling and thrownness are also adjuvant to her theme: love and dream. All the characters in stories are looking forward to love and dream eagerly, with no exception, even in those dark stories. In Welty's view, love and dream in the true meaning of life. Understanding and projection are true meanings of existence. She continues to affirm the beauties and terrors inherent in the human situations while asserting the right to love and the need to dream. Writing with love, she restores our illusions about the world of love. Welty uses the 17 short stories to express her view of life that love could heal human being .All the suffering and affliction we face in the life is for finding the essence of life and life, rather than beating ourselves down. Welty opens a panorama out to us. We see the sufferings of life as well as the light of life. Anxiety, death, falling, throwness, understanding and projection are indispensable elements of life which display the existence of human being. Welty believe that existence of human being and the meaning of life lie in the harmony with the world and other people. The alienation among people is caused by the loss of love and hope.