Confrontations And Negotiations:A Study Of E.M.Forster's Initiation Stories

E.M.Forster is one of the most prominent British novelists,literary critics and playwrights.His early representative works,Where Angels Fear to Tread,The Longest Journey and A Room with a View,can be defines as Initiation Story,reflecting the social psychology of British and the country in the transition period.Forster's initiation stories mainly described that the protagonists dissatisfied with the rigid social order under the bondage of the British etiquette,thus stepping on the journey of "going out".After struggling and confusing,they began to break through the barriers,to achieve self-psychological maturity and to grow up.It reveals the complex relationship among ideology,value and position of individuals and the group during the transition period.According to his personal experience,Forster has fully demonstrated the process of theendless change between the characters and their growing environment in his initiation stories.In addition,the figures depict the characters of the middle class and its related surroundings.Forster not only constructs the relationship of the characters in the initiation stories,but also fully displays his critical position and creative idea.Forster has pondered over the thought of historical change in these characters and also intends to reflect the hidden psychological problem of the middle class in the British society in depicting the characters.The thesis attempts to apply Carl Jung's personality theory to analyze the growth of individuals and the psychological set in Forster's initiation stories,and further explores the dilemma of the time reflected on his initiation stories.This thesis consists of six parts.In the part of introduction,the thesis gives a brief introduction to the life of Forster and his personal experience.The part of literature review gives a review and summary of previous studies of E.M.Forster and his initiation stories,as well as puts forward the thesis statement and illustrates the purpose of the present study.Chapter three,based on the background of the times,explores the transformation of British social mentality from the late Victorian to the Edwardian era from the perspective of social class,culture and national state.The increasingly obvious and stable social status of middle-class deepened the contradictions and conflicts of the British class,the development of industrialization and the extreme sense of property of middle-class materialized the English culture,leading to the value of British people being more and more material and utilitarian.In addition,the growing strength of the United States was in sharp contrast with the decline of the British Empire.The collapse of the Empire's image had enveloped the whole British society in Edwardian fear and pessimism.Two female figure in Forster's initiation stories—one who changed the self-class through marriage,one is the middle class—contrastively represent the materialized value orientation in the British society during the Edwardian era,and expose the hidden problems in the British society in the transition period and the transformation of the whole social mentality.In chapter four,with four archetypes of Jung's archetypal theory-persona,anima and animus,shadow and the self,this thesis analyzes the personality transformation of the characters in the process of growth in Forster's initiation stories.In the novels,by using confronted characters and negotiated characters,Forster displays the social psychological changes of the growing characters who have a strong sense of freedom when they are in the face of the birthplace of European civilization and Sun-Rising-Empire,the value of individuals and the material consciousness of the middle class.The novels deeply express the theme that what a nation should do and what the individuals should choose in the huge change of the society.Chapter five analyzes the symbol of the cities in Forster's initiation stories.Based on the narration of Forster and the characters in the novels,the symbol of the cities not only reflects conservative life of the British middle-class in this transition period,but also the confrontations and negotiations of two different cultures can be perceived.The contradictions and dialogues among different cities reflect the oppositions between the consciousness of liberty in the birthplace of European civilization and traditional conception in Britain with time goes by and expose that it is hard for unique individuals to establish self-image freely and to achieve self-realization because of the dominance of the middle class in Briton.The conclusion part concludes that the setting of Forster's initiation stories was in the turn of the old and new era when the bondage of tradition and the design of reform intertwined with each other.Under such circumstances,Forster implies the spiritual dilemma of individuals in his novels in this period,which not only highlights the growing predicament of individuals in their process of growth,but also reflects the contradictory psychology and ideological change of independent,progressive and free individuals in the long run of the times.By initiation stories,Forster contrasts the birthplace of European civilization with the new era of England,reflecting his reflection on the social mentality of cultural loss and material desire in the transformation period.