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Literature Review

2.1Previous studies on Dreiser and Sister Carrie

Dreiser has been studied by lots of critics from different perspectives. Although Dreiser's time has been over for many years, up to now his works are still influencing the whole world. There are some foreign literature reviews on Dreiser and Sister Carrie. Robert Keeble observed that in this novel Dreiser manipulates his triangles to vary his characters romantic involvements, he also employs changes of locale to alter their physical environments.(8) Robert Keeble also cited that Dreiser modifies conditions to govern his characters motives and tension, to highlight the contrasts of their situations.(60) Helen Ouliaei Nia,Fatemeh Torki Baghbaderani, Dreiser minutely portrayed the lives of the poor in society because he had experienced poverty both as a child and an adult and he could also depict the lives of the rich as he was a journalist who was in everyday contact with the facts of such peoples life. (123) In one of his novels, Sister Carrie, Dreiser, impersonally, represents the struggles of a poor girl who finds her way up the social scale.(200) Huangyingyu, Carrie is always dreaming while the rocking chair is rocking again and again, this is the deep impression on us after we read Sister Carrie which is the first novel of Theodore Dreiser. (50) In this novel the protagonist Sister Carrie is a controversial person. This paper tries to analyze the character of Sister Carrie in order to find out why what she has finally achieved is just extreme void and unhappiness, and shed light on how the author calls warmly for human intuitive knowledge, attacks vigorously the society of money omnipotent, and further more exposes bourgeois societys darkness.(80)

Jing gang BAI, In Sister Carrie, Dreiser drew a vivid picture of American life in the late 19th century. In this paper, the author tried to give a detailed analysis of Carries rise and Hurst woods fall, and pointed out the description of all these things indicated that there was a conflict between individual and society that, to Carrie, she wanted to leave countryside for big cities for a better life through her own effort, but couldnt refuse the help and attraction from others in materialistic society so that she lost herself, and, to Hurst wood, he was also honest to his desire and left for a big city to begin a new life with Carrie, but he couldnt adapt himself to the environment where everyone couldnt escape the law of jungle that the weak was the prey of the strong. In the end, life was so hardfor him that he had no choice but commit suicide to escape the reality.(102)

2.2 Problems in the previous studies

Over the past many years, it has been shaking the mind of readers. The point of view that people make some researches on Carrie is one-sided. They seldom make further researches on why and how Dreiser created the image of Carrie. Firstly, living in a poor and intensely religious family, Dreiser had a very unhappy childhood. A world of jungle where "kill or to be killed" was the law can be found in Dreiser's fictions. In Sister Carrie Dreiser expressed his naturalistic pursuit by expounding the purposelessness of life and attacking the conventional moral standards. Secondly, Sister Carrie best embodies Dreiser's naturalistic belief that while men are controlled and conditioned by heredity, instinct and chance, a few extraordinary and unsophisticated human beings refuse to accept their fate wordlessly and instead strive, unsuccessfully, to find meaning and purpose for their existence. Carrie, as one of such, senses that she is merely a cipher in an uncaring world yet seeks to grasp the mysteries of life and thereby satisfies her desires for social status and material comfort. Thirdly, to satisfy her desires for social status and material comfort Sister Carrie naively puts her stakes on two men, first Drogue then Hurstwood. While this proved to no avail, she starts striving by her own. This is against the convention that a woman can only hope her marriage bring her worldly success. This thesis will have a thorough study on the womens tragedy and will focus on analyzing the image of Carrie. The character Carrie, represents women in that time. So it is meaningful to do this research which can help us get a better understanding of womens tragedy from the novel.