Aesthetics As The Means Of Redemption

In the wealth of scholarship regarding James Joyce, aesthetics study has long been a hot subject for critics to probe into. Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man as the main study objects, this thesis uses the aesthetics redemption theory of Herbert Marcuse to analyze the innovation sense of Joyce and his diverse writing techniques in novels to reveal the features and forms of art, which protest against the reality, expand new sensibility and seek redemption.The introduction primarily summarizes the study of Joyce home and abroad. In addition, this part put forward the major difficulties, study approach and feasibility of study approach.Chapter one is about fantasy. Starting from the essence of Eros in the mind of Freud, Marcuse considers that the repression of modern society has beyond the limitation of repression of general culture. To get rid of this oppressiveness of society is fantasy. The fantasy in the artistic work not only can interpret the secret of individual’s but also can elaborate the profound meaning of culture. The main form of fantasy is stream of consciousness. This essay analyzes the elements of stream of consciousness, which is the dramatic reappearing of suppression of reality. The repression hidden in the sub-consciousness could not be confirmed, relieved and liberated in reality. However, in the novel, the characters’repressions are indicated by stream of consciousness, for it provides a way for characters to liberate.Chapter two discusses the affirmative character of culture put forward by Herbert Marcuse. Marcuse reveals the negative effect brought by affirmative character of culture, which is advocated by capitalist culture. In fact, the value affirmed by society is at the cost of sacrificing individual’s real need and sense. It is a negation of individual. Literary work should not be affirmative about certain value. In the capitalism era, novelists usually protest against certain values in the form of negation. Marcuse appealed to abolish this affirmative culture and realize the liberation of people. This chapter will take Dubliners as an example and combine with Marcuse’s negation of affirmative culture to analyze the positive significance and limitation of negation from the imprisonment of religion, corruption of political beliefs and morbid view of marriage.Chapter three discusses the new sensibility. Marcuse pointed out that human beings gradually lose the ability of sense, criticizing, and negating in an industrial society. Therefore, he proposed to have new sensibility in art to negate the existing system. In the aesthetic dimension, he further emphasized the autonomy of artistic form and signified the revolutionary and liberation significance. Although Joyce did not argue about the importance of art form, he expressed his aesthetics and the aim of liberation through aesthetics by the protagonist Stephen. Joyce made breakthroughs in Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, using the technique of epiphany and symbolism, which enriched the forms of expressing and updated the understanding of these specific art forms.In a word, this essay studies the aesthetics and artistic work of Joyce on the basis of Marcuse’s the theory of repression society and analyzes how Joyce takes advantage of the feature and form of art to protest against repression, train new sensibility and seek liberation. We can see the active role played by art from the writing techniques and the innovation in the novel, and great potential of art as a means to liberate humanity.