幸福之光,海市幻灭——论曼斯菲尔德短篇小说《幸福》中幸福感的虚无(英文)

Light of Bliss; Disillusion of Hopes——On the Illusion of Blissful Feelings in Mansfield’s Short Story Bliss

凯瑟琳·曼斯菲尔德是20世纪新西兰伟大的小说家,与契科夫一样以短篇小说见长。其短篇小说在题材选择上脱离了传统小说的题材形式,在细节描写上注重涵义深度上的刻画,小说结尾的处理也是曼斯菲尔德作品的一大特色。在女作家一些作品中,死亡往往是矛盾冲突的解决途径,而《幸福》这篇作品则以人物的幻灭感、甚至其他幻想成分的介入而告终,特别是在对幻想的巧妙处理堪称别具一格。通过对女主人柏莎公时而幸福溢溢而时而空虚失落的冲突描写,侧面表现柏莎过于完美幸福的危机感,最终结局证明那幸福感不过是像海市蜃楼一样不堪一击,从而进一步隐射出当时社会中女性命运的思考,无奈她们挣脱不开现实生活枷锁。

Katherine Mansfield is a great New Zealand writer in 20 century, who excels at writing short stories as Chekhov. The stories she wrote are different from those traditional novels on subject forms. The profound detail descriptions and the unexpected endings are another two characteristics of her works. In some female writers’works, death often is the final solution to the conflicts. On the contrary, Bliss ends with the collapse of heroine’s blissful feeling, intervened by some fantasy components, which are particularly handled by writers. On the detailed descriptions of heroine’s brimming cup of bliss sometimes, her void and loses sometimes, Bliss reflects a sense of crisis of Bertha’s perfect bliss. The ending of the story proves the outcome of the feeling of bliss is just as a Mirage, collapsing at the first blow and further consideration on female’s destiny at that time, their struggle to free themselves in social reality.