Crane’s Concerns For Man’s Plight In The Modern World

Stephen Crane (1871-1900) is regarded as a precursor of modern poetry inAmerican literature. His poetry is rich in metaphorical and thought-provoking images.However, until now, critics at home or abroad, have barely made a systematicclassification of his poetic imagery, or expatiated on the condensed archetypes in hispoems, much less clearly affirmed Crane’s concern for modern man’s plight, which isunderlying in the modulation of his poetic imagery. Therefore, it is of significance forthis thesis to study the images in Stephen Crane’s poetry in light of archetypalcriticism put forward by a prominent Canadian literary critic Northrop Frye.Inspired by the falling and rising pattern in Frye’s U-shaped narrative structure,this thesis classifies the imagery of Crane’s poetry into two kinds, the rising imageryand the falling imagery, and makes textual analysis in context of Biblical and classicalworks. Firstly, the thesis discusses the rising imagery which represents modern man’spursuit of his ideal. The thesis then proceeds to discuss the falling imagery whichrepresents man’s fervent desire for the fulfillment of his personal needs. The intensivestudy of the two kinds of images is intended to reveal Crane’s concern for modernman’s plight, which is consistent with the framework of “myth of concern” advancedby Frye: man’s primary concern involves his desire for food, liberty, sex and property; man’s secondary concern dealing with social contract such as patriotism, religiousbelief, and other collective sentiments. Meanwhile, it is noteworthy to mention thegeneral rising-falling pattern in Crane’s poetic imagery, which helps to reveal Crane’sconcern for man’s problematic living conditions in the modern age.Crane has branded his poetry into a parody of the traditional pattern ofU-shaped myth narrative and produced the rough rising-falling pattern in Crane’spoetic imagery that presents a promising vision of ascent at a beginning and adistressful vision of descent at the end. These recurring images depict a demonic andabsurd world where the estranged individual literally fails at every attempt to achievehis ideal and to satisfy his desire. All of these manifest Crane’s concern for man’splight in the modern age.So far, this thesis has been the first one to clearly affirm the rising-fallingpattern in Crane’s poetic imagery. This unusual pattern marks his breakthrough fromthe genteel style of the nineteenth century and awakes people to their plight in modernsociety. To the poet, the modern man’s plight is rooted in the discrepancy betweenman’s overwhelmingly ambitious goal and his relatively limited capacity.