Suffering Is Blessing,Love Is Redemption

As one of the most famous Jewish American novelists,Bernard Malamud,is often mentioned together with Saul Below and Philip Roth."Jewishness" is his most outstanding writing feature,so western critics call him as the best Jewish American novelist with "Jewishness".He gives great considerations on the sufferings of the poor and praises their virtues even under plights and sufferings.The Assistant is the most representative novel among other works.Because Malamud is a Jewish American,his works are not only influenced by Judaism,but Holy Bible of Christianity as well.Thus,in The Assistant,there are lots of biblical archetypes originating from Holy Bible,This thesis is going to explore and study The Assistant on the basis of the criticism of biblical archetypes,and tries to analyze the novel from three aspects,themes,narrative patterns and archetypes of scene,imagery and character.Frye is the representative figure of criticism of mythic archetype and his theory interprets the importance of myth on human intellectual history and the history of civilization.He thinks that myths and archetypes are interlinked,even interchangeable.As the oldest literary genre,myth is the most primary literary archetype and later literary genres evolve from myth.Frye takes Holy Bible as the core of western myths and his theory emphasizes on analyzing literary works integrally.Malamud's Christian background,narrative patterns,archetypes and themes in The Assistant indicate that Holy Bible has influenced this novel deeply.Themes of this novel could be divided into four levels:suffering,guilt,redemption and love.In terms of suffering,all characters in The Assistant experience sufferings respectively;however,the meaning of suffering is just what Malamud would like to discuss and embody in this novel.The theme of guilt is Malamud's criticism to humanity and religions in modern society,meanwhile it is one of the most important themes in Holy Bible,All characters are in the bondage of sins because of their personality,experience and environment.Under the influence of Judaism and Christianity.Malamud intends to exhibit human virtues in The Assistant,The theme of love mainly embodies from father-son love between Morris and Frank,Morris's philanthropism and love between Frank and Helen.The theme of love is an eternal theme in Holy Bible and the core doctrine of Christianity at the same time.The theme of redemption is the consequence of above three themes,because main characters in this novel get redemption of themselves,morality and affection respectively after experiencing guilt,suffering and love.This is the thought that Malamud intends to deliver to people.Besides,this thesis explores the influence of biblical archetypes on imagery such as snow,hellfire,rose and so on.These imageries appear repeatedly in Holy Bible and have profound significance.At last,by studying Morris and Frank,two key characters in this novel,the thesis reveals the influence of biblical archetype on characterization.As main characters,their behaviors and thoughts are like Jesus Christ and St.Paul.Criticism of biblical archetype influences The Assistant in many aspects covering theme,narrative pattern,character,imagery and so on.Analyzing this novel deeply will deepen the understanding of Malamud and his other works and reveal the author's real intention-succession to Jewish culture and Christian culture.