本科畢業(yè)論文An Analysis of the Writing Styles of Mark Twain

1、An Analysis of the Writing Styles of Mark TwainContentsAbstract & Key Words-3Introduction -51. The Background of Mark Twain-41.1 Mark Twain and His Experienc-41.2 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn -41.3 A General Introduction to the Mississippi-52. Analyzing Two Writing Styles of Mark Twain (in

2、 the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn) -52.1 Use of Colloquial Language-6 Vernacular Language -6 Local Color- 82.1.3 Pun-92.2 Satire in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn-9 Vanity-10 Unquestioning Acceptance of Violence-11 Coward-12 Slave-132.3 A Combination of Colloquial Language and Satire-143. The

3、Significance of Mark Twains Writing Styles-14Conclusion-15Bibliography-16AbstractMark Twain (pseudonym of Samuel Langhorne Clemens, 1835-1910), was an American writer, journalist and humorist, who won a worldwide audience for his stories of the youthful adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn.

4、His colloquial Language and Satire in the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.Key Words: American writer, Huckleberry Finn. 1. The Background of Mark Twain1.1 Mark Twain and His ExperienceMark Twain, pseudorym of Samuel langhone Clemens, was brought up in the town of Hannibal, Missouri, near the Mis

5、sissippi River. He was twelve when his father diod and he had to leave school. He was successively a printers apprentice, a tramp printer, a silver miner, a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi, and a frontier journalist in Nevada and California. This knocking about gave him a wide knowledge of humani

6、ty. As one of Americas first and foremost realists and humorists, Mark Twain usually wrote about his own personal experiences and things he knew about from firsthand experience. His life spanned the two Americas, the frontier America and the emerging urban, industrial giant of the twenty-century.As

7、a witness of the civil war, Twain saw clearly the great changes in nations economic development and political life. With the final victory over the South the North once again enjoyed its wielding power in the nations administration. Now the acute conflict at home was undermined and the American peop

8、le again focused their full attention on re-construction after the war. Because most majority of the slaves were emancipated, the slave-based economy of the defeated South had its prosperity became rootless. In this case, clusters of groundless southern poor whites and the newly freed slaves headed

9、directly of indirectly for the new-liberated cities to seek opportunities. It may be called the Gold Rush rejuvenated, or rather, it was so-called the American Dream by some critics. Twain also could not help rushing to the west to will his American dream. He once believed the idea of development an

10、d industrialization since it would modernize the young country and encourage the enterprising spirit of the American who had long been famous for it. He was firmly enthralled by such fever, so once again he held an optimistic attitude towards the post-westward expansion. He drew much inspiration fro

11、m the unparalleled and magnificent event and spoke highly of its decision-makers and its people.1.2 The Adventures of Huckleberry FinnThe best work that Mark Twain ever produced is, as we noted earlier on, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. It tells a story about the United States before the Civil

12、War, around 1850, when the great Mississippi Valley was still being settled. Here lies an America, with its great national faults, full of violence and even cruelty, yet still retaining the virtues of some simplicity, some innocence, and some peace. The story takes place along the Mississippi River,

13、 on both sides of which there was unpopulated wilderness and a dense forest. It relates the story of the escape of Jim from slavery and, more important, how Huck Finn, floating along with him and helping him as best he could, changes his mind, his prejudice about black people, and comes to accept Ji

14、m as a man and as a close friend as well.At the heart of Twains achievement is his creation of Huck Finn, who embodies that mythic America, midway between the wilderness and the modern super state.1.3 A General Introduction to the MississippiThe Mississippi is not only Mark Twains life stage but als

15、o American societys stage. It flows through the middle of America; its one of the greatest rivers in the world. In Twains early years, the geographic core was the great valley of the Mississippi River, and the Mississippi is the main artery of transportation on the young nations heart. In 1857, youn

16、g Mark Twain entered that world as a cub pilot on a steamboat. Later, when he wented to write something, this land provided him with many plentiful writing materials. 2. Analyzing Two Writing Styles of Mark Twain (in the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn)Mark Twain was the first important writer t

17、o consistently use the American speech rather than Englands English. His honor, whether it was aimed at pure entertainment or at social satire, was irresistible. His realism, and details influenced many later American novelists. That was why Ernest Hemingway once said “all modern American literature

18、s came from one book written by Mark Twain called The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.” And it became Twains masterpiece. Mark Twains three years life on that returned to the Mississippi left such a fond memory with him that returned to the theme more than once in his writing career.Huckleberry Finn

