摘要：2007 年诺贝尔文学奖得主、英国女作家多丽丝?莱辛的小说《另外那个女人》,成功塑造了一个在生活和情感中备受煎熬的女性形象。本文以人物形象为切入点,探究小说中造成女主人公陷入困境的成因，并希望在两性关系的问题上获得一定的启迪。
关键词：孤独，另外那个女人，独立，和谐
Abstract:Doris Lessing won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2007.Her novel“The Other Woman”has successfully portrayed a female figure that undergoes deep emotional crisis and inner conflict in daily life.This paper aims to interpret the heroine of the novel so as to explore the underlying causes for the dilemma she is in and seek for enlightenment about the relationship between male and female from it in some ways.
Key words:loneliness; the other woman; independent, harmony
中图分类号：I561文献标识码：A文章编号：1006-026X（2012）02-0000-02
I.Introduction
In 2007, Doris Lessing won the Nobel Prize in Literature.She is described by the Swedish Academy as “that epicist of the female experience, who with scepticism, fire and visionary power has subjected a divided civilisation to scrutiny”.Lessing is the eleventh woman and the oldest person ever to win the Literature Prize.
Doris Lessing has been called an African writer, a political writer, a space fiction writer, a mystic writer, and a feminist writer.Despite her wide literary scope, her interest in placing the individual against history to universalize the human experience ties together her more than 40 novels and collections of short stories and essays.Writing in simple, eloquent prose, Lessing frames women?s psychology, domestic relations, and personal transformations with the violence of colonialism, racism, social upheaval, and planetary warfare.The Other Woman is one of the five stories in Five Short Novels written in the year of 1953, and Lessing was awarded The Somerset Maugham Award by the story collection.
The protagonist of The Other Woman is a working girl of lower class in London by the name of Rose.The story presents us her daily life, work and love experiences, during which she finds out the truth that she herself is the unscrupulous woman in other people?s eyes after she has co-habited with her lover-Jimmie for some time.After many a times of persuading him to divorce his wife, she is conceived that he would never make a decision unless she does it for him, therefore she writes a letter to invite his wife to come and have a discussion on it.As the truth is revealed to Rose, she chooses to leave Jimmie and goes to live with Jimmie?s wife.This paper aims to interprete the causes of Rose?s dilemma in life, and love through the portrait of the heroine.
Ⅱ.A Solitary Soul
“Rose?s mother was killed one morning crossing the street to do her shopping.” (Doris Lessing 71)After hearing of the news, Rose does not break down at once and goes into hysterics as is imagined by others, rather she seems to be rather composed in an unatural way.At that time, she thinks of no one who can come to her assistance, including her father and her former engaged lover- George.Thus we can declare she is lonely in front of tragedy.
After the death of her mother, Rose takes the responsibility of looking after her father, who is, in George?s words, “(he?s) just like a big baby”.(Doris Lessing 73)She undertakes the bereavement and buries her great anguish at the bottom of her heart, so as not to disturb her father.The moment her mother is dead, she tears down all the pictures and makes radical adjustments to suit her taste.It is also a sign that she can not exert all her thoughts and imaginations to make her mother accept them, for her mother can not even understand her on many aspects.
As for George, though Rose and him are supposed to get married if everything goes smoothly as imagined before, as a matter of fact, they are not suitable in nature or on principals.It is proved that George is calllous and indiffident to the suffering and pain that Rose is going through, and regardless of her present feelings on family and marriage after the accident.Later, as she once admits to Jimmie that he is the first man that she loves, which means that she does not believe that the love between she and George is a gunuine one.To her disppointment, George equals her to those people of caparious characteristics, obviously, she is lonely and deemed as a mystery to others all the way for years.
Ⅲ.Insecurity
Rose feels unsafe unsafe throughout the story, for her, it is not easy to come to terms with life, which means death and destitution to her.Her mother?s sudden death triggers off her fear and fright of life.Saving money is the only hope that she can find security with against the terrible and changeable life in reality.She becomes very thin in shape and pale in the face, which does not suit her age because of years of labour.And she would not take her father?s suggestion of giving up her work, and continue to work to support her father and herself, which is a reflection of her feelings of insecure feeling for life.
Unfortunely, not long before the war ends, Rose?s father is killed in the bomb, and her house is in a horribly dangerous situation, however, she would rather stay at her own home, despite of the chance that it may collapse at any time.It is a vivid portrait of her mental condition that she feels that she can find no safe place except at home.She argues that her house is safe, ironically, the only safe place in her mind is damaged and not safe at all, for the crack in the ceiling of the building is being widened all the time, later we know that house finally reduces into a heap of bricks and stuff.
It is when she is in distress that she meets Jimmie.Gradually, she regains consciousness from numbness, and becomes aware of the visible peril of her house, and can not wait to get out of the house any longer.Later, she and Jimmie move to a flat high above streets and houses, but it seems to her there is no protection around as before when she lives underground, nevertherless, rather than escaping from the place, she attempts to persuade herself to make adjustment to the situation, which contrasts sharply with her former attitude and behavior.
