荒诞与救赎一论《只争朝夕》主人公的精神历险.pdfVIP

review of Seize the Day and the organization of the present thesis. Chapter Two analyzes the stage of practice, in which Wilhelm’s personal experiences are exposed—his lifelong pursuit of meaning in an absurd world: in his youthful years, he has abandoned his college studies in Pennsylvania University; and then like most young people longing for success, he, at the age of twenty, decides for himself to change his name as Tommy Wilhelm to pin hopes on himself. With his new name, Wilhelm is coaxed by the scout Maurice Venice into coming single-handedly to Hollywood to take a screen test, in the hope of becoming an actor. But he ends up a failure there. Having accomplished nothing, the protagonist returns to New York to be employed as an oblivious clerk. Worse still, misfortune befalls Wilhelm again—before long he quits his job for the sake of somewhat unfair competition between employees. In desperation, he could do nothing but live with his retired father Dr. Alder for a livelihood, till which time the absurdity in the book reaches its peak. In other words, whatever efforts he has made, Wilhelm is still unable to realize his illusionary “American Dream” all the same. Chapter Three focuses on the interpretation of the second stage of Wilhelm’s spiritual odyssey, where the concept of alienation is put forward and under such theory, Wilhelm’s alienation with others is expounded that in his middle-aged years, the unemployed hero has nowhere to go, with his hopes for success broken into pieces. His present self is not only alienated from the outer world he exists in but also alienated from those people around himself. He is first and foremost alienated from his father, then from his separated wife and two sons and