19、is a veritable recreation of living models, and is Hucks book, not Jims. The two major characters, Huck and Jim, represent the two sides of the dilemma: Huck strikes out for an absolute freedom, while Jim requires, in order to gain his own freedom, that Huck qualify his freedom by entering into the

20、pursuit of Jims. It starts out as a comedy , an As You Like It with a hero drawn from the bottom of society rather than the top. Huck and his father, Jim, the swindlers(the Duke and the Dauphin), colonel sherburn and the drunkard Boggy-all these characters prototypes in real life. The portrayal of i

21、ndividual incidents and characters achieved intense verisimilitude of detail. Serious problems are being discussed through the narration of a little illiterate boy. The fact that the wilderness juxtaposed with civilization, the people half wild and half civilized, many of whom are worse, vulgar, are

22、 brutal. As for the style of the book, the form is based on the simplest of all novel-forms, the so-called picaresque novel, or novel of the road, which strings its incidents on the line of the heros travels. But, in this novel, rivers are roads that move, and the movement of the road in its own mys

23、terious life transmutes the primitive simplicity of the from: the road itself is the greatest character in this novel of the road, and the heros departures from the river and his returns to it compose a subtle and significant pattern. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn shows us the major achievement

24、s of his art: the masterful use of dialects; humor and pathos, innocence and evil. This novel demonstrates his ability to capture the enduring, archetypal, mythic images of America and to create the most memorable characters in all of American fiction.2.1 Use of Colloquial LanguageThe book is writte

25、n in a colloquial style, in the general standard speech of uneducated Americans. Moreover, the prose of Huckleberry Finn established the prose virtues of American colloquial speech. It has something to do with ease and freedom in the use of language. Most of all, it has to do with the structure of t

26、he sentence, which is simple, direct, and fluent, maintaining the rhythm of the words group of speech and the intonations of the speaking voice. Mark Twains colloquial style has influenced a large number of American writers.The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn displays the major achievements of his ar

27、t: the carefully controlled point of view, with its implicit ironies expressed through the voice of a semiliterate boy: the masterful use of dialects: the felicitous balancing of nostalgic humorist and realism, humor and pathos, innocence and evil, all united for a journey down the Mississippi that

28、serves as the mythic center of the novel. This novel demonstrates his ability to capture the enduring, archetypal, mythic images of America and to create the most memorable characters in all of American fiction. Vernacular LanguageMark Twain wrote in his unpretentious, colloquial, and poetic style.

29、He used vernacular language, dialect with spelling representing pronunciation. Part of this comes from his interest in humor. The directness of the language is a very influential point in Twains style. Ernest Hemingway in the 20th century said that he had learnt his craft from Mark Twain because if

30、the direct speech and the direct narration that Twain was able to achieve. The hoax and tall tale are also part of twains style. Hoax is writing something fantastic and pretending that it were true, much like the tall tale. It tolls as if it were true, and so the reader would laugh that any body cou

31、ld believe such preposterous things, the burlesque making fun of establishes ways of writing.Mark Twain said, “I amend dialect stuff by talking and talking it till it sounds right.” He wanted his writing to have the sound of easy-going speech. In Huckleberry Finn the fountainhead of the American col

32、loquial prose, he wrote seven different dialects and each can be distinguished. If the reader is a linguist, he can examine the different pronunciations that Twain has shown. In his own time, dialect writing was considered humorous. People got a big laugh out of reading these misspell words. Another

33、 feature of the book, which helps to make it famous is its language. The book is written in the colloquial style in the general standard speech of uneducated Americans. Mark Twains introductory note on accents is an indication of his conscious attempt to achieve accurate detail. “In this book,” he s

34、ays, “a number of dialects are used, to wit: the Missouri Negro dialect; the extreme forms of the backwoods southwestern dialect; the ordinary pike country dialect; and four modified varieties of this last. The shadings have not been done in a haphazard fashion, or by guesswork; but painstakingly, a

35、nd with the trustworthy guidance and support of personal familiarity, with these several forms of speech.” “Painstaking ” and “not haphazard,” though they possess a humorous ring, denote the conscientious effort on the part of the author, and trustworthiness and familiarity and the authors awareness

36、 of dialects in using which reveal his attempt to reproduce actual daily speech with a degree of accuracy. A recent and very influential recasting of Hucks vernacular voice has identified.We may quote a passage from this masterpiece as an illustration:“I took the sack of corn meal and took it to whe

