On The Narrative Arts And The Morals Of Dream Of The Red Chamber

Based on Narratology,this thesis studies the morals ofDream of The Red Chamber.The thesis will discuss the narrative arts from the the aspects of the narrative levels,the cross-layer narrative,the narrators,the focalizers,the unreliable narrator and the implied author.Through the analyses of the narrative elements mentioned above,the thesis will conclude that although literary works usually exhibit certain value choices that are away from imperfection and towards perfection,the moralsrevealed inDream of the Red Chamberare at the same time adversarial and in coexistence.The first chapter analyzes the narrative levels and the cross-level narrative inDream of the Red Chamber,then explains that the unique morphology of the narration caused that each of the narrative level appeared to represent both the “real life” and the “dream” of the characters.The chapter goes on to discuss the moral of the work by reading it from the perspective of the "Towards Enlightenment" novel and the "Towards the Secular Life" novel.When discussing the narrative levels,the thesis proceeds first from the theories of narrative level,then explicate the narrative levels inDream of the Red Chamber,and why they are so difficult to discern.Then,the cross-level narration is to be analyzed and the “between-mirror effect” is to be introduced in this part of the thesis.It was because of these effect that the characters who are from different narrative levels were able to communicate as equals,and the “real life” and the “dream” were impossible to be distinguished from each other.Therefore,Dream of The Red Chamber is at the same time a "Towards Enlightenment" novel and a "Towards the Secular Life" novel.The second chapter discusses the identity of the narrators and the focalizers in Dream of Red Chamber.Through this discussion,it reveals that instead of being independent from each other,“Qing” and “Yu” are actually overlapping.The third chapter explores the intentionof the pursuit of the truth and false that was revealed by the implied author of Dream of the Red Chamber.The chapterfocuses on the analysisof the attitude of the implied author and the morals of Dream of The Red Chamber,the unreliable narrator and irony in the novel,and concludes that the true intention of the implied author is,as a matter of fact,in line with the morals of the work,which is neither to praise the pursuit of the truth nor to criticize the pursuit of false,but to cherish both truth and false.In conclusion,through the discussion in the three chapters above,it expresses that the inclination revealed in Dream of the Red Chamber are,as a matter of fact,paradoxical.