“资本契约”与“女英雄”——论维多利亚小说中的资本、性别与文化

The Capitalist Contract and the Heroine: Reconfi guring Capital, Gender and Culture in the Victorian Novel

近来"女性的性别活动"(feminine labour)已日渐成为维多利亚文学文化研究的一个重要概念。本论文以卢卡契的资本主义整体论为出发点,分析资本对维多利亚小说的性别和文化表征所产生的意识形态上的交互影响。资本既推动又限制女性主义能动性,这一矛盾特性导致从盖斯盖尔到哈代的小说中存在女性性别活动的不均衡表现,这一规律即可称之为"资本契约"。研究表明,维多利亚小说史再现了"女英雄精神"的性别活动:作为现代个人消费主体的女主人公在典型的"婚姻情节"之中追求自由、空间、知识和权力,或斡旋劳资矛盾,或构建国家文化,又或颠覆资本主义父权制度。研究意义在于通过分析维多利亚女性性别活动的内在动力,从而对维多利亚小说中资本、性别与文化的互动关联作出进一步的阐释。

Drawing upon Luk^cs＇ theories of bourgeois totality, this paper aims to analyze the ideological influences of capital upon feminine labour in the Victorian Novel. By focusing upon uneven representations of empowerment, contradiction, and negotiation in marriage defined as a ＂female heroism＂ in the novels from Gaskell to Hardy, the paper suggests that capital has endorsed yet contained the heroine＇s feminist agency as the wife-as-hero characterization develops progressively from the rise of individual consumerism to an emerging agency for feminist liberty, space, knowledge and power by women as parties to ＂the capitalist contract＂. Specific analyses of how literary heroines mediate class conflict, help reconstruct national culture, and subvert capitalist patriarchy in the Victorian novel thus highlight the underlying interfacing of capital and gender embedded as a key engine for feminine labour within Victorian literary culture.