从《处女与吉普赛人》看成长环境对少女爱情观的影响

论文总字数：31256字

摘 要

《处女与吉普赛人》是戴·赫·劳伦斯所著的一部中篇小说，故事围绕两个单亲家庭少女的成长展开，主人公是妹妹伊维特。本文通过对伊维特的爱情观以及其成长的环境的分析，指出成长环境对少女爱情观的影响，以期引起读者对这方面的思考，从新的角度来理解这部小说的意义；并与现实生活相结合，写出该小说对自身的启发，以提醒家长注意成长环境对孩子爱情观形成的重要性。本文中成长环境分为家庭环境和社会环境两部分来分析。

关键词：《处女与吉普赛人》；成长环境；爱情观

Contents

1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………1
   1. Purpose of the study…………………………………………………………1
   2. Significance of the study…………………………………………………….1
   3. A brief introduction to the novel…………………………………………….2
2. Literature Review…………………………………………………………3
3. The Influence of Family Environment on Yvette’s View of Love…...…...6

3.1 Family structure..............................................................................................6

3.2 Rearing style…………………………………………………………...……7

4. The Influence of Social Environment on Yvette’s View of Love………….8

4.1 The common characteristics of the men who had pursued Yvette…………..8

4.2 The love between a married Jewish woman and her paramour…………......9

4.3 The mysterious gypsy family…………………….……………………….....9

4.4 The social status of women at that time……….………………………..….10

4.5 The religious environment of the rectory………….………………….........10

5. Conclusion……………………………………………….…………...…….11

5.1 Conclusion of the study.................................................................................11

5.2 Implication of the study.................................................................................11

5.3 Limitation of the study..................................................................................12

5.4 Recommendation for future researches………………………….…...……12

Works Cited…………………………………………………………………13

1. Introduction

People hold different attitudes towards love, which can be influenced by many factors. On one writing class, my teacher mentioned Sons and Lovers, which made me interested in D. H. Lawrence. Then I read the Virgin and the Gypsy. To my surprise, it was quite different from other works of Lawrence.

1.1 Purpose of the study

While describing the relationship between men and women, Lawrence boldly covered the topic of “sex”, which everyone owned and needed but seldom talked about. Owing to too much description of sex, Lawrence was severely criticized at that time. But in this novel, the love between the virgin and the Gypsy was so pure and primitive. What’s more, while reading this novel, I keep thinking about why Yvette has affection for the Gypsy man almost by instinct. However, to some extent, I hold that her living surroundings must have some influence on her love view. That’s why I start my study.

This article aims to explore the influence of growing environment on the view of love through analysing young girl Yvette’s view of love and her growing environment in the Virgin and the Gypsy. Firstly, the author and the writing background of the novel are briefly introduced. Then, the growing environment is divided into family environment and social environment. The analysis of the family environment includes the analysis of family structure and family atmosphere, etc. The analysis of social environment includes the analysis of friends or pursuers around Yvette, the analysis of the status of women in society at that time and the analysis of the religious environment around Yvette. I use textual analysis in my thesis.

1.2 Significance of the study

Although many scholars have studied the Virgin and the Gypsy from many aspects, so far there is no one studying this novel from the influence of growing environment on a girl’s view of love, which can be seen as innovation of my thesis.

Besides, the article is also combined with the real society, aiming to make people think about the influence of growing environment on a girl’s view of love.

1.3 A brief introduction to the novel

This novel was written in 1926. It was published after the author’s death. This fiction was written for his wife Frieda, who was the archetype of mother Cynthia. Yvette and Lucille were created based on Frieda’s two daughters.

The tale was related to the story of two sisters, whose father was an Anglican vicar. They finished their school from abroad and then returned to a drab, lifeless rectory in the East Midlands, shortly after the World War I. Their mother had eloped with a young man. This scandal was seldom talked about in this family, especially by the father, who was seriously humiliated by his wife. And he only remembered her as she was when they first met many years before.

Grandma and her selfish and vicious daughter aunt Cissie became the masters of the family. The lives of the two girls, Yvette and Lucille, became unbearable. In particular, Yvette’s despair was exacerbated by the fact that she “borrowed” a little money from a charity fund managed by her family. Her relationship with her father and aunt has become very poor. When she saw her father’s huge reaction to her petty mistake, she found out for the first time that his father was such a stingy and timid person.

