[Abstract] This paper attempts to explore the novel The Thor(4)
2013-08-04 01:10
导读：If the days were long and bitter with a sense of failure, she must bear it in silence. She was one of those people whose feelings were so intense they became unbearable, unlivable, and her lesson had
“If the days were long and bitter with a sense of failure, she must bear it in silence…. She was one of those people whose feelings were so intense they became unbearable, unlivable, and her lesson had been a harsh one. For almost twenty-five years she had been crushing emotion out of existence, and she was convinced that in the end persistence would succeed.”[14]
Therefore, there is no doubt that Frank’s father is her longest spine, for her life loses colors without him. The love between her and him is so transient, yet she puts in all her life for it. She knows that Paddy hasn’t been the man of her choice, but a better man than Paddy never lives. The moment she hears that Paddy died unexpectedly in the fire, she suddenly senses that she loves him, like all of her life. But it is too late for him, and too late for her, as she has wallowed in the former delusion so long and leaves it too late. Finally, she chooses to get herself under that iron control once more, as if she is determined to elongate her periods of darkness until the light shires no more in her lifetime. She is really a very unhappy woman who cannot live with the man she loves, and loses the man who loves her. But on the other hand, she is somewhat lucky, for she has loved someone, and been loved by someone.
When Meggie gives birth to Justine, she has gone through death and life, which implies that Justine will be out of the ordinary, will never be Meggie’s , Luke’s or anyone else’s, and will always belong to herself. Compared with her mother and her grandmother, Justine lives in a new age, and is more enlightened than them. What’s more, she has her own life style that she will not like to have changed by others, which usually cannot be understood by her family. In Drogheda, Dane gets far more emotion from the family, especially their mother than Justine, who thinks she will never love anyone and need other’s love. But actually she longs for love in her heart of hearts, and the reason she pretends to be indifferent to love is that she is terrified of committing herself to the kind of love which marriage will entail. She only chooses to stand on the stage to make her full emotions release. However, because of her younger brother Dane’s death, she plunges into a helplessness and distress, which urges her to recognize herself again and to reflect how to treat her life again. Finally, she becomes brave to confront and accept her love and her lover Rainer. Although her final is not a tragedy as her mother’s, her experience of searching for love also shows that the best is only bought at the cost of great pain.
中国大学排名 2.3 Meggie’s noble faith
In the story about The Thorn Birds, women do not want to submit themselves to men’s authority and old customs. They do their utmost to strive for their faith. As the thorn birds, their faith is love; as the thorn birds which sing just once in their life, these women love only once in their life. They will not like to change their faith and they appeal to men for understanding and valuing their love. No matter how difficult and painful the experiences will be, they do not care at all. They also believe that the real happiness comes after the extremely suffering experiences. They have the same faith, and love occupies their dream for all their life, but they treat their faith with different attitudes and pursue their love with different behaviors. Meggie does not ruin her faithful lover that she cannot get as Mary does; she does not just keep waiting for her hopeless lover as her mother Fiona does; she is not too timid to accept her lover as her daughter Justine is. Therefore, Mary’s love is selfish, for she kills her lover’s love ruthlessly; Fiona’s love is passive, for she just lives in the past, leading a hopeless and lonely life; Justine’s love is fainthearted, for she cannot be brave enough to bear the expectation of love. But Meggie pursues her faith indefatigably and sublimates her love to the utmost. Her happiness is based on her anguish. The more sorrowful she is, the happier she will feel. Actually, Meggie’s pursuit of love is the strongest, and her voice is the most moving and tragic.
2.4 Meggie’s influence on the other women in The Thorn Birds
As a member of the Clearys, Meggie actually affects the other three women unconsciously in her family. When Ralph introduces Meggie to her, Mary instantaneously discerns that Ralph is infatuated with Meggie, which is intolerable to her. She senses that she must lose Ralph to Meggie, but she wants to make sure that Meggie doesn’t get Ralph, either. So she decides to change her former will, of which Paddy is the beneficiary. It’s Meggie that makes her change her lover’s fate. Meggie is the only girl of Fiona, but Fiona does not envy her or pity her. She thinks that a daughter is just a reminder of the pain and she tries to forget that she has a daughter. However, with little maternal love, Meggie always spreads her angelical love to others. She loves her family, loves her brothers, loves her children, loves her friends, and loves Ralph. What she has done really makes Fiona change her former attitude to Meggie. Her manner toward Meggie becomes tempered with respect and affection. In some way, she admires and adores her daughter for Meggie’s humanities and noble faith. As Meggie’s daughter, Justine has a quite different personality from her mother. It’s difficult for her to accept her mother’s philosophy. When her mother advises her to marry,
