On The Indeterminacy Of Characters’ Identities In The Cement Garden By Ian Mcewan

Ian McEwan is generally acknowledged as a unique and distinctive figure in the history of contemporary English literature. As the winner of almost all major English fiction awards, his well-written works and unique writing styles endear him to readers and earn him worldwide critical acclaim. Critics at home and aboard mainly focus on his masterpieces The Child in Time and Amsterdam and Atonement. The Cement Garden, his first novel, was published in1978, of which the critical articles in small quantity are centered around the theme of initiation and the ethical problems of human beings, ignoring the characters’indeterminate identities in the text.This thesis endeavors to interpret The Cement Garden from the perspective of indeterminacy and decode its thematic significance. In The Cement Garden, the loss of personal characteristics deprives the characters of basic distinctions among people, their relationships and life courses are ambiguous and indeterminate. On the basis of Hassan’s theory on indeterminacy, this thesis intends to study the novel’s profound themes through the analysis of indeterminacy in The Cement Garden from time and space, the characters’identities, their relationships, as well as their life courses; thus finally discusses their identity crises.This thesis consists of five chapters. The first chapter briefly introduces Ian McEwan and his novel The Cement Garden. It also illustrates the significance of the research, the relevant theories and briefly states the layout of the thesis. Chapter Two is divided into two sections, which are respectively devoted to expounding the absence of time and location, so as to reveal the indeterminate world of the characters. Chapter Three also consists of two sections. The first section is concerned with the characters’indeterminate identities; the second section illustrates their ambiguous and confusing relationships. Chapter Four proceeds with their life courses, mainly discussing the uncertain events they experience and their "fractured" growth. This chapter also analyzes the open ending of the novel, which further enhances the obscurity and uncertainty of characters’life courses and the endlessness of their absurd lives. The last chapter is the conclusion. Aside from summing up the entire thesis, it re-explores the novel’s theme:by portraying the indeterminate characters, McEwan profoundly and vividly illustrates human beings’ identity crises and even survival crises in the contemporary society. An increasing number of people can be classified into the same category, which is devoid of particularity and identity, they merely possess their flesh; they find neither substance nor meaning of lives in the chaotic and orderless contemporary society, accordingly their meaningless lives are endless. With an extremely high sense of artistic mission and social responsibility, McEwan always shows humanistic care in his mind for the people living in the contemporary world, therefore he indeed deserves the title of Britain’s "national author". In the end, possible ways to further approach The Cement Garden are also raised.