But even so, girls did their best to bring color and fun to their life every day. They went out for an outing with their neighbor Framley’s family. On one outing, Yvette met a gypsy and his family. The wife of the gypsy man told her fortune. She was an attractive and strong woman who seemed to see through them easily. The gypsy man also looked deeply at Yvette and his first impression on her was unforgettable. The first meeting deepened her disappointment at the rector"s repressed family life. This also aroused her curiosity about sex. Although she had admirers, she had never felt or thought like this before.

On her second visit to the Gypsy family, she became friends with a married Jewish woman. She left her husband and now lived with her paramour, impatiently waiting for divorce. Yvette would not judge anyone she newly met, neither the gypsy nor the Jewish woman, because she was young and modern-minded. But when her father found out about her friendship, he threatened her. Yvette realized that her father was such a despicable, paranoid, conservative and shallow man. Obviously, her father believed that she could not be friends with such a woman. The rich woman ran off with a handsome young man and abandoned her old husband even though the young man happened to be a war hero.

There was a surprising twist at the end of the novel. A huge flood surged through the vale, coming from a burst dam at a nearby reservoir. It happened that the gypsy was approaching the rector’s house. No one was at home except Yvette and her blind grandmother. At the critical moment, the brave gypsy saved Yvette, but the unexpected flood washed away most of the rectory and drowned her grandmother.

A touching scene ensued. The gypsy hero brought life and warmth back to virgin Yvette, who felt the strong attraction of his masculinity and strength. She fell asleep and the gypsy disappeared. Her family came home to find her safe, and they flattered the gypsy as her savior.

One day, she received a short message from the Gypsy, “Hope to see you again.” Only here did readers and Yvette knew that his name was Joe Boswell.

This is the plot summary of the Virgin and the Gypsy, from which readers can have a brief understanding of the main idea of the novel and Yvette’s growing environment.

2. Literature Review

Lawrence’s works are always valued by world literature. Although The Virgin and the Gypsy is not as famous as Sons and Lovers, Lady Chatterley’s lover and The Rainbow, there are still many scholars at home and abroad studying this novel.

Ashby Bland Crowder and Lynn O’Malley Crowder say that Kingsley Widmer has pointed out Lawrence’s ‘desire to mythicize the primitive figure’ of the gipsy. But they believe that the novel’s mythic dimension is much wider than has been appreciated and that this dimension gives The Virgin and the Gipsy its unusual conviction and intensity. Everything in the novel moves towards its central mythic event, the transcendent sexual union between the virgin and the gipsy. So, they intensively study the mythic intent in this novel.

ÓSCAR IBÁÑEZ MUÑOZ aims to present The Virgin and de Gipsy as a work that holds strong links with the themes and structures of some classic fairy tales but which deviates from the socializing functions imposed on the folk tale from the 17^th century onwards. He tries to demonstrate that the aim of the tale is to achieve a reestablishment of the neat, original relationship between man and nature in what is in fact an apology of ritual and myth.

What’s more, Michael Kramp talks about Gypsy Desire in the Land: The Decay of the English Race and Radical Nomadism in “The Virgin and the Gipsy”. B Guttenberg discusses Realism and Romance in Lawrence’s “The Virgin and the Gipsy”. I have no access to the two articles, so the details can’t be given here.

In China, only four theses studying this novel are found. I’ll detail all of them below.

Li Shanshan from College of Science amp; Technology Ningbo University studies from the perspective of psychoanalysis, combined with Freud’s theory. Her paper concludes that Yvette’s inner change is from division to harmony. This process is Yvette’s pursuit of a state of self-balance combining desire and spirit.

