An Eco-criticism Interpretation Of The Disintegrated Relationships In The Mayor Of Casterbridge

The Mayor of Casterbridge, published in1886, is one of Thomas Hardy’s masterpieces, and it is also one of his early four works in Hardy’s writing career. The novel’s background is based on the industrial revolution and urbanization, and its theme of times is that the patriarchal clan system of agricultural economy must die outWith the help of ecological theory, this thesis analyzes the change of interpersonal relationship under the invasion of industrial civilization. Many scholars and critics at home and at abroad make researches from various perspectives, especially from the protagonist’s tragic fate and the novel’s writing techniques, but few spend their energy on this novel according to the ethic of the interpersonal relationship in ecological literature. This thesis makes an interpretation of relationships from the perspective of ecological criticism for The Mayor of Casterbridge through the analysis of Henchard’s interpersonal relationship in his work and his family. It analyzes that the development of industrial civilization causes a series of changes:the change of ecological environment, the change of the relationship between human beings and nature, the alienation of interpersonal relationship. It points out that only human beings learn to respect the ecology, the harmony of human beings and nature, and the ethical harmony, the society can be really developed. This thesis has its reference value of a good construal about interpersonal relationship in the process of Chinese economical transformation.This thesis consists of five parts:In chapter one, the author and creation background of the novel are briefly introduced. This part also introduces the main content of the novel and its current research situation as well as the research meaning of this thesisIn chapter two, the basic theory of this thesis is introduced-the theory of ecological criticism. It introduces the theory’s development, definition, and the main content which is applied in this thesis. This thesis will make use of the theory to analyze the novel.In chapter three, this thesis analyzes the change of interpersonal relationship in the process of economical transformation according to the theory of ecological criticism. In chapter four, this thesis makes a research about the change of the relationship between male and female (mainly the marital relationship, the generation relationship) in the industrialized agricultural economy.In chapter five, the thesis summarizes the main content and the research meaning: Human being is a part of the ecological environment, and equal to any other creature. In today’s society, human beings can own real harmony only by having a harmonious coexistence with the world and developing knowledge economy without the damage of the ecology.