The Awakening Of Female Consciousness In Pearl Buck’s Pavilion Of Women (1948), And Eileen Chang’s The Rouge Of The North (1955)

Pearl Sydenstricker Buck was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature in1938. Shewas praised highly "for her rich and truly epic descriptions of peasant life in Chinaand for her biographical masterpieces". Born in a family of Presbyterian missionariesin1857, she was taken to China by her parents as an infant, grew up and passed morethan half of her life-time there. Compared with Pearl S. Buck, Eileen Chang, who wasborn to a prestigious family of gentlefolk in Shanghai, China in1920, has a quitedifferent background. However, they have similar point of views regarding the normsand rituals of traditional Chinese society which are represented in their works. Thepresent thesis sets out to examine the representation of the awakening of femaleconsciousness in Pearl Buck s Pavilion of Women (1948), and Eileen Chang s TheRouge of the North (1955). Two novels of the mid-twentieth century were writtenrespectively by an American and a Chinese writer concerned both with the place ofwomen in Chinese society, but the protagonists consciousness is viewed throughquite different prisms.In the first half of20thcentury in China, along with cultural conflicts, thegradually aroused female consciousness saw a series of dramatic changes in physicallife, cultural and intellectual life. To a certain degree, conflicts can be seen as a crucialagent of female consciousness. These conflicts and changes are also mirrored in PearlS. Buck s Pavilion of Women and Eileen Chang s The Rouge of the North. Thus, thepresent thesis will be devoted to a comparative study between the two representationsof the awakening of the protagonists consciousness in the above two novels disclosedby the handling of the thematic, narrative and other poetic items, so as to highlight the poetics of each work in the light of the above cultural conflicts, and social andindividual changes.