田纳西·威廉斯戏剧中的创伤与救赎

Trauma and Redemption in Tennessee Williams'Plays

田纳西·威廉斯是20世纪美国文学史上最著名的南方剧作家,以其笔下的“南方淑女”形象为评论界所熟知。然而纵观其创作生涯,“南方淑女”仅是威廉斯对南方身份思考的众多维度之一。在创伤理论、马克思主义文学理论、后结构主义身份理论的视域下,考察威廉斯早、中、后期代表性戏剧作品中人物经历的创伤性事件以及他们面对创伤表现出的不同态度,挖掘造成这些人物悲剧的深层原因与历史语境之间的复杂关系,可以透析剧作家对于社会变革期和文化断层期的个体的脆弱性以及美国南方身份认同困惑的批判和思考。威廉斯将美国南方的历史重负和身份危机转化为剧作中的创伤性事件和主要人物的身份困境,剧作中频繁出现的创伤性事件正是剧作家用于回应社会矛盾的特殊方式。面对现实中难以解决的社会矛盾,威廉斯以戏剧创作为手段,批判南方身份建构中的谬误,并在象征层面化解矛盾,寻求一种基于他者伦理的理想南方身份建构。

Tennessee Williams is the most famous Southern playwright in 20th-century American literary history,known for his portrayal of the"Southern belle"image.However,throughout his creative career,the"Southern belle"is only one of the many dimensions through which Williams reflects on his Southern identity.Examining the traumatic events experienced by characters in Williams'early,middle and late representative plays,as well as the different attitudes they exhibit when facing trauma,from the perspectives of trauma theory,Marxist literary theory,and post-structuralist identity theory,this paper delves into the complex relationship between the underlying causes of these characters'tragedies and their historical contexts.This analysis can give insight into the playwright's criticism and reflection on the vulnerability of individuals during times of social change and cultural discontinuity,as well as the identity crisis of Southern identity in the United States.Williams transformed the historical burden and identity crisis of the American South into traumatic events and identity predicaments in his plays.The frequent appearance of traumatic events in his works is Williams'unique way of responding to social contradictions.Faced with social contradictions that are difficult to resolve in reality,Williams used drama as a means of critique to challenge the fallacies of Southern identity construction,and symbolically resolve contradictions to seek an ideal Southern identity construction based on the ethics of the other.