Imbalance And Salvation:An Interpretation Of Ian McEwan's Atonement From The Perspective Of Spiritual Ecology

Ian McEwan is one of the most influential writers in contemporary Britain and is recognized as a “national writer” by British literary world.The novel Atonement is considered to be McEwan's most successful masterpiece,and has won many nominations including the Booker Prize,which has attracted much attention of numerous critics and readers since its publication.At present,scholars at home and abroad have studied Atonement from different perspectives such as narrative techniques,meta-fiction,ethics and themes,but there is no one interpreting this novel from the perspective of the spiritual ecology.This thesis attempts to apply the spiritual ecology theory of Lu Shuyuan to analyze Atonement by showing the spiritual ecological state embodied on the protagonist Briony in the novel and pointing out the importance of constructing a harmonious spiritual ecology,hoping to draw attention to the spiritual ecology from more people.This thesis is divided into six chapters.The first three chapters respectively sketch out the life of Ian McEwan,the main contents of Atonement and the significance of this research,overviews the related researches on McEwan and Atonement at home and abroad,and elaborates on the theory of spiritual ecology.The fourth chapter analyzes Briony's spiritual ecological imbalance in the novel from the three aspects of the spiritual vacuum,the existential alienation and the behavioral incapability.And it also analyzes the causes of Briony's spiritual ecological imbalance.The fifth chapter deeply analyzes Briony's salvation of imbalanced spiritual ecology from three aspects of returning to the inner heart by reflection,reconstruction of interpersonal relationship with love,and reconciliation with self by literature.In the end,Briony has achieved her self-salvation and spiritual renewal through the salvation of spiritual ecology.The final chapter concludes the whole thesis and points out the limitations of the thesis and suggestions for future study.This thesis interprets Atonement from the perspective of spiritual ecology,providing a new perspective for the interpretation of this novel.The exploration of Briony's spiritual world also provides reference and inspiration for modern people.Only by returning to theinner heart,living in harmony with other people and accepting the influence of literature and art,can human beings save the unbalanced spiritual ecology,achieve true peace and tranquility in our hearts and realize poetic dwelling on earth.