A Study On The Anti-Pastoral Themes In The Deserted Village

Oliver Goldsmith is a prominent poet in the eighteenth-century England,whose achievement covers different fields of literature,including drama,essay,fiction and poetry.His works are written with clear thoughts,flexible narrative and elegant language.No matter in which type of literary creation,Goldsmith maintains the writing style of ironic jokes and indignant curse to expose and satirize the unhealthy practices and evil phenomena in society.This is especially true in The Deserted Village,whose original writing purpose is to reflect the dramatic decline of rural population at that time.Although Goldsmith does not directly mention the reason of rural depopulation in this poem,there are still some allusions of negative effects of enclosure movement and industrial revolution in it.At the same time,this poem also discloses the widespread serious inequality in English society of that time and the materialism and commercialism of its upper-class.Therefore,it can be asserted that The Deserted Village is an anti-pastoral poem under the cloak of pastoral.In this poem,great changes have taken place in both the natural scenery and integration mechanism of the village,as well as in the mental state of countrymen,all of which shows the characteristics of anti-pastoral clearly.Therefore,this thesis will carry on the study of anti-pastoral themes in The Deserted Village from the following three aspects: nature,society and human spirit in rural England.Based on close textual analysis,this thesis conducts a research on the above three themes,and is correspondingly divided into three parts.The first part is Introduction,which offers a review of Goldsmith's The Deserted Village,focusing on the thematic research of this poem,introducing the general features of anti-pastoral and analyzing the feasibility of this study,as well as research motivation and methodology and the research questions.As the major part of this thesis,the second part consists of three chapters and explores anti-pastoral themes of The Deserted Village.Chapter One analyzes the disappearance of traditional pastoral landscape,which is embodied in the fading of natural beauty in the countryside and the break-up of the harmony between English villagers and rural nature.This is largely the result of the English enclosure movement in the 18 th century,whose publicly governmental operation leads to the ruined cottages and annexed land,which means that traditional villages as the living place of small population have been destroyed completely.The commonland of village community is replaced by large-scale ranches and private mansions with giant garden and paddock,in other words,the traditional pastoral scenery in rural England has been disappeared.The loss of farmland causes the villagers to leave their countryside,moreover,the demand for cheap labor in English industrial development also promotes the migration of rural population.Both factors combine together and result in the demise of traditional rural community,which is the content of the second chapter.This chapter mainly discusses two aspects: one is the depopulation of rural countryside and the other is the uprooted way of villagers' life and their declining livelihood.Whether staying in the countryside or fleeing into the town,whether employed by large landowners or urban capitalists,rural farmers are always in the position of being exploited,living a hard abject life.Chapter Three mainly discusses the spiritual plight of those innocent villagers,including the departure of rural virtues and villagers' wandering soul.With countryside homeland lost and traditional way of living undermined,the inner hearts of rural people have suffered great spiritual trauma;also,the materialism and consumerism of the city are seriously corroding the traditional morality of English countryside.The last section is a conclusion,which sums up the anti-pastoral themes of The Deserted Village,and points out the reasons why rural people's living circumstances and spiritual state are facing those serious crises.It can be seen that the above three levels are incrementally progressive in depth and these three aspects are mutually independent but interacted with each other.The English government's egoistic handling of natural resources in the countryside causes the deterioration of rural residents' living environment,affecting the social level of English rural life.In the meantime,anxiety of self survival under the new disadvantaged society situation influences the spiritual state of rural people,leading to the loss of traditional rural morality and the villagers' wandering soul.Goldsmiths shows the precious peace and harmony of traditional rural life by contrasting with the anti-pastoral depiction of declined England countryside which is under the effect of enclosure movement and industrial revolution.Thus,returning to the simple sustained lifestyle and keeping the inner innocence is the poet's final yearning for pastoral pursuit.