Seeking Equality Between The Two Sexes A Narrative Semiotic Analysis Of Nights At The Circus

Angela Carter(1940-1992) was one of the English writers who are most outstanding in contemporary literary field. Her novel Nights at the Circus was first published in 1984, which incorporates multiple categories of fiction, including postmodernism and magical realism. The novel focuses on the life and exploits of Sophie Fevvers, a woman who is – or so she would have people believe – a Cockney virgin, hatched from an egg laid by unknown parents and ready to develop fully fledged wings. At the time of the story, she has become a celebrated aerialiste, and she captivates the young journalist Jack Walser, who runs away with the circus and falls into a world that his journalistic exploits had not prepared him to encounter.There have been many studies on Nights at the Circus both at home and abroad, most of which, however, analyze the novel from the perspectives like magical realism, postmodernism, feminism and so forth. This paper tries to apply the Greimassian approach to the interpretation of N ights at the Circus. It will explore the relationship between Fevvers and Walser from the discursive level, the narrative level and the deep level so as to expose Carter‘s purpose of writing this novel, which is to shape the images of new woman and new man and advocate establishing equal and harmonious relationship between men and women.The thesis is composed of five chapters. C hapter one is a brief introduction to Angela Carter as well as to Nights at the Circus, which also includes a literature review on the target novel and an overview of the Greimassian approach. The body chapters start from chapter two to chapter 4. C hapter two is a discursive- level analysis of the relationship between Fevvers and Walser. The author will read between lines and find out their hidden meanings. Chapter three conducts a narrative- level analysis of their relationship. The novel falls into three parts and the author tries to find the six actants in each part, namely subject/object, sender/receiver and helper/opponent, to see whether the quest in each section succeeds. C hapter four is committed to the deep- level analysis of the themes, in which three binary oppositions are found and therefore, three semiotic squares are built. The author analyzes the reasons why Fevvers and Walser cannot be to gether in the first two sections and why they end up married ultimately. Last chapter summarizes the earlier chapters and points out Carter‘s ultimate goal of creating this novel: she creates the images of new woman and new man, who march into the new cent ury hand in hand. She expresses her desire for a balance of the two sexes.