"The Other" And Utopia In The Island

Victoria Hislop is a British contemporary female novelist.She loves Greek culture and always cares about disadvantaged groups.The Island is the first novel written by her,and the story mainly focuses on lepers on an isolated island named Spinalonga which is a few hundred meters away from the south coast on Crete in Greek.The island is a common sense in English literature.Many writers use islands to describe and analyze social problems and express their thoughts on the meaning of life.Hislop describes a story about Petrakis family who fight against leprosy on a island Spinalonga which truly exists.There are few studies that refer to Victoria Hislop's works at home and abroad.They mainly focus on three aspects: the ecological perspective,the symbolic meaning of “the island” and analysis on characters in the novel.After reading all the novels written by Hislop,the thesis chooses her first novel The Island to do the research and bases on the living conditions of the lepers and other marginalized “other” described in the novel,gives a comprehensive analysis and interpretation to the complexity and readability of Hislop's works,which is the innovation of this article.Based on The Otherness in post-colonialism and by post-colonialism elaboration of “the other” including physical “other” which refers to lepers,moral “other” like Vandoulakis family,women “other” through textual close reading,document analysis,social and historical criticism,this research discusses their connotation,development and evolution in the novel,as well as leprosy's cultural connotation.In this way,the purpose of writing this novel is discussed in the thesis.Moreover,Hislop uses the form of novel to give modern people the opportunity to review history.Research findings indicate that the image of “lepers” is gradually changing from moral declined people and “the other” to noble characters and the creator of Utopia,which completely overturns people's stereotype to lepers.Victoria Hislop is a woman with a humanitarian spirit;she wants to eliminate people's prejudice over lepers and what she looking forward to is a peaceful country with democracy,love and equality.But the Utopia finally faded away which indicates that Hislop is suspicious about the possibility of realizing Utopia.Hislop is a responsible woman writer and women are always protagonists in her novels.She always try to get more freedom and rights for women.But she is not a staunch feminists.From various of programs for equal and freedom put forward by her for women and other marginalized people,also can see her self-contradiction.