Body Narrative In David Lodge’s Later Works

David Lodge is a famous modern contemporary novelist and literary critic who has international reputation. In his novel, David Lodge pay much attention to formal experiment and writing skills. What’s more, he also adds his unique life perception to his novels. Therapy and Deaf Sentence are David Lodge’s very important novels in his later works. Just like Lodge’s previous novels, these two novels also involve new contents, new themes, and have great innovations in narrative. These two novels represent David Lodge’s new exploration on his novel art and life philosophy after the creation which focuses on formal experiment and writing skill during his middle creating period. These two novels discuss the crisis of people’s life for the first time, which is full of humanistic care. On the narrative skills, the Bodies’condition of the protagonists in the novels, the following confrontation between men and women, the therapy of their Bodies, run through the novels and promote the development of the plots. Using the literature theory of’Body Narrative’,the dissertation claims that ’BODY’plays a very important role in these two novels. The’Body’ in the novels not only promotes the development of the plots, but also expresses the themes of the novels. Besides, the dissertation also discusses the innovation of the narrative in the novels and the reason of it.The dissertation consists of four parts. The first part presents a commentary summary of the theory of’Body Narrative’ and gives the definition of’Body Narrative’. Based on author’s process of creation, the dissertation illustrates the author’s using of’Body Narrative’in his whole novels and the significance of the ’Body Narrative’in his later works. The second part analyzes the’Body Narrative’ in Therapy and Deaf Sentence. In these two novels, men and women’s bodies constitute the narrative’s body environment. Men’s bodies are significantly abnormal and they are either sick, old or both sick and old. While women’s bodies are healthy and full of energy. The differences and comparisons between men’s and women’s bodies result in the power struggle of two sexes, the struggle of status and position. Men’s sick and old bodies are failed in the face of the women’s healthy and energetic bodies. The therapy of the bodies is another force of the novels narrative. Writing becomes one kind of therapy, which plays an important role in the bodies’curing. The recovery of the bodies is a result of self-dialogue and it expresses the thinking of life as well as the theme of the novels. The third part analyzes the significance of’Body narrative’in Lodge’s new works. The plots of David Lodge’s novels are mostly taken from his own experience. Therapy and Deaf Sentence involves Lodge’s examining and thinking of his own body. Using the strategy of’Body Narrative’, Lodge explains his new exploration of the meaning of life and continues to express the themes of religion and scholar.