An Interpretation Of Multiple Meanings Of Land In A Thousand Acres

Jane Smiley is hailed as one of the most innovative and prolific contemporary women writers in the United States. In1991A Thousand Acres was published and won her the Pulitzer Prize for fiction and National Book Critics Circle Award in1992. Since it came out, it has attracted great attention, and many scholars have interpreted it from various perspectives.This novel depicts the life of people who lived on the mid-western farmland during the1980s farm crisis in Iowa in the Reagan years. The story shows what happened after the father decided to transfer his one thousand acres of land to his three daughters.According to the cause-and-effect sequence of the events, this thesis interprets different meanings of land embodied in different stages. Therefore, this thesis could be divided into three parts.Chapter One introduces that farmers are crazy about land more than because it satisfies human beings’physical needs. The quantity and quality of land can influence farmer’s status, appearance (that is, face in the novel) and power in the community. Besides, farmers create a richer, better and fuller life by following the basic principle---hard work as what the American Dream promised. All these have become the inner motives of pursuit of land. Land in this novel witnesses how farmers expand the scale of land, how farmers improve social status, how farmers become qualified and how farmers realized the American dream.Chapter Two demonstrates that the ownership of land reflects the power relations. Males take the priority of possessing land, a means of production, to control. Moreover, labor division principle typical in capitalist society and deprivation of means of production determines the subordinate status of female. Patriarchy regards women as men’s private property. Therefore, due to the double effects of capitalism and patriarchy, women and land become objects doomed to be owned.Chapter Three unveils the tragedy caused by the obsession with land from three dimensions, namely, agriculture civilization, family and individual. Farmers used chemicals and pesticides to improve the productivity. Therefore, environment worsened. Bad effects took a toll on farmers as well. Besides, land in the novel has badly distorted the interpersonal relationship. As a result, agriculture civilization is putting on a tragedy, each family is suffering crisis and individuals is enduring the traumatic experience.Land has fully interferes the operation of human society. The interpretation of multiple meanings of land can make clear how it works in people’s life. Meanwhile, the interpretation of meanings of land can help readers get a better understanding of this novel and provide a new direction for exploration and further study.