37、re the canoe was hid, and shoved the vines and branches apart and put it in; then I done the same with the side of bacon; then the whisky-jug. I took all the coffee and sugar there was, and all the ammunition; I took the wadding; I took the bucket and gourd; took a dipper and a tin cup, and my old s

38、on and two blankets, and the skillet and the coffee-pot/ I took fish lines and matches and other things- everything that was worth a cent. I cleaned out the place I wanted an ax, but there wasnt any, only the one out at woodpile, and I know why I was going to leave that. I fetched out the gun, and n

39、ow I was done.”The words used here are, perhaps “ammunition” which is etymologically French, mostly Anglo-Saxon in origin, and are short, concrete and direct in effect. Sentence structures are most of them simple or compound, with a series of “then” and “ands” and semi-colons serving as connectives.

40、 The repetition of the word “took” and the stringing together of things leave the impression that Mark Twain depend solely on the concrete object and action for the body and movement of his prose. What is more, there is an ungrammatical element, which gives the final finish to his style. The whole b

41、ook approximates the actual speech habit of an uneducated boy from south American of the mid-nineteenth century.The vernacular language in the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn initiated the new style of language in American novels, and has had significant influence upon American writers of later gener

42、ations. Local ColorLocal color as a trend first made its presence in the late 1860s and early seventies. The vogue of local color fiction was, the logical combination of a long, progressive development. It was the outgrowth of historical and aesthetic forces that been gathering energy since early ni

43、neteenth century. Twain refers to the elements, which characterize a local culture, elements such as speech, customs, and also a particular place. Local colorists concerned themselves with presenting and interpreting the local character of their regions. They tended to identify and glorify, but they

44、 never forgot to keep an eye on the truthful color of local life.Twain depicted social life through descriptions of local places and people he knew best and believed that “the most valuable capital, or culture, or education usable in the building of novels is personal experience.” Yet, sometimes Twa

45、in wrote a sentimental story, not because he was sentimental, but because he wanted to show the reader how stupid such a story really was. The reader has to be very careful when he or she reads Mark Twain. Twain often played trick on the reader. He often said things when he meant just the opposite.

46、This is the irony that he got the humor from the Far West. He would  do things that he did just to make fun , but the reader might think that he really meant it. Then the reader was the tender-foot who taken in .Mark twain preferred to respect social life through portraits of local places which

47、 he knew best and drew heavily from his own rich fund of knowledge of people and places. The Adventures of huckleberry Finn is one such example. Finn is living breathing personality. It is through his use of language and his activities that Twain creates character and sets down objective truth: Finn

48、 is uneducated; he dislikes civilized ways because they are restrictive and hypocritical he likes.Meanwhile, local color mixed romantic plots with realistic descriptions of things which were readily observed, with the customs , dialects, sights, smell and sounds of regional America. After the Civil

49、war, local color had further developed, In this book, this kind of literature mainly describes the local life, the keynote was optimistic, and the language was narrative humorous. The characters he created were humorous and full of wittiness. Mark Twins work was regarded the witness of Americas pure

50、 local life. According to Calkins, “Few American writers have written the same after reading telling.” From my point of view, American literature is so charming for this kind of works.Local color became dominate in American Literature(1860-1870). One of the most important writing features of Mark Tw

51、ain is the use of Local colorism. It is also impossible in the Mississippi River towns through which Huck and Jim journey to imagine being a hero .This in turn makes Sherborn a cold-blooded killer and Huck a saint (and Tom a good). Let me repeat it as a saint，however, Huck is no more bent on social

52、reform, no more optimistic about it, than is sherburn. So local colorism is a variation of American realism, and also a description of a small refined region. Twain, breaking out of the narrow limits of local-color fiction, described the breadth of American experience as no one had ever done before,

53、 or since, and he created The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, a masterpiece of American realism that proverbs to be one of the great books of world literature.2.1.3 PunIn English paronomasia called pun, means call by a different name. The exact definition is: Humorous use of word to suggest differen

54、t meanings, or of words of same or similar sound has different meanings. There are five forms of pun: homophonic pun, paranomasic, antalaclasis, sylletic pun, asteismus. In a certain context, pun has several pragmatic functions. Throughout all of Twains writing, we see the conflict between the ideals of Americans and their desire for money. But Twain never tried to solve the conflict. He is like a newspaperman who repor