An Analysis of the Causes of Catherine's Tragedy

zwwx@overseaen.comISSN 1009 -5039http://www.overseaen.comOverseas EnglishTel:+86- -551-5690811 5690812An Analysis of the Causes of Catherine 's TragedyTIAN Peng'2(1.WuHan University. Wuhan 430072, China; 2.0CTPS, Shenzhen 518053, China)Abstract: Tragedy is an everlasting theme of Hai Mingwei's literary works, every character can not save themselves from defeat and death.The aricle will probe the reasons of Catherine's tragic fate to make people rethink life and reveal the aesthetic signifcance of tragedy.Key words: Tragedy; the reasons; aesthetic signifcance中图分类号:1106文献标识码:A文章编号:1009- 503920111-0234 -021 IntroductionThe result is a war in which individuals are reduced tohelpless targets. So whoever involves into the war will not escapeThe tragic love between Henry and Catherine reveals thatfrom the tragic fate. As a nurse in the war, without any exception,Catherine's fate is much like:the wound, both mental and physical, inficted on the young by“The ants on the buming log swarmed out and went first to-that absurd war can hardly be healed. The reasons why Cather-wards the center where the fire was, then turmed back and runine's fate is a doomed lragedy are, in my opinion, very complexand profound.towards the end. When there were enough on the end they fell ofinto the fire. Some got out, their bodies bumt and flattened, and2 Analyze the Causes of Catherine's Tragedywent off not knowing where they were going. But most of themCatherine's tragedy is B0 profound and rich that its causeswent toward the fire and then back toward the end and swarmedare also quite complex. Now I will probe them from three aspects:on the cool end and finally fell off into the fire." (Hemingway8ociely ;Catherine '8 character;and the author himself.230)2.1 The social causesThese are the best ilustrations of Catherine's fate. So wecan see that Catherine's tragedy is not the individuals' tragedy,2.1.1 World War I obvously brings death as an everydaybut the tragedy of life, the tragedy of society, which is caused byoccurrencethe war."Henry, like so many young men of the American Midwest, isbored, and waiting for some chance of adventure, for“winning2.2 The causes of ber characterhis spurs" in a situation that will combine glory with danger. ToAs we know, Catherine's character is another cause of hersearch for idealism and objectives, Henry joins in the WW1. Buttragedy.the monotonous death of trench warfare and the mounting casual-2.2.1 As a heroineties in senseless attacks and counterattacks destroy his dream,Catherine poses a courageous and selr-acrificed figure toThe generals have very lttle notion of how to use their ownour understanding. Catherine not only helps Henry recover, buttroops eficiently. Even they treat their own troops us cattle. Sol-gives him the love, the true love, even the meaning and value ofdiers are there to die; that is their function. The war, in short, haslife. Like other commanders, Henry seeks pleasure to kill time.been reduced to an insane corpse-factory. (Coopemman 26), TheEven he considers their love as a game:bittermess breaks all holy values into pieces in his heart. No“I knew I did not love Catherine Barkley nor had any ideawander that Henry says,“... I had seen nothing sacred, and theof loving her. This was a game, like bridge, in which you saidthings that were glorious had no glory and the sacrifices were likethings instead of playing cards. Like bridge you had to pretendthe stockyards at Chicago if nothing was done with the meat ex-you were playing for money or playing for some stakes." (Hem-cept to bury it. (Hemingway 129).ingway 20) The world has always been chaos before the war, butNot only his mood of anti-war, but also the resentment,afterwards these expatriates have no energy or desire to even at-hatred, depression. and despair of young generation after they aretempt to find identity. Love is a deceptive game and empty peo-cheated. Thus , idealim and patriotism become hollow concepts.ple are in search for interests in sex and in drunkenness and inThe wound in them from the war destroys theirs confidence andhypoeritical human relationships.hope of future living. So when Henry leaves the war, he will loseAfter Henry is wounded, Catherine nurses him like a moth-the chance for manhood and "asertion of will" which he has be-er, and he recovers immediately, which makes Henry feel solieved that the war will provide. Henry is left in a world strippedpleased and happy that he can't see her there, he is feeling lone-of all meanings, a world which threats not only his life, but alsoly and hollow. This change exposes him to a world basedthe very essence of his manhood, And when he turs to Catherineues of commitment, tendemess, and service, values that has beenBarkley to seek for the true love, the tragedy is doomed. Henryabsent from his life before he meets her. Just as the priest oncenot only represents the young Hemingway, but also probably rep-told him,“ when you love you wish to do things for. You wish toresents the young Americans who search for values in the war.sacrifice for. You wish to serve. "(Hemingway 51)中国煤化工MHCNMH G收稿日期:2011-07-06修回日期:2011-08-02作者简介:因鹏(1979-),男,陕西汉中人,英语教师,学士,主要研究方向为英语教育。.234■ 申脑 文化研克年。