A Study Of Lao She's Reference And Development From Dickens' Works

Since the May Fourth Movement, by the effect of Western Learning Tide, almost all the writers of modern Chinese literature history had been impacted by the foreign literature, Lao She is the representative. In 1924, he set foot on British, and embarked on a creative path in London. In the course of his literary creation, he was affected by such foreign literatures as the British writers Charles Dickens, Conrad, Wells, Italian writers Dante and Russian literatures. Among them, his first foreign literature teacher is Charles Dickens, the person who also impacted his creation through the lifetime. It could be said without the inspiration of Dickens, Lao She would not go on the road of literature. The direct impact is mainly reflected in his early creation. With the mature of his creation, his works reflected more ethnic characteristics in spite of aesthetic style, theme selection and characterization referring to Dickens. So to speak, Lao She's creations not only absorbed nutriments of English works of Charles Dickens, but also revealed the root of Chinese culture. Thus, he was a master of Chinese literary writers on the basis of the reference and development of Dickens' creation.This paper mainly demonstrates the impact of Dickens' creations to Lao She and his works' development on the basis of Dickens' creations. The whole paper is divided into three chapters. Chapter One is to introduce the importance of the British period for Lao She's writing road. Chapter Two discusses Dickens' impact on Lao She's literature creation, which mainly reflected in two aspects:first, from the works' writing style, Lao She's humorous style has the similar roots with Dickens'. Humor is the main aesthetic feature of their works. It can be said that no humor, no the two writers. Their humor concentrates on shaping humorous characters and satirizing the unreasonable social system. Second, the characterization of ordinary people in Dickens works also has a great influence on Lao She. Dickens described the lower and middle classes of London as his main characters, while Lao She wrote the poor of Beijing city into his works. Chapter three discusses his development on the basis of Dickens' influence. For the different ages and countries of the two, Lao She also retains the style of localization on the basis of reference. His humor is based on Beijing dialect humor including tragedy, which differs from Dickens' comic and exaggerated humor. Lao She's works reflect the characteristics of strict realism. His low-class people images embodied the profound traditional Chinese culture, though their tragedies arise by economic reasons, but cultural reasons in deeper side. Lao She's epic masterpieces, "Four Generations (Si Shi Tong Tang)" and "Teahouse (Cha Guan)" penetrate the changes of the Chinese nation's times. Viewing from this point, the works of Mr. Lao She reflect the development under the influence of Charles Dickens' creation both in the breadth and depth of life.