An Analysis Of The Characterization In Fortress Besieged Through Interpersonal Meaning

The present study was intended to explore the characterization in the novel Fortress Besieged through the analysis of dialogues between the main characters from the perspective of interpersonal meaning and to investigate what or how communicative strategies are employed in their dialogues for the purpose of achieving different goals.Interpersonal function of Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) serves as the theoretical framework for the present study, mainly involving mood, modality and evaluation. As dialogues can reveal, maintain or adjust interpersonal relationship, they were used as the materials for the analysis in the study and altogether 40 dialogues representing different situations were selected as materials for the analysis from the English version of the novel translated by Jeanne Kelly and Nathan K. Mao.In order to acquire a deeper and truer understanding of the novel's main characters, especially that of the hero Fang Hung-chien, the present study divides the dialogues in different situations into two parts, namely, marriage/love and sociality/work, focusing analysis on dialogues in typical episodes from each of them.Other main characters involved in Fang Hung-chien's marriage/love are Su Wen-wan, T'ang Hsiao-fu and Sun Jou-chia, and those involved in his sociality/work are his friend Chao Hsin-mei and a group of his hypocritical colleagues—Kao Sung-nien, Han Hsüeh-yü, Wang Ch'u-hou, etc. Such characters are more or less involved in the analysis of the present study, though not the focus.The major findings of the study are listed as follows:1. Fang is a man of complex personalities, among which the most striking ones are his gullibility, cowardliness and incompetence. He always falls a victim to deceitful people. He is taken in first by Su and then by Sun, who seemingly love him but actually make use of him; he does not know how to defend himself when T'ang and Su attack him. Though Fang is na?ve by nature, this does him more harm than good. He is always in a state of disadvantage before his sophisticated colleagues. As a result, he is always socially marginalized and even fails to keep up his relations with his lover T'ang because of others'interferences, though he is sincere with her. In a word, Fang is repeatedly frustrated without an effective strategy to deal with people around him.2. Other people's characters are also vividly represented in the novel. To begin with, Su is very sophisticated and good at taking advantage of the situation both in her first dialogue with Fang and in their last meeting, in which Fang is completely controlled. Second, like Fang, T'ang is also na?ve and gullible. Third, Sun is very practical. In order to realize her goals, she can not only deceive Fang but also flinch from the unfavorable situation. Fourth, Chao is straightforward, though sometimes offensive. He is also upright and contemptuous of those hypocritical colleagues. Fifth, Fang's colleagues such as Kao, Han, etc. are all pretentious and hypocritical.3. Interpersonal meaning proves to be a useful and effective theoretical perspective for the analysis of dialogues in this novel in terms of characterization. For example, the personalities of characters can be identified in their attempts to dominate the dialogues and so on and so forth. Such analysis from the perspective of interpersonal meaning also illustrates the effective strategies employed in dialogues by different characters,such as the strategies of keeping asking questions, refusing to answer questions, providing false answers, changing topics, etc.The present study, which is based on the interpersonal function, may offer a new theoretical perspective for a better appreciation of characterization in literary works and lead to learners'better understanding of the target language from discourse level.