On Binary Opposition In My Sweet Orange Tree

José Mauro de Vasconcelos(1920-1984)has a great reputation and occupies an extremely important position in the literature of Brazil and even the world in the middle of the 20 th century.He has many popular works,but many of his works are written on the basis of his personal experience,reflecting his in-depth reflection on children's nature and care.My Sweet Orange Tree is Vasconcelos' masterpiece as well as a global classic for children's literature.The book is never out of print in Brazil since it was first published in 1968.It is adapted for literature classes for elementary schools in Brazil.My Sweet Orange Tree has been translated into astonishing number of languages and won the hearts of millions of young readers from Asia,Europe and the America.In2010,it won Bing Xin Children's Book Award,so it has a higher research value.Just like day/night,presence/absence impresses people as much,and binary oppositions have a clear role in highlighting characters and deepening the theme.This thesis explores binary oppositions in characters and binary oppositions in themes.They involve children versus adults,life versus death,poverty versus prosperity in different social status families,fantasy versus reality.In the children/adult dualism,Vasconcelos' s preferences are obvious.Although adults are superior to children,they are often tired and have no hope or happiness in life.In contrast,young children are innocent,although they are at a disadvantage.Parents,brothers and sisters go to work and do not have time to play with younger children or siblings.The backyard became Zezé's the best company.In the fantasy/real binary opposition,Vasconcelos highlights fantasy.In Zezé's virtual world,there are three game zones in the backyard.The “zoo” consists of a black panther and two lions.The second zone is “Europe”.Zezé and Luís play the game of “Sugarloaf Mountain cable car” there.The final zone is a space where the bat Luciano lives ".In fact,the panther and two lions in the zoo are just an old black hen and two young yellow hens.The Amazon forest and the Amazon river behind the zoo are merely six orange trees and a small ditch.As for the game of “Sugarloaf Mountain cable car” in “Europe”,it is a way to play the game.The binary opposition of the rich and the poor is not uncommon.Readers can see Glória's sighs in their longing for a better life and Zezé's desire for a Christmas gift.In the binary opposition of death/life,Vasconcelos praised life.The death of Manuel is the climax of the story.Zezé suffers from traumatic pain.He finally recovered from the pain and continued his life.It is like what people say: Once they triumph over suffering,they become real heroes.In the tender/violence binary opposition,people undoubtedly prefer tenderness to violence.No matter how Zezé is treated,or how to deal with others mischievously,his tenderness and kindness always win people's hearts.The use of binary opposition theory in My Sweet Orange Tree can make readers easier to understand the text,and have a deeper understanding of the content,theme,character characteristics of the article.One of Brazil's most adorable and mischievous boys leapt on paper.He is rich in imagination,tells stories,leaves money for his peers,applies wax to the sidewalk,and sometimes steals fruit from neighbors.No wonder Amazon's readers like him so much,and they do not want to be separated from him.The whole paper is composed of five chapters.The first chapter,introduction,mainly introduces the background,significance,purpose of the research and the structure of this thesis.The second chapter,literature review,gives some basic knowledge about the author's life and the influence of My Sweet Orange Tree.It also introduces the researches that scholars did on this work in the past.The third chapter,theoretical framework,mainly includes two aspects: the origin and development of structuralism and its core method binary opposition.Chapter four gives a detailed description in the binary oppositions: children versus adults,fantasy versus reality,life versus death,affluence versus poverty,and tenderness versus violence pairs in My Sweet Orange Tree.The fifth chapter is the conclusion part.First,it briefly summarizes the main contents of the preceding parts of the text,and then it draws the conclusion.