The Absurd World In Negation

Negation is an important form of language expression. According to Text World Theory, in the information flow of discourse, negative constructions can be used to foreground background information and regulate information flow through channeling and repairing information. At the macro-level of discourse structure, negative constructions are especially associated with denial-correction, denial-basis and hypothetical-real textual patterns, and thus are employed as important means of discourse organization.Joseph Heller’s first novel--Catch-22is a masterpiece of black humor fictions. In this novel, there are lots of contradictions, parodies and vagueness constructed by negation. These negation phenomena are important expressions of characters’mental style which play a significant role in reader’s interpretation of the novel. This thesis attempts to investigate the absurdity of the novel and the tragic life of the antiheros caused by their different world views from the perspective of negation based on text world theory.This paper is made up of six chapters.Chapter one is a general introduction of the purpose, the significance and the organization of this thesis.Chapter two is the literature review on Catch-22, which covers the general introduction of Joseph Heller and Catch-22and the previous studies on Catch-22at home and abroad in detail. Though critics have done fruitful work in interpretingCatch-22, the novel still suffers from a serious lack of studies from the perspective of text world theory. Hence, the significance of the thesis lies in making up the deficiency as much as possible.Chapter three is the general introduction of Text World Theory. According to Werth’s Text World Theory, the text is a communication discourse which includes three levels namely discourse world, text world and sub-world. As a stylistic theory, Text World Theory is a powerful means to analyze a dynamic discourse. In this article, the author tries to investigate the absurdity of Catch-22from the perspective of negation based on Text World Theory.Chapter four gives a detailed introduction of negation phenomenon in sub-world especially the functions of negation in discourse, which provides a new point of view to analyze the dynamic information. Negative constructions as the marked category in the polarity system of language play a unique role in communication. From the perspective of information organization, negative constructions are not only used to foreground information but regulate information flow through channeling and repairing information to make sure the information is smooth. So it is an important means in discourse organization.Chapter five is the main body of this thesis. It explores the absurdity of Catch-22from the inverted world and world conflicts and world views of survivalists in negation. Then the paper concludes that the fictional world of Catch-22is an absurd world controlled by military bureaucracy rather than a disorderly world out of control.Chapter six is the conclusion. Along with summarizing the major points discussed in the thesis, it states the limitations of the study and gives suggestions for further researches.