《达洛维夫人》中的年龄危机与老年镜像认同

The Age Crisis and Imaginary Identification of Old Age in Mrs. Dalloway

伍尔夫在《达洛维夫人》中用大量笔墨书写达洛维夫人的年龄表征及其变老体验,从文学老年学的视角观之,小说呈现了人物的年龄危机及其老年镜像认同,表现出对老年的积极想象。具体而言,由于战后英国社会的年龄歧视及其双重性别标准,50岁的达洛维夫人对即将来临的老年充满恐惧。身患“恐老症”的她拒绝认同老年镜像,表现为将老年镜像归为他者,并坚持老去的仅仅是身体、而非心灵。达洛维夫人对老年镜像的否定事实上是对“衰退叙事”和“包袱叙事”等老年话语的拒绝,她通过邻居老妇重新想象积极的老年镜像。貌似被社会隔绝的老妇对其孤寂、独立的老年生活感到自洽,同时与大本钟象征的伦敦社会保持半隐退式认同,从集体文化中寻求其生命的价值。受此鼓舞,达洛维夫人在阁楼象征的老年空间中探索积极的变老方式,重新认识年岁增长带来的智慧和自由。

Woolf extensively portrays the ageing process and experiences of Mrs. Dalloway,presenting the character's age crisis and her imaginary identification with the mirror image of old age and demonstrating a positive imagination of ageing, if studied from the perspective of literary gerontology. Due to ageism and double gender standards in post-war British society, the 50-year-old Mrs. Dalloway is filled with fear of impending old age. Afflicted with “gerontophobia,” she refuses to identify with the mirror image of old age, regarding it as the other and insisting that only the body, not the soul, ages. This denial is, in fact, a rebuttal of the ageing discourse including the “decline narrative” and the “burden narrative”. Instead,she reimagines the mirror image of old age through her imagination of an elderly neighbor, a seemingly socially isolated old woman who finds solace in her solitude and independent life in old age and seeks value in her life from collective culture, while maintaining a semi-retired identification with London society symbolized by Big Ben. Inspired by her, Mrs. Dalloway explores positive ways of aging in the attic, a symbol of old age, and reinterprets the wisdom and freedom brought by ageing.