| Sinclair Lewis is the first American author to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. He is a novelist, literary critic and social commentator and plays an important role in American literary history. His masterpiece Arrowsmith was selected for Pulitzer Prize for the novel in 1926, but Lewis refused to accept it. Arrowsmith is the first novel taking a medical worker as a protagonist with the significance of giving a satire on American medical society in twentieth century. According to Edward W. Soja’s view on three kinds of space which is put forward in his works Third Space----Journey to Los Angles and Other Real-and-Imagined Places, this paper tries to disclose hidden themes and provide artful appreciation to readers in the novel on three levels: Firstspace, Secondspace and Thirdspace.Firstspace refers to the real material world. The seven places where the protagonist Martin Arrowsmith studies and works belong to the Firstspace, which is studied in the first chapter of the present thesis. These places together represent American medical society and link each part of the novel as text structure and push the narrative progress forward. Secondspace refers to the spiritual world. The Second Chapter studies Martin’s mental growth in pursuit of his scientific ideal based on the theory of Secondspace. Readers’ psychological space is constructed through the limited presentation of the Secondspace. Thirdspace is not only a combination of the material and spiritual spaces but a space of openness. The Third Chapter probes into the Thirdspace, by which American cultural identity, the paradox of idealism and pragmatism is revealed. Due to the function of pragmatism, some Americans often choose escape to resolve the conflicts between ideals and reality and to foster the harmony of idealism and pragmatism through retreat from the society. Through the combination of the three spaces, Sinclair Lewis successfully discloses the far-reaching significance of the protagonist’s escape and retreat. |
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