Ambivalence In Representation Of Women Images In Humboldt’s Gift

There have been two completely different views about Saul Bellow’s creation of female images among critics. The female characters in Bellow’s early works have been criticized by the feminists and he is labeled as a male chauvinistic writer. However, the critics speak highly of Bellow’s female images in his later works. The doubts and controversies stem from Bellow’s complex emotions towards women both in life and in literary. Humboldt’s Gift is written in Bellow’s heyday and Bellow creates Charlie Citrine, the hero in Humboldt’s Gift, to represent him to show his peculiar emotions through Citrine’s ambivalent feelings and attitudes towards women. This thesis focuses on the female characters and studies Bellow’s ambivalent emotions towards women reflected in representation of women images in Humboldt’s’Gift from the perspective of feminism.This thesis firstly discusses the essential reason of the ambivalence and the male protagonist’s ambivalent feelings towards women in his past life. Deeply influenced by the patriarchal ideology and addicted to the vanished wonderful family life, Citrine is stuck in the ambivalence between his dream and the reality and ceases to advance in the real life. Moreover, Bellow embodies these feelings into his representation of his female characters. Secondly, Citrine tries to demonize his wife and maintains his male superiority under the mask of a "victim". However, Citrine struggles with his inner conflicts because of his self-examination and his sympathy for his wife. At last, the middie-aged Citrine treats the relationship with his mistress as a transaction of money and uses the youth and beauty of his mistress to resist the middle-aged crisis. Citrine’s behavior eventually leads to his mistress’s departure, which prompts Citrine who once has a prejudice against his mistress to dwell upon his unfair treatment of female.The present author analyzes Saul Bellow’s ambivalent representation of women characters in Humboldt’s Gift from the perspective of feminism. The study of the ambivalence in representation of women images in this novel sheds new light on the development of Bellow’s female characters in his works and arouses readers to think about Bellow’s creation of female characters.