Realistic Dimensions And Humanitarian Concern In Mother Night

Kurt Vonnegut is a typical postmodern writer in American literature in the20th century. The postmodern writing techniques adopted in most of his works, which are capturing more attention and getting more criticism. The author does not show the writing techniques merely, but what he demonstrates in Mother Night is the realism conveyed in his postmodern way of representation. As an early work of Vonnegut, it does not draw much attention from the critics, but he skillfully demonstrates the postmodern realism and expresses freely his humanitarian concern.Undoubtedly, the novel, written in the form of a spy’s autobiography and told from the perspective of first-person narration by Vonnegut for the first time, shows the development of the protagonist’s fate in the Second World War. This thesis illustrates Mother Night as a work of postmodern realism by means of an analysis which concerns about postmodern writing techniques and the features of realism implied in work. My thesis attempts to analyze the superficial postmodern characteristics adopted in order to demonstrate his real writing intention─humanitarian concern.In general, this thesis intends to illustrate the novel as a work of postmodern realism, in which the author conveys his humanitarian concern. Three parts included in this thesis, the first part is to reveal it as a work of postmodern realism with the application of the theories of Brook-Rose’s realism and postmodern realism to analyze the realistic elements in these four themes: the governmental conspiracy, characters’ morality, friendship and love. The second part mainly applies the relevant theories to analyze its characterization and narration, aiming to display its realistic dimensions in its postmodern context. Last part focuses on the features of realism implied in the writer’s real thoughts and the protagonist’s ending in the book, which explores his realistic humanitarian concern.