On The Female Images In The Dramas From The 1920s To 1930s

This paper aims to investigate female images in plays from the 1920s-30s (1920-1939) through categorization of female images in representative works from a feminist perspective. Based on principles of close reading, it uses methods such as narratology and structuralism, and integrates social, historical, and cultural backgrounds. The core of this paper consists of the following three chapters:1) "Emergence:Female Image in Plays under the Influence of the May Fourth Movement"; 2) "Find Sustenance in Love:Females’ Behavioral Choice in Love"; 3) "Self-Finding:Peeping Female Image through Mirrors". These chapters display the evolution of female images from appearing, departure, marching towards love, and eventually accomplishing self-finding via returning to self mirror-image. Moreover, this study analyzes the changes of different female images in terms of external behavior and internal psychology, and how these changes reflect writers’ mentality as well as cultural connotations. Finally, from the perspective of text creation, this paper analyzes the transformation of female images from being portrayed as naive to becoming more mature. Through comparative analysis of similar types of female images between earlier plays and the works of Cao Yu, this study summarizes how the mature portrayal of female images inherits and exceeds earlier works.