盖斯凯尔夫人的小说《南方与北方》中生态意识的觉醒
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硕士学位论文
II
Since the nineteenth century, industrialization and urbanization in Britain have
not solely accelerated technological innovation and wealth accumulation, but also
aggravated such conflicts as environmental crisis, class hostility and gender
discrimination. Mrs. Gaskell’s novel North and South distinctly reveals such problems
and sends out a foresighted ecological appeal for a harmonious world. For a long time,
however, critics focus their commentary of this novel on such themes as class
relations, alienation of commodity, gender inversion as well as religion, family and
death. Most of these researches are carried out separately, with no sufficient regard to
the innate relationship between various social crises and environmental crisis, and the
novel’s inherent ecological consciousness still remains beyond the critical horizons.
The cognition about Mrs. Gaskell’s creative achievements has yet to be deepened.
This thesis, based on previous and current commentary, makes an attempt at exploring
the awakening of ecological consciousness throughout the novel.
The central viewpoint of this thesis is that an ecological consciousness in North
and South awakens in the threefold adversity of environmental, labor-relation and
gender-relation crises. Environmental crisis keeps eroding human health;
labor-relation crisis devastates social stability; gender-relation crisis deprives
women’s basic equality and freedom. The triple crises are intricately related and
mutually influenced, which makes the ecological problems even more complex.
However, the roots of all these crises — anthropocentricism, hierarchal dualism and
androcentricism — are homologous and can be traced to the conception of
dominations, namely, human domination of nature, masters’ domination of workers
and male dominant of female. With a serious concern about various crises, the novel
actively explores a solution and conveys a strong appeal for a reformed ecological
relationship through a detailed description about three ecological transformations. In
the first place, the fictional scene turns from the southern village Helstone to the
northern industrial city Milton, which is not only a geographical but an environmental
conversion. The serious environmental crisis and survival predicaments in Milton
make a sharp contrast with the peaceful wilderness and agrarian life in Helstone. This
contrast implicates a strong aspiration for the restoration of human’s harmony with
nature. With the worsening environment, the dualistic opposition between masters and
workers gets sharp and class hostility intensified, but the novel, through the
reconciliation between Higgins and Thornton, molds a great transformation of
labor-relations from hostility to mutuality and coexistence, which can be seen as an
硕士学位论文
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appeal for the harmony between two classes. Intertwined with the previous two
transformations, female identity also experiences an evident shift from subordination
to equality. Margaret Hale grows from a domestic girl into a full member of her
community with equal dignity and independence. It is, therefore, an appeal for the
harmony between two genders. To summarize, the novel authentically conveys the
awakening of ecological consciousness in such territories as human-nature relations,
labor relations and gender-identity relations, and finally appeals for a harmonious
world characterized by equality, mutuality and symbiosis.
The thesis explains the causation of ecological consciousness in North and South
with reference to the theory of eco-criticism and the whole demonstration is based on
textual analysis. It fully investigates the root causes underneath various crises with an
analysis of their manifestations, and attentively explores the ecological concern,
ecological wisdom, and ecological demands inherent in the novel by examining its
triple transformations. It is the inherent ecological consciousness that makes the novel
once again show its vitality in most newly-industrialized countries even one and a half
centuries after its publication. Up to now, this consciousness gradually comes to
maturity and perfection, and ultimately constitutes a set of moral principles to conduct
people’s behavior in the process of industrialization, because only with reference to
these values can human evade going astray and successfully build up a harmonious
world. In the meantime, to make a more objective and comprehensive understanding
of Mrs. Gaskell’ creative achievements, it is also necessary to further an ecological
inquiry of her industrial novels.
