The Application Of Impressionism In Willa Cather’s My Antonia

Literary impressionism refers to an artistic writing style by focusing onperceptive impressions created in specific situations. Through analysis on literaryimpressionist theories, this thesis will research My Antonia by Willa Cather on how itemploys impressionistic subjectivity, presentation of light and color andimpressionistic narrative techniques to show impressionist trends.Subjective writing is the biggest difference between literary impressionism andrealism. The latter records facts on strictly chronological order, just like what a lifemirror does while the former pays more attention to expression of human emotion andrecords pieces of impressions in life according to human time, much the wayobjective events leave impressions on human mind. Based on the above theoreticalviews, this thesis analyzes expressions of personal emotion and the features of amemory novel and then proves that impressionistic subjectivity is the essence of thenovel.The progress of painting and writing is always the same. So do impressionisticwriting and painting. Like impressionist painters, literary impressionists also attachmuch importance to application of light and color, find mother-child relationshipbetween the two, and agree that colors change according to the change of light.Through skillful use of light and color, Willa Cather not only presents readers withpieces of beautiful Nebraska scenes, but also lets them realize the effects of strongsense of image in expressing feelings and conveying aesthetics.In order to present a more sincere life, literary impressionists adopt the uniquenarrative techniques, among which this thesis analyzes fragments, juxtaposition andrepetition. What Cather narrates in this novel is not a complete story, but pieces offragments and episodes. The aim is to let readers understand its wholeness throughintegrating fragments, just like the way of appreciating impressionist pictures that onecan find its completeness when he keeps some distance, otherwise the pictures areonly masses of fragments. Juxtaposition is one kind of narrative technique that writersbring more or more than two seemingly unrelated events together and then violentcontrast comes into being. It is the stark contrast that makes readers ponder over therelationship between those episodes. Cather repeats some language and scenes forseveral times, aiming to prove the variety of their meaning, in much the same way asimpressionist painters who paint the same object repeatedly in different light conditions.The application of subjectivity and impressionistic narrative techniques makereaders feel afresh. And light and color increase novel’s image sense and raise theeffect of conveying emotion. This thesis concludes that My Antonia by Willa Cather isa novel full of impressionistic elements and it is more meaningful when it is read inlight of literary impressionism.