The Binary Opposition And Reconciliation In Where Angels Fear To Tread

At the start of the 20 th century,Britain was in the interim period from the Victorian era to the Edwardian era,when the economy was declining rapidly,and the gap between rich and poor was more and more serious.At the same time,important social events emerged one after another such as industrial revolution,class conflict and women’s movement.Due to constant social changes,Forster,who was born in a middle-class family,began to scrutinize the traditional values of the British people,attempting to awaken their “undeveloped heart” by revealing the spiritual plight of the middle and upper class in his novels.As one of his representative works,Where Angels Fear to Tread takes the love between English widow Lilia and Italian boy Gino as the main line to portray the multifaceted opposition between the two societies under different cultural backgrounds,presenting the various personality changes of the protagonists after two influential deaths,which deeply reflects the author’s sense of hardship and his efforts to ameliorate the conflict and estrangement among social classes.It could be discovered in Forster’s works that his lifelong pursuit is to dispel diverse opposition relations through “connect”,meanwhile,the prominent characteristic of deconstruction is reversing the center and the binary confrontation.Therefore,based on the theory of binary opposition and deconstruction,this thesis aims to analyze the four groups of opposition in Where Angels Fear to Tread,namely,durance and liberation,domination and attachment,fogyism and progressivism,being and nothingness,along with respective ways to eliminate them.The thesis consists of three parts: introduction,body and conclusion.Firstly,it gives a brief introduction of Forster and his Where Angels Fear to Tread,and summarizes the relative research status at home and abroad,pointing out its study angle and significance.The main body interprets the opposition between Britain and Italy,the middle class and the lower class,men and women,the young generation and the diehards,and life and death from the perspective of binary opposition.The novel criticizes the rigidity,pedantry and conservatism of British social system,and glorifies Italy’s tolerance and freedom.According to deconstruction theory,the change of protagonist’s thought overturns the primary and secondary position in the opposite relationship,bringing on resolving the opposition,so as to highlight the author’s connection thought and humanistic care.The conclusion notices that the opposition and reconciliation embodied in Where Angels Fear to Tread signifies that the binary opposition is not absolute,but both antagonistic and complementary to each other,which contributes to self-elevating by introspection.And only by the opposition’s elimination can we promote cultural exchanges and construct a harmonious society.