Zhao Qian from the Normal School of Beihua University compares the women figures in A Dream of Red Mansions with those in The Virgin and the Gypsy. She says A Dream of Red Mansions pays special attention to the status of women. It pays attention to the equality between men and women, and correctly recognizes that equality between men and women is not just men’s praise of women’s beauty, but the recognition that women also have the same intelligence and work ability as men. In The Virgin and the Gypsy, there are contradictions and conflicts inside each person. The reason for its contradiction is the dual oppression of women’s body and spirit by the social form in the male-dominated society at that time along with women’s obedience or resistance to this form. Both A Dream of Red Mansions and The Virgin and the Gypsy describe social status where women are oppressed and destroyed. And the end of both stories is an end of a family, which can be seen as a criticism of the social reality. However, there is a fundamental difference between the two. There is no such courageous rebellious woman as Cynthia in The Virgin and the Gypsy who dares to fight against the old force.

Siqin from Northeast Forestry University studies the opposition between male supremacy and female consciousness. His paper takes The Virgin and the Gypsy as the text, deeply analyzes the bondage of male chauvinism to women left over from the Victorian era, explores the deep reasons for the different performances of the main characters in the novel by applying feminist theory and Freud’s psychoanalysis, and embodies Lawrence’s thought of pursuing gender balance in his works. The thesis mainly analyzes the restrictions of the male-dominated society on women shown in the novel, and analyzes the two anti-traditional male images in the male-dominated society and the tragic situation of the female admirers in the male-dominated society and their harms to other women. The fourth part introduces the voices of women’s resistance in the male-dominated society. Taking Cynthia and Yvette as examples, this paper focuses on the analysis of the “virgin”-Yvette’s rebellious behavior. From the external causes-social causes, internal causes-psychological causes, incentives-mysterious “gypsies”, it deeply analyzes her rebellious behavior and how Lawrence expresses his criticism of society and dissatisfaction with male chauvinism, constructs the ideal society in his heart, and expresses his love for nature and admiration for gender balance. This article tries to explain the awakening of female consciousness by analyzing the psychological activities and rebellious behaviors of female characters with rebellious spirit. At the same time, this article combines the main arguments to analyze the role of symbol in expressing the theme. In the conclusion, the enlightenment to modern women is expounded, which can inspire women to awaken, strive for equal rights and realize self-value.

Li Xiaoli and Li Li from the Business School of Xi’an International Studies University study the text construction of The Virgin and the Gypsy under bipolar contrast. They hold that there are there are many contradictory elements in the text: reality and myth, realism and imagination, death and rebirth, vitality and decay, nature and society, modern civilization and primitive civilization, rationality and instinct. These two bipolar-contrast elements make the works present modernity in content, form and technique, make the story text multiple in meaning, and make people’s interpretation of the story text more freely. Lawrence, who has lived in foreign countries for many years, constructs the novel by means of bipolar contrast, thus denouncing the shackles of western decadent rational civilization on human intuitive consciousness, expressing his keen concern for adjusting the old gender relationship and establishing a new relationship between men and women.

3. The Influence of Family Environment on Yvette’s View of Love

Yvette’s family environment is quite special, which plays a significant part in her growth. The following is an analysis of Yvette’s family structure and rearing style. We can see its influence on her view of love.

3.1 Family structure

Yvette’s family was not a typical nuclear family. She lived with father, sister, grandmother, uncle and aunt.

Yvette’s mother Cynthia was a woman who abandoned her family to pursue her love. She yearned for freedom and love. She did not want to be locked in a marriage that she thought was lifeless and meaningless. At the beginning of the novel, it was mentioned: “Her two little girls know nothing. Their young hearts were traumatized, thinking that their mother left her daughter only because she didn’t like them.” (Lawrence 530) Therefore, Yvette’s lack of maternal love in her childhood had a great influence on her view of love. When Yvette spent her family’s money and was severely criticized and insulted. She thought of her mother. She despised her father and despised the despicable Saywell family. She thought that her mother belonged to a higher realm. She was selfish and decisive, but her posture was gorgeous and dazzling. She was presumptuous and easy to be discriminated against, but she would never suffer such humiliation. (Lawrence 567) She even said: “Father and mother, they are so mismatched.” (Lawrence 606) It could be seen that Yvette did not think that her mother’s leaving was an act to be condemned. On the contrary, she admired her mother’s bravery.

The rector, Yvette’s father, was a rigid, resigned and passionless man. Even if Cynthia left him, he still secretly loved her. He loved not the real Cynthia, but a pure “snow flower” he imagined. Such a weak father made Yvette hate those men without passion.

