后殖民主义和精神分析视角下对《简爱》的解读

发表时间：2009-06-16T10:11:48.060Z 来源：《文科爱好者》2009年第2期供稿 作者： 王蕾蕾1 时 静2[导读] 《简·爱》，英国文学史上最重要的文学作品之一，自一问世就吸引了许多学者的关注。（1.枣庄学院 山东 枣庄 277160；2.上海应用技术学院 上海 200235）

【摘 要】 《简·爱》，英国文学史上最重要的文学作品之一，自一问世就吸引了许多学者的关注。许多年来，这部作品也因其展现的女权主义思想而备受批评家们钟爱。近来，许多学者尝试从不同的角度对其进行研究并取得了一些新发现。本文主要从后殖民主义和精神分析这两个不同的视角对这部作品进行分析。【关键词】 映像；后殖民主义；精神分析 【中图分类号】 I 3.4 【文献标识码】 A

【文章编号】 1671-1270（2009)2-0006-02

Jane Eyre has been regarded as one of the greatest literary works in the history of English literature since its first appearance. JaneEyre, the heroine, an ordinary girl, has already been identified as a sign of courageous woman fighting for her own dream, while theauthor, Charlotte Bronte has become an outstanding and revolutionary figure, and was together with Dickenson and Thackeray

considered by Marx as one of the most excellent British writers . For years this novel belongs to the favorite texts among the critics for itslofty theme of feminism. Recently, many scholars have employed some other approaches and have got many new discoveries. Thisarticle attempts to analyze Jane Eyre from two different perspectives: post-colonist studies and Freudian psychoanalytical criticism. In the 19th century, Britain underwent a number of changes and grew to be the Great British Empire. In 1832, the social order ofbourgeoisie was set after the reform of parliament. Five years later, Queen Victoria came to the throne and dedicated her life to

establishing a powerful Britain. Industrial Revolution also took place in this period and U.K. from then on, was remembered as the firstindustrial country in the world. All of these contributed to the strengthening of this country and colonial expansion as well.

The never-sun-set empire was founded not only on the basis of military and economic power, but also on that of text. The

colonizers needed to, by means of diversified texts, get some knowledge of the colonies, set rules for them, reproduce the process ofcolonization and introduce the outside world to their own people. However, in these imperial texts, the places such as India, West Indiesand Africa always appeared to be primitive and people there unenlightened, barbarian, dissolute, indulging in sexual pleasures, short ofreason. “Some Victorian writers and thinkers…in their articles, reports and long novels described the development of the empire. Most ofthem adopted a taking-it-for-granted attitude when participating in the reproduction of their empire in letters” (Boehmer 26). This reflectsthe national superiority and confidence of the British people and at the same time, the imperial hegemony.

In Jane Eyre, Bertha Mason, a minor figure from West Indies, suffers from the imperial hegemony. She is depicted as a devil andbeast and does not get a voice from her first appearance to her last one. As a Creole from a Spanish Town of West Indies—the colony ofthe U.K., she is in the marginal position in the British Empire—the suzerain. In the world of colonial discourses, Mason becomes a silentOther. All the knowledge we know about her comes from Rochester, her British husband. In this case, “she is in the margin of a marginalposition”(Gu). She is a female from the colony. In the suzerain country, a society of patriarchy, she is under double oppression.

Rochester, as a male, feels superior to Mason; as a citizen of the empire, he has the control over the colonized Creole. Bronte, whilecreating Jane, must have ignored the situation of Bertha, and put her into the attic prison. Jane Eyre does not pay any sympathy toBertha and only stands on Rochester’s side. She believes Rochester’s words about Bertha not only because she loves him, but also inher mind the colonial should be like that, which means that Bertha Mason is also in the marginal social position of the Western womendiscourse.

Mr. Mason, another character from West Indies, is also described as an unpleasant figure. Among all the words modifying Mr.Mason’s features, besides the neutral ones used for the delineation of appearance, the rest are all negative. If not influenced by thenegative ones, we can find a mild, easy-going and good-looking man. Here, Jane just puts Mr. Mason in the opposite side to Rochester,her love and the spokesman on behalf of the colonists, and regards all Mr. Mason’s good qualities as bad ones. Jane’s power of

discourse completely compels Mason out of the center of discourse. Imperial discourse can be used to describe not only the colonizedbut also other suzerains. “The early ‘imperialism’ did not refer to the relationship between the colonies and their suzerains, but the fightsbetween different nations which had different imperial systems and were suzerains” (Zhang 5). From this perspective, we should sum upthat West Indies in the story is distorted. Bertha Mason—the mad woman and Mr. Mason—the trouble maker in the hero and heroine’swedding ceremony all turn out to be the victims of the colonial discourse. They deserve our attention and sympathy.