Key Words: North and South; ecological consciousness; awakening; eco-criticism
摘要
硕士学位论文
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十九世纪以来，英国工业化和城镇化不仅加快了技术革新和财富积累，同时
也加深了环境危机、阶级对立和性别歧视等矛盾。盖斯凯尔夫人的小说《南方与
北方》突出地反映了这些问题，并且发出一种在当时具有先见之明的诉求——构
建和谐世界的生态诉求。然而长期以来，评论界对于这部小说的研究多集中在阶
级关系、商品异化、性别越位以及宗教、家庭、死亡等主题上。评论家主要是针
对其中某个方面单独开展研究，尚未对各种社会危机和环境危机之间的内在关系
给予足够关注。小说所蕴含的生态意识还没有得到充分挖掘。对盖斯凯尔夫人创
作成就的认识还有待深化。本文将在先前和当前相关研究的基础上，探讨贯穿于
这部小说中的生态意识觉醒问题。
本文的核心观点是：《南方与北方》中的生态意识觉醒于环境危机、劳资关
系危机和性别关系危机的三重困境之中。其中，环境危机持续侵蚀着人类健康；
阶级关系危机破坏了社会稳定；性别关系危机剥夺了女性基本的平等和自由权
利。三重危机相互交织、相互影响，使得生态问题更加复杂化。然而，这些危机
的根源——人类中心主义、阶级二元对立和男性中心主义——都是同源的，均可
追溯到一种支配观念，即人对自然的支配、厂主对工人的支配以及男性对女性的
支配。小说严正关注各种危机，积极探索解决危机的途径，通过详细描述三种生
态转向，强烈呼吁人与自然之间、人与人之间应建立一种新的生态关系。首先是
故事场景由南方乡村赫尔斯通转向北方工业重镇米尔顿。这种转向不仅是地理位
置上的转变，而且是生态环境的转变。米尔顿严重的环境危机和生存困境与赫尔
斯通那种和平安宁的荒野和农耕生活形成了鲜明对照。这种对照暗含了一种复归
人与自然和谐关系的强烈愿望。随着环境的恶化，劳资之间的二元对立尖锐化，
阶级仇视进一步加剧，但小说通过描写希金斯和桑顿的和解，塑造了一种由仇视
对抗向相依共存关系的转化。这一转化可被视为小说寻求两个阶级和谐共处的一
种诉求。同时，女性身份也经历着一个由从属地位向平等地位转变的过程，并与
以上两种转向交织在一起。玛格丽特·希尔从一个大门不出的女孩成长为一个成
熟的社区成员，并拥有了平等的尊严和独立的人格。这便成为一种对建立两性之
间平等和谐关系的诉求。总之，小说在人与自然的关系、劳资关系和性别身份关
系三个层面上真实地表达了一种生态意识的觉醒，并最终呼吁建立一个以平等、
相依、共生为特征的和谐世界。
本文运用相关生态批评理论对《南方与北方》中的生态意识的因果关系进行
了解释，整个论证立足文本分析：在分析各种危机表现的基础上，充分挖掘危机
的根源；通过考察三种转向深入探讨小说所蕴含的生态关怀、生态智慧、和生态
诉求。正是蕴含于其中的这种生态意识才使得这部小说在一个半世纪以后的新兴
工业国家重新彰显活力。迄今为止，这一意识已经逐渐走向成熟和完善，并且最
硕士学位论文
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终形成一套道德原则，以指导人们在工业化进程中的行为，因为只有用生态价值
观作指导，人类才能避免误入歧途，从而构建起和谐世界。同时，若要对盖斯凯
尔夫人的创作成就作出更加客观全面的认识，也必须不断深化对其工业小说的生
态探究。
关键词：《南方与北方》；生态意识；觉醒；生态批评
Contents
硕士学位论文
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Introduction ………………………………………………………………………….1
Chapter 1 Industrialization and Ecological Crises………………………………...8
1.1 Environmental Crisis…………........................................................................8
1.2 Labor-relation Crisis…................................................................................12
1.3 Gender-relation Crisis ………………………………………………….......15
Chapter 2 The Awakening of Natural Ecological Consciousness………………..17
2.1 The Roots of Environmental Crisis…………................................................17
2.2 The Transformation from Agrarian South to Industrial North.......................19
2.3 An Appeal for the Harmony between Human and Nature…………………22
Chapter 3 The Awakening of Class Ecological Consciousness …………………..26
3.1 The Roots of Labor-relation Crisis…….........................................................26
3.2 The Transformation from Hostility to Reconciliation……............................28
3.3 An Appeal for the Harmony between Two Classes ………………………33
Chapter 4 The Awakening of Gender Ecological Consciousness...………………36
4.1 The Roots of Gender-relation Crisis…………...............................................36
4.2 The Transformation from Subordination to Equality…………….................38
4.3 An Appeal for the Harmony between Two Genders………………………47
Chapter 5 An Appeal for Reconstruction of Ecological Harmony………….........50
5.1 Reconstruction of Ecological Concepts…….................................................51
5.2 Reconstruction of a Harmonious World …………………………………53
Conclusion………………...........................................................................................56
Bibliography………………………………………………………………………...58
硕士学位论文
VII
硕士学位论文
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Introduction
The nineteenth century saw dramatic social changes along with the process of
industrialization in England. Traditional agrarian production was gradually pushed aside
by the rapid-expanding industrial production. Peaceful rural life gave way to oppressing
urban life and the original ecological system collapsed thereafter. Industrialization and
urbanization not merely accelerated economic development and wealth accumulation
but also aggravated such conflicts as environmental deterioration, class hostility and
gender bias. These triple crises are intricately connected with each other and further
deepen the complexity of ecological crises. Mrs. Gaskell’s novel North and South
faithfully reflects these ecological problems and sends out a world-stirring appeal－an
ecological appeal for reconstructing a harmonious ecosystem, characterized by equality,
mutuality and symbiosis.
