“杀子虐母”与伦理禁忌——论《美国梦》中的伦理危机

“Kill Child and Abuse Mother”with Ethical Taboos:On the Ethical Crisis in The American Dream

爱德华·阿尔比的《美国梦》是一则有关伦理禁忌的道德寓言。剧中的伦理罪行揭示了人类斯芬克斯因子的存在及其复杂性:"人性因子"和"兽性因子"相互交锋与转变,展现了理性意志、自由意志和非理性意志之间的伦理冲突。剧本围绕着一桩"无爱婚姻"和戏剧人物的自然情感而展开:由于剧中人物伦理意识的淡薄,在自然情感的驱动下,竟然"杀子虐母",导致了血亲关系的破裂,违背了人类早已形成的伦理禁忌,引发伦理危机。他们之所以敢于公然地违背这种伦理禁忌,主要原因在于他们受到非理性意志的控制,失去理性后做出错误的伦理选择,实施了伦理犯罪。文章以文学伦理学批评方法为研究视角,紧扣剧中"杀子虐母"的核心伦理事件,探讨这一伦理事件所引发的诸如责任、义务、孝顺、仁慈、恐惧、绝望、杀戮、自杀等伦理命题,揭示阿尔比的戏剧创作的伦理旨图:通过书写美国家庭生活中极端的道德行为及其对家庭成员的伤害,企图唤醒人们对于亲情的重视和对家庭伦理秩序的维护。

Edward Albee's The American Dreamis a moral fable about ethical taboos.The ethical crimes appeared in that play reveals the existence of Sphinx factors in people's mind and its complexity:the mutual collide and transformation between 'human factor'and 'animal factor'actually show the ethical conflict among rational will,free will and irrational will.The play centers on a'loveless marriage'and the natural emotion of characters:because of the weakness of ethical consciousness,those characters driven by their natural emotion to'kill child and abuse mother',thus,which causes the breakdown of consanguinity relationship and goes against the human ethical taboos that has already been formed for ages,consequently,their behavior lead to a serious ethical crisis.The main reason why they dare to blatantly violate the ethical taboos is that they are all controlled by irrational will and lose their rational will,so they make their ethical choices wrongly and execute ethical crimes.This paper uses Ethical Literary Criticism as its research perspective,and it focuses on'kill child and abuse mother',the core event of ethic in that play,meanwhile,it probes a series of ethical propositions,which are caused by this ethical event,such as responsibility,obligation,filial piety,mercy,fear,despair,killing,suicide and so on.What's more,it reveals the ethical purport of Albee's drama creation:through writing the extreme moral behaviors in American family life and the damage these behaviors have made to those family members,Albee attempts to awaken people's attention of familial affection and their maintenance of family ethical order.