Conrad's Concern For Humanity In Under Western Eyes

This thesis is an attempt to explore Conrad's deep concern for humanity in one of his novels—Under Western Eyes. To some critics, it is nothing but a political novel. This thesis is to prove, however, that it is a novel whose subject is continuous with his other works—his concern over morality and humanity. No matter in his famous sea novels and jungle novels, or in his less famous political novels, Conrad all shows his deep concern for the above issues, and also tries to probe into these issues in the given situation and environment in the novels. Under Western Eyes is just such a novel set in the Russian community in Geneva.On the basis of this assumption, with a historical-biographical and narratological analysis, this thesis forms an attempt to explore Conrad's concern over morality and humanity from the following three aspects: Conrad's political attitude and humane ideas deriving from his life experiences; Conrad's humane ideas reflected through his respective attitude towards different political groups represented by some major and typical characters in the novel; Conrad's concern over humanity under the "Western Eyes" of the narrators.The thesis consists of four chapters. Chapter One is an introduction, which sketches briefly the methodology, the goal and the motivation for the writing of this thesis, together with a literature review.Chapter Two discusses Conrad's views of humanity revealed through his judgment on the morality of political action and his different attitudes towards different political groups: deep hatred of the cruel Russian authorities which caused countless innocent victims to sustain its autocratic rule; disapproval and antipathy to the revolutionaries, characterized with ideal but hollow ideas and radical, violent actions; and appreciation and respect to social reformers and even some revolutionaries featured with humane nature.Chapter Three probes into Conrad's concern for humanity revealed through the purposefully designed title Under Western Eyes and his purposeful arrangement of the double narrators.Finally, Chapter Four concludes that Under Western Eyes is not only a political novel as is seen traditionally, but also a novel of common Conradian subject and artistry like his other novels, and that the novel shows Conrad's deep concern for and meditation on the issue of humanity.