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell (1810-1865), one of the renowned Victorian industrial
novelists in England, exquisitely produced a series of works, covering a large scope.
According to Edgar Wright’s classification, Mrs. Gaskell, in her twenty-year writing
career, created altogether “seven novels, five novelettes, twenty-two short stories,
eleven articles or essays, a major biography, two prefaces, and a poem” (Nickel, 1974:
6). Among them, Mary Barton (1848), Ruth (1853) and North and South (1855) are
generally regarded as her typical social-problem novels in “the context of the shift from
a rural to an urban society” (Shelston, 2005: vii). North and South, the third full-length
novel, was firstly published as a serial in Dickens’s Household Words between
September 1854 and January 1855, and later in volume form. It was given the title
North and South by Charles Dickens, though its original title was “Margaret Hale”,
named after its heroine. The phrase “North and South” originates from Nicholas
Higgins’ word “North and South has both met and made kind o’ friends in this big
smoky place” ①(Gaskell, 2005: 67) in Chapter VIII of the first volume. Comparatively,
this title has a broader sense, for it “juxtaposes the new northern industrialism with the
traditional rural environment of the South” (Shelston, 2005: xi), and vividly manifests
an ecological transformation from the pastoral Helstone, a world of harmony between
human and nature, to the polluted Milton, a world of environmental disasters. For a long
①Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, North and South, 1855. North and South: An Authoritative Text Context Criticism.
Ed. Alan Shelston. (New York and London: W.W. Norton and Company, 2005), pp. 1-395. In this thesis, every direct
quotation of novel’s text is from this book. Later when such textual quotation appears, only the page number will be
marked.
硕士学位论文
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time since its publication, however, critical attentions have always been concentrated on
one or several aspects of the novel, ranging from class relations, alienation of
commodity and gender conversion to religion, family and death. Most of the criticisms
explore these problems separately, without regard to the correlations between the
environmental problems and social problems concerning gender and class dimensions.
The ecological consciousness behind the correlations has been neglected. This thesis
attempts to investigate the awakening of such a consciousness in Mrs. Gaskell’s North
and South with reference to the related theory of eco-criticism.
Ecological consciousness, though not directly mentioned by Mrs. Gaskell in her
novel, deeply penetrates her novel text. Here “at Milton the chimneys smoked, the
ceaseless roar and mighty beat, and dizzying whirl of machinery, struggled and strove
perpetually” (379). Every thing in this industrial city is in “endless labors”; strong
crowds are always “busy and restless”; “few loiterers” walk in the street “with pleasure”;
everywhere is permeated with “fierce and avidity” and “deep selfishness of
competition” and there is “gloom over the town” (379). Here we see the rupture
between human and nature, the distorted interpersonal relations and unhealthy life style.
Such detailed descriptions distinctly show her great concern about the environmental
crisis and survival conditions in Milton. It is the anti-ecological phenomena that awaken
the latent ecological consciousness. The word “consciousness” is a “derivative of the
Latin conscientia”, firstly used by “Ralph Cudworth in his True Intellectual System of
the Universe (1678)” (Heinamaa, 2007: 6). Neil Manson regards it as “an epistemic
notion: a broad synonym for knowledge, or awareness.” ①Jill L. Matus once
comments on North and South in terms of “grief, shock and psychic pain” (Matus, 2007:
3). The ecological consciousness to be explored in this thesis includes not merely
natural eco-consciousness but class and gender eco-consciousness. Ecological theory
examines the ecosystem as a whole and regards human as an integral part of the system.
“Ecology (from Greek oîkos, "house"; -λογία, -logia, study of) is the scientific study
of … life and the interactions between organisms and their natural environment.” ②In
1978, a new term “Eco-criticism” (or Ecocriticism), was coined by William Rueckert.
According to Cheryll Glotfelty, eco-criticism negotiates “between human and
nonhuman” and “expands the notion of ‘the world’ to include the entire ecosphere”
(Glotfelty, 1996: xix). Greg Garrard gives his widest definition of the subject of
①Neil Manson, “Contemporary Naturalism and the Concept of Consciousness”, Consciousness: From Perception to
Reflection in the History of Philosophy. Eds. Sara Heinamaa et al. (Springer. 2007), p. 288.
②Michael Begon et al., Ecology: From individuals to ecosystems (4th ed.), (Blackwell: 2006). Also see
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecology#cite_note-0, 2009-10-26.>
硕士学位论文
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eco-criticism －“the study of the relationship of the human and the non-human,
throughout human cultural history and entailing critical analysis of the term ‘human’
itself” (Garrard, 2004: 5). Kate Rigby generally sees eco-criticism “incorporates a
concern with questions of gender, ‘race’ and class” (Rigby, 2006: 163). It is definite that
ecological theory not only adjusts human-nature relations but more and more penetrates
the territory of human-human relations. It contends that there is no domination or
hierarchy in universe and all species should be treated equally and live harmoniously
within the ecosystem. There are several branches of ecological theory such as deep
ecology, eco-feminism and social ecology. They all advocate the symbiosis and
interdependence of the species including human beings and challenge all such ruling
relationships as racialism, gender bias, class oppression and over-exploitation of nature.
