Imbalance And Balance—An Interpretation Of To Kill A Mockingbird From The Perspective Of Spiritual Ecology

Harper Lee has a well-known reputation in American literature in the 20 th century and her works are commended by a great many literary critics because of rich connotation and profound humanitarianism in the novel.It is narrated through the eyes of a child,Scout,and its story background is set in Maycomb County in American South.To Kill a Mockingbird tells us a story about impartiality and justice,imbalance and balance in spiritual aspects as well as love and responsibility.What's more,the novel demonstrates a perfect combination of spiritual ecology and Americans' everyday life,interpreting authentic living conditions of people who live in American South.Lu Shuyuan,a famous ecologist and thinker in China,puts forward spiritual ecology theory on the basis of ecology theory and explains systematically modern people's spiritual symptoms in his representative work Ecological Literature and Art.They are respectively spiritual vacuum,incompetence of behavior and alienation of existence.As far as he is concerned,due to rapid development of science and technology,the interpersonal relationships become exceedingly indifferent among modern people.What's worse,it is difficult to get a state of serenity and harmony between man and himself.In consequence,he expresses that people are supposed to realize spiritual harmony by means of listening to classical music and cultivating all sorts of hobbies.With the spiritual ecology theory as the framework and To Kill a Mockingbird as the research object,this thesis tries to discuss the symptoms and reasons for spiritual imbalances in Boo Radley,Mayella Ewell and Tm Robinson,revealing that Harper Lee has a deep understanding and thoughts about social issues in American South,such as racial discrimination and oppression of patriarchy.The thesis gives some enlightenment to people who have a spiritual dilemma: Human beings should understand and help each other in relations with man and nature,man and society as well as man and himself,to abandon previous secular bias and to build new system of social relations positively.Only in this way can people realize the aim of spiritual freedom and harmony.