An Eco-Feminist Reading Of The Cleft And The Last Quarter Of The Moon

The Cleft and The Last Quarter of the Moon were respectively the masterpieces of the British writer Doris Lessing and the Chinese writer Chi Zijian. Published in2007, The Cleft describes the history of primitive people evolving from singular sexual reproduction to bilingual sexual reproduction. The Last Quarter of the Moon, written by Chi Zijian, delineates the ups and downs of the Ewenki people in the past hundreds of years. With the development of eco-feminist literary criticism, several critics have already analyzed the two works from the eco-feminist perspective, but few compare these two novels with the method of parallel research. So this paper attempts to make Eco-feminist literary criticism as its theoretical framework, analyses and compares the similarities and differences of these two novels.With the ecological ideas at the perspectives of feminism, the western literary eco-feminism put its criticism on the patriarchy cultural basis. They argued that both of the oppression and exploitation on nature and female derived from the human patriarchy centralism. The eco-feminist genres mainly include the social eco-feminism, spiritual eco-feminism and green eco-feminism, every one of which is full of its own critical feature. There are certain paradoxes on eco-feminism but it deserves for it aims at the critical practice to against the human ecology crisis.From the "same" and "different" perspective to analyze the eco-feminism conceived in the two novels, it can not only show the profound ecological consciousness of women in both of the works from the macro prospective, but also demonstrate the differences of the eco-feminism between the two novels from the micro angle, which is helpful to excavate and expand two novels’ philosophy, besides that, the narrative efforts can be enhanced.The main part of the thesis aims to elaborate on the similarities of two novels from the perspective of eco-feminism in the frame work of parallel studies at first:both of the two works have spent a lot of words to describe the beauty of nature, there was the "warm and clean original beach" in The Cleft, in The Last Quarter of the Moon, the lush jungle expands miles and miles. Nature is closely related to the survival of mankind, it is the Garden of Eden that nurtures human beings. Secondly, Women and nature share homoousia. In The Cleft, the seashore had the magic power to make the tribeswomen conceived on the full day. In The Last Quarter of the Moon, the forest is the hotbed of male and female reproduction, moreover, the reindeers and the sika deer, which repeatedly appeared in the two novels, are full of compassion and mercy. Thirdly, women in the two novels also show the characteristics of nature, they ate coarse food and wore animals’skin, energetic and wise, respected the nature. Finally, both of the novels demonstrate the harmonious theme that human can live with the nature. The cleft people and the Ewenkis worshiped the nature, and got along with it placidly.Then the thesis mainly analyzes the differences between the two works from the eco-feminist perspective. Through in-depth study, the writer finds the Eco-feminist views embodied in the two works are not the same. It can be divided in three aspects:Firstly, the different degree of the patriarchal oppression:As the representative of the patriarchy, the Squirts have fight against the cleft group hostilely for decades. However, the conflict between men and women in the Ewenki tribe was comparatively less, both men and women can live with each other harmoniously. Secondly, the different attitude in the face of external pressure:Finally, both the Squirts and the Clefts eliminated the burning hatred, worked together to find better beach to live. Nevertheless, in the face of challenge of industrial society, the Ewenkis had to forsake virgin forest where they had lived for generations. Thirdly, the different ideal social form described in the two novels. In The Cleft, the ideal society the primitive men pursued was peaceful coexistence and cooperation between men and women. But in The Last Quarter of the Moon, the Ewenkis wished they can realize the doctrine of the unity of heaven and man.The research significance of this thesis lies in the parallel studies of the two novels to interpret their differences and similarities. Moreover, it makes people taking a profound look on themselves by the reference of "others", thinking about the present situation full of various crises and reflecting the reality.