A Comparative Study Of The Hometown Mythologiesby Mo Yan And William Faulkner

With a parallel study and an impact study, this thesis chooses Mo Yan and William Faulkner as the research objects to make a comprehensive comparative study of the hometown mythologies created by them. William Faulkner is a representative writer of American southern literature. Based on his hometown Jefferson County, a small place, Faulkner modeled a fictional Yoknapatawpha descent, created a mythical kingdom, and obtained a road to the world. These mythologies not only introduced the Southern America to readers, but also helped readers to appreciate the universal significance of the human society in the lines. Likewise, Mo Yan created mythologies on the basis of his hometown, Northeast Township, Gaomi. His mythologies are a kind of inheritance and innovation of Faulkner. In the stories on Northeast Township, Gaomi, Mo Yan revealed the historical changes in Gaomi from Genesis to now, reproducing multiple historical periods there with art, which reflected a common human society. As the saying goes, all roads lead to Rome. Faulkner and Mo Yan achieved the same goal on the background of their hometown, where they were born and brought up. However, due to the different countries, different cultural enrichment, coupled with individual differences in temperament, parenting, preferences, etc., the hometown mythologies by them also make a difference. In my eyes, a comparative study, made through analyzing the connotation and denotation on these two sets of hometown mythologies, allows us to a better understanding of their creation.This thesis includes the following three aspects. The first chapter is the introduction part, which discusses the feasibility of this research mainly from the connotation of "hometown mythologies" by Faulkner and Mo Yan and the research significance, the research status at home and abroad, the research methods and the main research results. The second chapter deals with the characteristics of the times in the "hometown mythologies" by Faulkner and Mo Yan. First a background chronology according to their works is simply lined up. Combined with the social background of each writer’s life, and with the method of new historical criticism, it analyzes the impact of the historical background on the writer’s life and the influence emerged from their works. Finally, it’s an analysis of their historical narrative similarities and differences. The third chapter focuses on the geographic features of the "hometown mythologies" by Faulkner and Mo Yan. It mainly narrates the similarities, differences and changes of the geographic features in the writers’real hometown and their fictional mythologies. On the basis, a comparative study on the differences of their fictional techniques between Mo Yan and Faulkner is made. The fourth chapter analyzes the cultural identity. Adopting the geo-cultural poetics theory, the author presents the cultural characteristics in their hometowns, and explores the influence featured in their works. Both Mo Yan and Faulkner succeeded in combining their real hometown with the fictional hometown, setting from a specific period of time, specific location, specific cultural connotations, as well as the regional characteristics, to reflect the universal problems of mankind. And writing novelty also provided an eternal aesthetic value for literature and human beings.