An Intertextual Analysis Of War Babies And Tess Of The D’urbervilles

Frederick Busch, a famous contemporary America writer, his novel War Babies was published in 1989. In War Babies, all the description of characters, plots, scenes and themes are glutted with signs of Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’urbervilles. The previous studies on Hardy’s fictions mainly focus on the following aspects: the causes of tragedy, the concern of modernism and feminism, the exploration into Hardy’s artistic achievement and the discussion on religious belief. Through intensive reading of the texts, based on the theories of intertextuality of new historicism, this thesis discovers intertextuality between War Babies and Tess of the D’urbervilles in many aspects so as to further comprehend the deep implication of War Babies.This thesis consists of six parts. The first part is a brief introduction to the two texts and the research status both overseas and China. Besides, it elaborates the purpose, significance and research methods of this thesis. Chapter One is an elaboration on the intertextuality based on the choice of the characters of the two works. The author of War Babies makes Tess of the D’urbervilles an intertext by applying the specific intertextuality techniques reference and quotation to create the corresponding characters of his own works. Chapter Two is an elaboration on the intertextuality based on the plot. Busch makes Tess of the D’urbervilles as the sources of War Babies by using the specific intertextuality skills quotation and allusion to accomplish successfully what the two works signify to each other on the plot. Chapter Three is an elaboration on the intertextuality of the theme. The two works have three corresponding motifs of being seduced, victim and tragic fate and Busch achieves what War Babies signifies by pastiching the three motifs of Tess of the D’urbervilles. Because the value of the intertextuality research is precisely the heterogeneity and the interactivity between the texts, Chapter Four focuses on the study of the heterogeneity and the interactivity of the two works, namely from the perspective of the authors, a further study was exerted on the intertextuality embodied in the two works to find out the heterogeneity and the interactivity between the two works. The conclusion can be drawn that transcending different times and spaces (heterogeneity), the two works interweave with each other in the limited texts, expressing the authors’ similar indictment, criticism and irony (interactivity).This thesis demonstrates that the author Frederick Busch makes Tess of the D’urbervilles as his works War Babies intertext by using different kinds of specific techniques and by pastiching Tess of the D’urbervilles Busch expresses his voiceless indictment against wars.