The awakening of ecological consciousness always accompanies environmental
crisis in the industrialization. The story of North and South involves a transformation
from Helstone in the agrarian south to Milton in the industrial north. Helstone is a
pastoral village where local residents enjoy a peaceful and healthy life. Everywhere in
the rural area is a picture of the original harmony of human with nature. In Milton,
however, urban dwellers are suffering from the unprecedented environmental crisis,
including serious air pollution, water pollution and deterioration of general living
condition. It is common to see those “many-windowed” factories keep “puffing out
black ‘unparliamentary’ smoke”, and the whole city is shrouded with a terrible cloud
“which Margaret ha[s] taken to foretell rain” (55). This condition in turn causes various
respiratory and infectious diseases which keep eroding public health and lead to
widespread death. Bessy Higgins dies of lung disease, seriously damaged by the fluff in
her workshop. Mrs. Hale gets much frailer since her migration from Helstone to Milton
and dies soon after. Sequentially, Mr. hale dies of heartbreak and over-weariness of his
life. Everywhere in Milton is a shadow of death. Numerous victims of the
environmental deterioration seek in vain for an escape from this human inferno. It is a
voiceless appeal for the symbiosis and harmony of human with nature.
Survival crisis arouses people to review the mode of industrial production and
compels them to reexamine the root cause of such a catastrophe. Urban residents
painfully feel an unprecedented fracture or dualistic opposition, which appears between
human and nature. They not merely lose their wholesome environment but their
spiritual homestead, which never fails to console their soul every time they feel painful
and oppressed. Without Mother Nature, there can’t be beauty or emotional development.
硕士学位论文
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It is human’s plundering-like exploitation of nature that violates the original ecological
balance. To seek maximum profit, factory owners unlimitedly expand production and
open up new markets at all costs. They totally disregard the supporting capacity of
environment, leaving the city heavily polluted. Just as John Thornton says, Milton
industrialists choose to “give up its cleanliness” (76) for economic profits. This is the
concentrated embodiment of anthropocentric dualism. Dualism can be seen as “an
alienated form of differentiation, in which power construes and constructs differences in
terms of an inferior and alien realm” (Plumwood, 1993, 42). Industrialists, accordingly,
justify the inferiority of nature in their mind and define the relation between human and
nature as exploiter and the exploited. They only see nature’s instrumental value for
mankind but ignore the wholeness of ecosystem. Deep ecology, however, lays emphasis
on the value of ecosystem and “identifies the anthropocentric dualism human/nature as
the ultimate source of anti-ecological beliefs and practices” (Garrard, 2004: 23). Factory
owners in Milton are only content with their victory over nature but totally forget that
such a victory is always followed by nature’s retaliation. It is the misconception of
anthropocentricism that conducts their misdeeds, which in turn brings about survival
catastrophe. Environmental crisis ultimately stems from human’s arrogance and
ignorance, and aggravates all other crises such as labor-relation conflicts and gender
bias in human world.
Labor-relation crisis is never independent of environmental crisis. The biggest
victims of the crisis are always those disadvantaged mass, represented by the majority
of mill workers in Milton. Extreme poverty has laid a heavy burden on their shoulders.
Severe environmental crisis further makes most of them suffer from various respiratory
diseases. With the double pressures, they can do nothing but depend on the mercy of
their mill owners or wait for death. The owners, however, mainly care about their gain
or loss in the fierce trade competition, which forces them to drive down the wages of
industrial workers. Therefore, the conflict between employers and employees gets
severely aggravated and hostility intensified. Moreover, alienation is another direct
consequence of large-scale mechanization production. In the workshop, all workers are
treated as machinery “hands” rather than full human beings, completely losing their
freedom and independence. In the eyes of factory owners, workers are no more than the
pats of machines, and at the same time, the slaves of their entire business machinery. It
is impossible for them to enjoy equality or dignity in industrial production. Apart from
hostility and confrontation, there can hardly be any effective communication between
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硕士学位论文IISincethenineteenthcentury,industrializationandurbanizationinBritainhavenotsolelyacceleratedtechnologicalinnovationandwealthaccumulation,butalsoaggravatedsuchconflictsasenvironmentalcrisis,classhostilityandgenderdiscrimination.Mrs.Gaskell’snovelNorthandSouthdistinctlyrevealssuchproblemsandsen...
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作者：李江
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时间：2024-09-20