本栏目责任编辑:桶莘事2011年11月Overseas English 海外葬语What Catherine has said reveals the highest apex of love.shadow to many things, such as love, mary, family.. .Without herThat is to say love unies against the blows of life, and the spiritdeath, Henry cannot have a piece of mind to think about theand physical, even at the departure. This signifies that Henry hasworld and the life. It is sbe who provides a perfect complement totaken the final step in his remarkable growth from authoritativethe atitude of Henry. It is she who makes a noteworthy contribu-spotter of conventional wisdom to understale. It is Catherine whoion to the Hemmingway doctrine about life and deah and theteaches Henry to be a faithful man from a lost playboy. Thus Hen-world. So Catherine's tragedy is an artistic exhibition of his style.ny finds the real value and meaning of love, And in many ways,2.3.2 The hidden causes of the femaleCatherine prepares to devote herself, whatever the cost, to the ide-Almost all the female in Hemingway's novels can't escapeal of love. Obviously her love speeds up her death gradually.from the tragic fate. There are two reasons why Hemingway has a2.2.2 Love as a dominant idealdeep prejudice on female instead of male. He thinks that womenThe love makes Henry forget all, even the wound. Alsoare the scourges. the biggest calamity of his pain.Catherine provides a perfect complement to the atitude of deathto Henry. Facing the death, Catherine says,who not only decides her children's future according to her own"I'm not afraid, I just hate it" (Hemingway 222)standard, but also forces his father suicide. Such an unhappy"I'm not a bit afraid. It's just a dirty trick." (Hemingwaychildhood injured him deeply all the lifelong. So he hates his233)mother. Since then, he hates all women whuever they are good orGradually, Heny begin to know life is impossible to con-quer and death is the ultimate end of the struggle. Catherinesure, but the more is pain. So, in order to show“grace under thelikewise expresses another key idea in Hemingway: one mustpresure'，he has to write the female in tragedy to compensatekeep physical courage and a stoical stance when facing death.his pain by the women. Cowley said, “His heroines live in aShe is willing to sacrifice herself for love and makes Henry hap-world that is like a hostile forest, full of unseen dangers. Deathpy. This is exactly the stance of the“ Hemingway Hero." Thus,spies on them from behind every tree” (Klibbe 41). Thus lragedyHemingway hero brings back to life completely. Meanwhile, it isis the author's artistic means as well as the limitation of hisshe who pushes herself at the edge of death. Hemingway thinksthought. It is Hemingway who causes Catherine's tragedy.that if people bring much courage to the world, they have to be3 Conclusiondestroyed. The world forces people to submit and lets anyone sub-From above, we can see that society, Catherine's character,mit, and destroys any one who can not be submitted (Liu 75).. Ac-cording to the code of Hemingway, Henry must see everything innd the author lead to Catherine's tragedy. Death, in a basicterms of the simple and elementary. Catherine's existence threatssense, is the end of life, the ultimate honesty, and the final "fact"which cant be falsified or cheated. So almost all the people con-the chance for manhood and assertion of will. So she has to disap-sider death as“completely be destroyed," while Hemingwaypear, She becomes what the war itself should have been and is not;an instrument by means of which the“Hemingway hero”assertsgives up the (raditional code, thinking that death is the end ofhis masculine role. Catherine herself hardly exists at all; she offerslife for those who throw themselves in the emotion and life. Cer-to become whatever you are. She becomes what Edmund Wilsontainly Hemingway considers life to be a perpetual struggle againsta universe whose essential quality is one of irational destruc-alls“Hemingway's amoeba woman" (Cooperman 260).tions, of violence without meanings. He affimms the various hu~2.3 The causes of the authorman efforts and human dignity and courage to accept and sur-Besides ，the author himself prefers to write women in amount death. He emphasizes the aloneness of the hero and thetragic fate. And Catherine's tragic fate comes from Hemingway'solitary effort to achieve identity. That is to say death is anothertragic version on world and life as a master of the lost generation.form of living So "Catherine's death leads Henry to the highestThe theme of tragedy is the production of his special culure psy-peak of lfe--the meaning of life is not to be found in death or lifechology.itself, but rather in the struygle itself. Whatever the condition is,23.1 The tragic lite valueone should suvive in the struggle, keep grace in the struggle"The two things have a deep efect on Hemingway. One is his(Zhou 34). This is what Hemingway wants to tell us. It is just thefather's suicide, which brings him a big horror in his heart. Hehigh aesthetic value and artistic harm of tragedy.can't understand such an unusual death for a long time. 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