“I Am the Family Face”:Darwinism,Heredity,and Atavism in Thomas Hardy’s Novels

• 作者: QI Jun-jie
• 来源期刊: 文学与艺术研究:英文版
• 学科: 数学
• 关键词: DARWINISM HEREDITY PEDIGREE atavism PATHOLOGY
• 年，卷（期）: wxyysyjywb_2019,（8）
• 页码范围: 830-839
• 页数: 10页
• 分类号: O17

摘要

19th-century scientific breakthroughs and developments exerted huge influence upon Thomas Hardy’s literary work,among which Darwinian discourses as well as issues of heredity and degeneration have attracted considerable critical attention.These scientific discourses can find their literary echoes in Hardy’s novels.Hardy’s characters are trapped by biological determinism and are therefore deprived of freewill,a devastating element which contributes to Hardy’s tragic vision.In Hardy’s early novels,Darwinism and other scientific issues are dealt with in a discursive manner,as is the case in A Pair of Blue Eyes;it is only in his late novels,especially in Tess of the d’Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure,that Hardy finally succeeds in incorporating Darwinian and hereditary discourses into his literary and philosophical conception and design.Thus to use a Darwinian term,this paper investigates the evolutionary process in which Hardy grows gradually adept in his artistic attempt to fuse the contemporary scientific discourses with his literary imagination,as well as in using scientific issues to mediate between authorial intention and critical expectation.