Reading The Gothic In Carson McCullers's Fiction

Carson McCullers (1917-1967) is a prominent American writer in the twentieth century whose works abound in morbidity and grotesque. This thesis explores McCullers's particular Gothic art in her literary creation through the analysis of her two representative works:The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter and The Ballad of the Sad Cafe, and it points out the significance of the Gothic to McCullers.At first this thesis briefly introduces McCullers's life and literary career. In Chapter Two it narrates the origin and the development of the Gothic—the rise of American Southern Gothic in particular. Based on this tracing, the thesis is about to generalize McCullers's heritage and development of the Gothic tradition, and it probes into the causes of McCullers's adoption of Gothic technique from the perspectives of society and the author herself.Chapter Three and Chapter Four point out the distinctive features of Carson McCullers's Gothic. McCullers develops a special Gothic theme, that is, spiritual isolation. Her works profoundly investigate social reality and shows her sympathy with the marginalized groups—the female, the working-class, the colored, the sexually ambiguous. McCullers thoroughly exposes the serious social problems, as well as human being's solitary spiritual status in modern world. McCullers also depicts various grotesque love patterns including "spoke-and-hub" love, triangle love, etc. in which the characters involved are making desperate efforts to find comfort and solace in another soul and what they obtain at last is mere an intensified solitude and agony. Through the description of all kinds of inevitably disillusioned love, McCullers aims to arouse human being's concern about modern spiritual crisis. In addition, McCullers displays some individuals with strange gender identity, which vividly reflects people's distorted living status under the social oppression.Chapter Five focuses on vehicles of McCullers's Gothic. McCullers's fictions are often set in an estranged and dreary environment which gives the readers an impression of depression and suspense. The aloof and isolated environment serves to reflect the desperation of the inhabitants living there. Besides the Gothic atmosphere, McCullers's works are imbued with frightful torture scenes and violent death which show people's frustration and struggling in society. McCullers also portrays a lot of morally or physically deformed freaks. The characters are grotesque because they are twisted and distorted by the morbid society. Moreover, McCullers adds comic elements to traditional Gothic. To sum up, the devices of McCullers's Gothic art manifest in the following four aspects:dreary and isolated settings, violence and death, grotesques and freaks, tragicomic vision.The Conclusion part summarizes the whole thesis and points out the significance of the Gothic to McCullers. Actually, for McCullers, Gothic element serves as a means to highlight her themes. She renews and enriches the content of Gothic tradition by adding modern realistic spirit. In her works, McCullers demonstrates the helpless situation of people's alienation and exposes cruel social reality. Via the research on McCullers's Gothic art, we definitely feel McCullers's deep concern for people's spiritual state and social problems. McCullers hopes that people can break their spiritual isolation and restore their communication trough normal love.