The Reading Of Sister Carrie: A Double Perspective Of Ethical Literary Criticism And Consumer Culture

Theodore Dreiser is one of the most original and controversial American novelists in the early 20th century. Coming from the bottom of the society, Theodore Dreiser is the first one to describe the real American citizen life. He is called pioneer of American contemporary fiction and is thought to be the great master of American realism. In Dreiser's novels, he discards"the genteel tradition", which is very popular at that time. On the contrary, he dares to depict the life as it is and discover the dark side of the social life, bravely attacking the traditional moral standard of America. In his literary career, Dreiser creates many characters who are in great favor of consumer culture. With enormous desires for consumption, their destinies, to some extent, are determined by their consumption life goal. In the novel, the heroine Carrie is depicted as a great victim of desire. To Dreiser, just like animals human beings are driven and controlled by desire.The recent research on Dreiser mainly focuses on three aspects: his American-dream-theme, naturalism and pessimism. With the development of literary ethical criticism and the change of historical context, new perspectives are adopted to study Dreiser's literary works. Because of the uniqueness of Dreiser's literary creation, this thesis chooses the perspective of consumer culture and ethical literary criticism to investigate the ethics of the characters under the influence of consumer culture.Part One gives a brief introduction to Dreiser, and then literature review is presented, both home and abroad. Meanwhile, the approach and significance of the study are introduced.Part Two introduces the ethical literary criticism and consumer culture. Then it analyzes the factors attributing to Dreiser's ethical thought. Born and grown in poverty, Dreiser is deeply influenced by Darwinism and Spencer and consumer culture. Dreiser lives in the period when consumer culture rises in American society. Therefore, his artistic creation is influenced by this cultural atmosphere.Part Three mainly demonstrates the various desires of the characters in the novel and the realization of their desires through consumption. Living in the consumer society of America, Dreiser is unavoidably a member of consumer culture. The characters created by him are also greatly influenced by consumer culture, have endless desires for materials, and gain their satisfaction of desire through consumption. They all come from urban cities, summit to their instinctive desires, and chase wealth and pleasure. Successful or not, none of them is happy. In Sister Carrie, Theodore Dreiser shows his critical attitude towards consumerism: people's worship of money, blind pursuit of consumption and the disappearance of good virtues in consumer society.Part Four discusses Dreiser's ethics by the analysis of characters'behavior. There are two kinds of ethics embodied in the novel. The society in which Sister Carrie is created is the transitional period from production type to consumption one. In the novel, Dreiser expresses his dissatisfaction towards conventional Puritanism which confines people's desires and thoughts; on the contrary he advocates hedonism and pragmatism. In this sense, Dreiser is in accordance with new economical development and consumption concepts since he sets up a new model which can help people to form new thinking habits. Therefore, the novel demonstrates two kinds of ethics: one is conventional ethics whose voice is very weak and the other is the anti-conventional ethics including hedonism and pragmatism which is the result of Dreiser's acceptance of consumer culture.In summery, Sister Carrie is greatly influenced by consumer culture, which advocates new ethical thoughts different from conventional Puritanism. Dreiser is a supporter of new ethical thoughts and morality such as pragmatism and hedonism. Meanwhile, Dreiser dares not to break up with conventional ethic and morality. Therefore, on the one hand, Sister Carrie advocates new ethical thoughts which are in accordance with consumer culture; on the other hand, it also embodies weak conventional ethics and morality.