Classical works, with their deep meaning, are always impossible to be thoroughly interpreted through one approach of literarycriticism. Besides feminism and postcolonialism, psychoanalysis has also been applied to the studies on Jane Eyre. In late 1970s, theAmerican feminists Gilbert and Gubar, for the first time, put forward in The Madwoman in the Attic that the mad woman, Bertha Mason, isactually another depressive and angry Jane. In China, many scholars also hold similar idea. In Wang Wenhui’s “The Tripartite PersonalityAnalysis of Jane Eyre”, she argues that the mad woman is id, Jane ego and St. John superego. Fan Wenbin, another scholar points outthat “Jane Eyre represents the bight side of the author while the madwoman the dark side” (Fan).

If we divide the story into two parts (before Jane knew Rochester and after she knew him) and analyze it with Freud’s “tripartitemodel”--human’s personality consists of three parts: the id, the ego and the superego, we will have new discoveries. In part one, beforeJane Eyre knew Rochester, she was most of the time dominated by the id just to escape from the cross Mrs. Reed and cruel Mr.

Brocklehurst. And, fortunately, she got help and comfort from Bessie, Helen and Miss Temple, who acted like the ego. After Jane enteredThornfield Hall, she became a mixture of reason and passion in face of her master’

s love and was herself id and ego in intervals. However, the hard reality compelled her from her love to weasel from the superego—Mr.Mason and Bertha Mason. But finally, the superego satisfied the id. Jane reunited with Mr. Rochester. This is a complicated process ofthe id, the ego and the superego’s competing for one’s respective place. In this process, the heroine herself matures and becomes acomplete character.

The id and the superego can be said to be enemies on the opposite sides, while the ego is the coordinator to maintain the peace andharmony. When in Gateshead, Jane suffered from ill treatment from Mrs. Reed, her guardian, the representative of authority, who can be

regarded as the superego. As a small child, Jane just listened to the inner voice and behaved only following her desires. She was, at thattime, the spokesman of the id. When punished, she could only turn to Bessie for warmth to calm down the fury inside. In this point,Bessie’s words and action can give protection to the id and keep it from irritating the superego, which means that Bessie was a perfectego. In the second part, the scene is transferred to Thornfield Hall, where our heroine cannot find another Bessie, Helen or Miss Temple,which indicates that she has to assume the id and the ego herself. In this part we can see that the heroine herself becomes theembodiment of both the id and the ego. When facing the powerful superego, the ego has the id under control; when driven by theirresistible force of the id, the ego helps it get released. This is, in fact, how the model works.

Reviewing the story from the first scene to the last one, we can come to the conclusion that in every scene the three parts of the

tripartite model are all present and they all fully display themselves as the story develops. On the whole, the id plays a more significantrole in the heroine’s personality than the other two. The story itself is actually a process of Jane Eyre’s fighting for rights, liberty, andhappiness, as what the feminists believe.

【参考文献】

[1]Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre [M]. Stockholm/London: the Continental Book Company, 1946.

[2]爱德华·傅克斯. 赵永穆、许宏治译 《欧洲风化史》（资产阶级时代）[M]. 沈阳：辽宁教育出版社，2000. [3]艾勒克·博埃默. 韩敏中译 《殖民与后殖民文学》[M]. 沈阳：辽宁教育出版社，1998. [4]范文彬. 《简爱》中疯女人的艺术形象 [J]. 外国文学评论，1990（4）.

[5]谷红丽. 《〈简爱〉和〈沧海茫茫〉中的殖民主义话语》[J]. 外国语学院学报，2003(26)(1). [6]张京媛. 《后殖民理论与文化批评》[M]北京：北京大学出版社，1991.

【作者简介】王蕾蕾（1981-），女，汉族，山东枣庄人，现工作于山东省枣庄学院外国语系，助教，学士。 时 静（1981-） 女，汉族，山东枣庄人，现工作于上海应用技术学院外语系 讲师，硕士 英美文学方向。