A Comparative Study Of Female Consciousness Between Moment In Peking And Gone With The Wind

Women's issues have been regarded as one of the main themes of literature since the first wave of the feminist movement.Margaret Mitchell and Lin Yutang are two typical representatives of female literary creation in the history of America and China.Margaret Mitchell published her first book named Gone with the Wind in 1936.After its publication,it was widely spread all over America.Scarlett,the heroine of Gone with the Wind,is full of legends.Her pursuits of self-independence and her unyielding attitudes towards miseries have drawn great attention from Americans.At the same time,Lin Yutang also finished his masterpiece called Moment in Peking in which he showed his sympathy and respect for women.Yao Mulan,the heroine of his masterpiece,is described to reflect the advanced female consciousness.The comparative method is applied in the thesis to analyze the similarities and differences of female consciousness via intensive reading of two works and other relevant literature.The author finds that no matter Scarlett's pursuit in self-realization and economic independence or Yao Mulan's cry for unequal treatment derived from her mother,they are the typical reflections of awakened female consciousness,but the endings of two heroines are totally different.Scarlett moves forward hard but still adheres to pursue her self-independence.Nevertheless,because of profound cultural influence,Yao Mulan compromises to the tradition after all.Based on cultural value orientation,the focus of this thesis is to analyze the underlying reasons why two heroines have made different choices in terms of their views on social tradition,love,marriage and life.By means of comparison between two books,the thesis draws the conclusion that the different understanding towards individualism vs.collectivism,uncertainty avoidance,power distance,and man-nature orientation lead to different destinies of two heroines.Based on the comparative study of female consciousness in two works,the thesis discusses the similarities and differences of female consciousness under different cultural backgrounds,for the purpose of offering an inspiration for modern women's love,marriage and their pursuit of self-independence.