Grandma was a strange old lady with vulgar manners and sharp intelligence. When the marriage between the rector and Cynthia ended, the old lady stopped her son from renewing his marriage, making the 40-year-old a good son again. Grandma was very afraid that Cynthia would come back, because she knew that if she came back, she would lose everything she had now, including the obedient son, as well as the family power. “The children grew up in this insidious, sly, hypocritical and secretive environment.” (Lawrence 533) Yvette described her grandmother as a “toad”. Yvette went out with friends and the old lady would ask about everything. The old lady, who had to take control of the whole family, made Yvette eager to escape even more.

As for aunt Cissie, she dedicated her whole life to her “Mater”. She cherished her emotions, lost the vitality of her life and lost the charm of women. She was firmly controlled by her mother. She lived in this world to take care of her Mater. Aunt Cissie hated Yvette because Yvette was absent-minded, self-absorbed, and indifferent to everything. Cissie and her old mother, echo each other, became the two guards in the family.

Lucille and Yvette were both Cynthia’s daughters. Although their personalities were not completely the same, they both disliked the depressing and suffocating family life, yearning for the outside world, and yearning for free and warm love. Yvette would tell her attitudes towards the Gypsies to her sister, who made her feel that she was not an alien, but others in the family were. Sister’s influence on Yvette’s view of love was not small either.

3.2 Rearing style

Yvette’s mother left her when she was seven years old, and she grew up in this “insidious and sly, dignified” home for the next ten years or so. Yvette encountered a series of problems during her growth. The way her family handled the problems made her more and more disgusted with them, and her love view was quietly taking shape.

Yvette had little freedom to make friends at home. Every time she and Lucille brought young friends home, grandma was always there, like a terrible, ancient physical idol, staring at them all the time. Aunt Cissie was always watching over her, and every visitor must be introduced to grandma first. And when Yvette expressed her love for the newly-met Eastwood couple, his father said to her, “I will kill you before you repeat your mother"s mistake.” He also used grandmother as an excuse: “If there is still a faithful wife in the world, your grandmother is one. She has already endured s humiliation and can no longer bear the second one.” (Lawrence 618) As if in his mind, Cynthia’s departure was entirely her own fault, and he was very afraid that his daughter would do the same thing like her mother. Yvette was fed up with this kind of restraint and puzzling discipline. She thought that the Saywell family was born lowly. She called her attitude towards this family “the contempt of a man born free for a man born lowly.” (Lawrence 615)

On one occasion, Yvette borrowed a small sum of money from his family’s charity fund to buy a pair of stockings and some gadgets, without telling her father. Yvette was humiliated by his father. He said, “Anyone who borrows money must pay interest. You must pay back the money.” (Lawrence 566) Her father was so narrow-minded, completely unable to communicate. Aunt Cissie was even worse. She madly scolded, “Liar! Thief! Selfish little beast!” Yvette was afraid of that dirty, perverted grimace. When she returned to her room, she laid in bed, wishing she were the gypsy man. He lived in a tent in inside, on a caravan and never set foot in a house. He ignored the existence of the church and did not bother to glance at it. The rigidity and lack of freedom in her family made her yearn for the life of the gypsies and feel more curious about them.

1. The Influence of Social Environment on Yvette’s View of Love

Aside from family environment, social environment also makes a difference to Yvette’s view of love, which can be divided into the following five parts.

4.1 The common characteristics of the men who had pursued Yvette

Yvette was surrounded by pursuers. Their common characteristics were too mediocre and too superficial to express their love.

Gilles Samcott was one of them. When Lucille teased her about him, Yvette shouted, “But I hate those who love me. I hate those people. They are always clinging to others. Whoever pesters me turns me off.” (Lawrence 537) Evidently Yvette was not interested in men who actively pursued her. She liked men who were novel and mysterious and were close to her in spirit.

When her friend Leo asked her to marry him, Yvette made no effort to hide her disgust. She didn’t want to marry a “watchdog”. In her eyes, Leo belonged to this land, where he would breed and led an ordinary life. And that was not what she wanted to do.

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