浅析《月亮与六便士》中艺术家与大众文化的矛盾_英语论文

The Conflict Between Artist And Mass Culture In The Moon And Sixpence

摘要

《月亮与六便士》是英国小说家威廉·萨默塞特·毛姆最著名的文学作品之一。该部小说成书于1919年，以自法国印象派画家保罗·高更的真实经历为素材，从第三人称的视角描绘了一个令人惊异的故事：一名原本平凡的伦敦股票经纪人在中年之时突然着了魔，决心背弃自己原本乏味但无虑的生活，抛妻弃子，不顾一切地前往异乡追寻自己成为画家的梦想。

在这部小说中，以斯特里克兰德为典型的艺术家及其代表的精英文化与书中其他人物和对应的大众文化产生了巨大的冲突，比如对于现实和理想的平衡、对于艺术表现形式的追求、面对冲突的态度等。在小说所创作的20世纪初期，这些冲突以激烈的形式所存在，不管是斯特里克兰德所代表的艺术家还是大众文化都无法接受和容纳对方，这也造成了书中斯特里克兰德为他所追寻的新艺术的出走以及世人对他的鄙夷和唾弃。20世纪后，随着市场经济的发展和享乐主义观念深入人心，精英文化的生存土壤和受众逐渐被追求娱乐化和消费化的大众文化所取代。因此，在20世纪后，西方艺术文化领域以及艺术家们面临着一个如何在大众文化和新的文化表现形式的“围剿”下重新定义自己、传播自己、最终革新自己的问题。本文旨在基于《月亮与六便士》的文本对其中以斯特里克兰德为代表的艺术家和大众文化之间的激烈冲突进行总结和分析；根据小说中所表现出来的两者之间的矛盾，结合20世纪前后西方的社会变革和文化发展趋势，对于20世纪前后艺术家和其代表的精英文化与大众文化之间的关系及其中的变化进行总结和原因分析；最后，本文将通过总结当今精英文化与大众文化的融合方式，就艺术家与大众文化间的良性互助机制给出建议，希望对今后涉及此领域的研究提供借鉴。

关键词：矛盾；艺术家；大众文化；融合；

Abstract

The Moon and Sixpence is one of the most famous masterpieces of British novelist William Somerset Maugham. Finished in 1919, the novel was adapted from the true life experience of French impressionistic painter Paul Gauguin and depicted an astonishing story: an ordinary stockbroker in London decides to abandon his bland but carefree life and leaves for strange cities to chase his dream of becoming an artist at all costs at a middle age out of a sudden. 

In the novel, artists represented by Strickland greatly collide with other characters and the mass culture. Among those conflicts, the balance between dream and reality, the pursuit for different artistic presentations, and attitudes towards conflicts are typical ones. In the early 20th century when the novel was born, those conflicts seemed to be irreconcilable and neither artists nor mass culture was willing to accept and embrace each other, which is why Strickland chose to leave the secular society for the new art in his mind and was refused by the society. After the 20th century, with the development of market economy and the popularity of hedonism, the audience of elite culture gradually faded away and followers of mass culture rose. Thus, after the 20th century, western artistic and cultural field is facing a problem of redefining, spreading, and reforming itself under the shadow of mass culture and new artistic presentations. This paper aims to summarize and analyze the sharp conflicts between Strickland and mass culture based on The Moon and Sixpence; furthermore, according to those conflicts portrayed in the novel and combining the social reformation and the tendency of cultural development around the 20th century, an summary of the relationship between artists and mass culture and its changes will be given; last, the paper is going to give suggestions for benign interactive mechanism based on contemporary emerging way of elite culture and mass culture, hoping to provide a reference for later studies in this aspect.

Key Words: conflict; artist; mass culture; merging 

Contents

Acknowledgements 3

摘要 4

Abstract 5

Introduction 7

Chapter One The conflicts between Strickland and mass culture 14

1.1 The conflicts between Strickland and the civil society 14

1.2 The conflict between Strickland and the traditional form of artistic presentation 16

1.3 Strickland’s and others’ ways to deal with conflicts 17

Chapter Two The relationship between artists and mass culture after the 20th century 17

2.1 the relationship between Strickland and the mass culture in the novel 17

2.2 The rising of the mass culture and the recession of elite culture in the 20th century 18

2.3 The relationship between artists and the mass culture after the 20th century 20

Chapter Three The merging of artists and the mass culture 20

3.1 The emerging of Strickland and the mass culture in the novel 20

3.2 The contemporary merging way of artists and the mass culture 21

Conclusion 23

Bibliography 25