A New Historical Study Of The Book Of Daniel

As a versatile and prolific writer,Edgar Laurence Doctorow(1931-2015)occupies a very important position in American literary field.Doctorow starts to get his first big success since his publishing of The Book of Daniel.This thesis starts with a close reading of The Book of Daniel and analyzes it from the perspective of New Historicism.The historicity and textuality of the novel will be explored through detailed analysis and interpretation on the basis of New Historicism,especially Doctorow's strategies in the novel to blur the boundary between history and fiction will be searched.What's more,the thesis expects to explore the relationships between history and text,literature and history in Doctorow's works.In addition,the thesis also expects to reveal the repressed voice and marginalized power in the contemporary society,such as the afflictions and sufferings of women and children,and the struggles of the ethnic groups.In the novel,Doctorow's political concern and his power narrative will be explored with the focus of power relations,dissidence or subversion in the novel.The discussion will be based on Foucault's power theories and new historicist power theories.The new historicists claim that text is the carrier of power,especially the political power,so the power relations implied in the novel will be explored form different aspects of relations among man and his around.Structurally,the analysis will be carried out according to the following steps:Chapter ? gives an introduction to E.L.Doctorow and the novel The Book of Daniel;then the thesis sums up the critical approaches to The Book of Daniel up to date from home and abroad;the next part shows the theoretical frame,and the last part of the chapter offers the significance,objective and structure of the thesis.Chapter ? analyzes the historicity of Doctorow's text.Doctorow reconstructs the historical event of the Rosenberg Case through the text and reveals the struggles of the vulnerable group to the ruling power,in order to make people aware that history is composite.Chapter ? analyzes the textuality of Doctorow's history.More attention will be paid to the analysis of the fictional history in The Book of Daniel and Doctorow's strategies in constructing fictional history.Chapter ? analyzes the political commitment of Doctorow's text from the power relationships among man and his around.Chapter ? summaries the major points of the thesis and gives some fresh understanding of the novel which can deepen the practice of the new historicism through analyzing the relationship between the historicity of text and the textuality of history.