Ⅳ.In Love
As a woman who is no longer young and trapped in a world filled with insecurity and loneliness, Rose has the confidence in life again, one thing that is sure is that she loves Jimmie deep in heart.She make sacrifices so that the financial burden of Jimmies can be reduced, for instance, she contributes her savings to the furnishings of the house, she buys things mainly for Jimmie, without consideration for herself, she pays for the rent of the flat and the food for herself and Jimmie.
Despite the concessions Rose has made and her exertion, Jimmie still could not understand her.According to his judgement, Rose is too serious, cool-hearted and indifferent to him and his feelings or her, or even he envies George, for he imagines that George is the one who is solely loved by Rose.
On one hand,if Jimmie knows what kind of person she is and has a fairly clear understanding of her, there will be less quarrels and misunderstandings between them.On the other hand,we can say what Jimmie wants Rose to be is “the angel in the house”,(Coventry Patmore 1954) who should be devoted and submissive to her husband as well as being kind and patient with her babies.
As we know,in western culture,woman?s subordinate position is symbolized in Genesis where woman is depicted as made from a bone of man.And it is God?s will that woman belongs to man and is only one part of man.The traditional male supremacy in the human culture has put women into the second status.Woman is regarded as the property of man, obviously, Jimmie belongs to this type of men.For instance,when he takes Rose to the pictures, he would walk in front of her with pride,conscious of the other men?s glances at her.She is pitifully equal to an object for him to show off and flaunt his possessions.When Rose has her own opinion, not consistent with Jimmie, he would comfort her with his body, leaving the conflicts and collision unsolved.
However, Rose is not born to be “the angel in the house”by nature.Beauvoir tells us that “a woman is not born,but becomes and in dominated societies,women are restricted to do many things.”( Simone de Beauvoir 1974) Rose?s personality and conduct are not imposed of necessity by natural “feminine”characteristics but rather by strong educational forces under her mother?s influence, who insists on being dependent through her life before the traffic accident.Rose is not as pleasing as“the angel in the house” expected by Jimmie, which is one of the reasons that finally precipitate the rupture in their relationship.
Ⅴ.The Other Woman
It is a fact that Rose is the other woman, however,she is by no means the unscrupulous woman condemned by the public in the newspaper.As she says:“I can?t help being a surplus woman.Don?t blame me,blame the war, it?s not my fault…”,(Doris Lessing 112) she is not intent to be a surplus woman.It is Jimmie who should take the blame for her embarrassing plight,for he himself would not like to be bound with marriage and only wish to enjoy the fun of love, regardless morality and the trauma that he will bring to other women.
Troubled with the guilty conscience for violating the social ethics, distrust of Jimmie, and his flirtation with other women, Rose at last determines to make the decision for him and end up her self-condemnation and ordeal that she has gone through.It turns out Jimmie has been divorced for three years.Thus She should not deserve all the affliction of conscience, for she is not in the violation of the ethics at all.
Ⅵ.Harmony
In the end, Mrs.Pearson, who is the ex-wife of Jimmie, exposes the real relationship between she and him at the presence of the three.In the meanwhile, at the suggestion of Mrs.Pearson, Rose agrees to live with her and help her running a cake shop, so that she herself can be qualified to adopt George?s orphaned girl-Jill.
Mrs.Pearson peruades Rose to leave Jimmie, for in her mind, “Women have to look after themselves these days, because if they don?t, no one will”, (Doris Lessing 128 ) with which Rose acquiesces with reluctance, for Rose still wishes that Jimmie would implore her to stay with him, yet “he remains motionless, with that bitter little smile”.(ibid) It intimates to us that Rose holds a perspective not quite the same as that of Mrs.Pearson.In the deep recesses of her mind, she does not desire to be absolutely independent of man, for she is aware that man and woman should be in harmony with each other instead of being antagonistic and isolated in their separately intolerant circle.
In The Second Sex, Beauvoir comes to the conclusion that women must face their physical difference from men,shoulder their own responsibilities and set up a brotherhood relationship with men if they want to get real liberation.It is the way with which women shall depend on to get out of the dilemma if they are inclined to do so.
Works Cited
［1］Beauvoir,Simone de.The Second Sex.New York:Vintage Books,1974.
［2］Jingjing Li, Pan Fei.“A Vivid Portrayal of Modern Female Anxiety: A Critical Reading of Doris Lessing?s ‘The Other Woman’”.Journal of Mudanjiang College of Education, 1(2009):25-27.(李晶晶，潘斐，现代女性焦虑的生动写照-多丽丝?莱辛《另外那个女人》解读，牡丹江教育学院学报 2009年第1期。)
［3］Lessing, Doris.Five Short Novels.1969; rpt.London: Panther Books,1974.
［4］Li Ling.“The Tragic Fate of Women in the Patriarchal Society-A Feminist Reading of Kate Chopin?s The Awakening ”.Unpublished M.A.dissertation, Chongqing Normal University.
［5］Ogden,Annegret S..The Great American Housewife From Helpmate to Wage Earner,1776-1986.London:Greenwood Press,1986.
［6］Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.“Doris Lessing.” 30 May (2010).22 June.2010..