1. Sentimentalism&Sentimentalism& Oliver Goldsmith

2. SentimentalismSentimentalism  感伤主义文学  time:  the middle and later decades of the 18th century  It gains its name from  Sterne’s A Sentimental Journey.

3.  a reaction against  the cold rationalism  a pessimistic outlook  an appeal to  emotion, sentiment, not reason

4.  This trend marks the transition form neoclassicism to romanticism in English poetry.

5.  It carefully depicts person’s mood and their miserable life so as to arouse readers’ sympathy, reflecting  the disdain towards the actual world  deep sympathy to the ordinary people

6. target  1. to criticize  the cruelty of the capitalist relations  the gross social injustices brought about by the bourgeois revolutions

7.  2. to blame  reason  the Industrial Revolution  3. to show a sincere sympathy for  the poverty-stricken, expropriated peasants

8. characteristics  (1) Appeal to emotion, sentiment, not reason.  (2) Heroes in sentimentalists’ works are usually common people, or the oppressed.

9.  (3) Sentimentalists usually like to idealize village or the countryside.  (4) Sentimentalists often turn to describe nature.

10. Representatives  the most outstanding figure:  Laurence Sterne.  the most important sentimentalist poets:  Oliver Goldsmith  Thomas Gray  the first sentimentalist novelist:  Samuel Richardson

11. Sentimental novel  Oliver Goldsmith:  The Vicar of Wakefield  Laurence Sterne:  Tristram Shandy  A Sentimental Journey

12. Oliver Goldsmith Anglo-Irish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist

13. Contents  Best known for  his comedy She Stoops to Conquer  his novel The Vicar of Wakefield

14. 1. 1. Life Story  birth date and year unknown  the location of his birthplace uncertain  the son of an Anglo-Irish minister

15.  went to Trinity College, Dublin in 1744  graduated in 1749 as a Bachelor of Arts, but without the discipline or distinction that might have gained him entry to a profession in the church or the law.

16.  His education seemed to have given him mainly a taste for  fine clothes  playing cards  singing Irish songs  playing the flute

17.  He tried various professions without success  studied medicine  set out on a walking tour of Flanders, France, Switzerland and Northern Italy

18.  He settled in London in 1756.  Perennially in debt and addicted to gambling, Goldsmith produced a massive output as a hack writer for the publishers of London.

19.  But his few painstaking works earned him the company of Samuel Johnson, with whom he was a founding member of “The Club”.

20.  The combination of his literary work and his dissolute lifestyle led Horace Walpole to give him the epithet “inspired idiot”.

21.  arrested in 1762 for failing to pay his rent  showed the manuscript of The Vicar of Wakefield to his friend Samuel Johnson  Johnson sold the book for £60, enough to pay Goldsmith's debts.  The novel was not published until 1766.

22.  Goldsmith was described by contemporaries as prone to envy, a congenial but impetuous and disorganised personality who once planned to emigrate to America but failed because he missed his ship.

23.  His premature death in 1774 may have been partly due to his own misdiagnosis of his kidney infection.

24.  Goldsmith was buried in Temple Church.  The inscription reads; “HERE LIES/OLIVER GOLDSMITH”.

25.  There is also a monument to him in Westminster Abbey with an epitaph written by Samuel Johnson.

26. 2. 2. Literary Career  Goldsmith’s literary work began with writing for periodicals, and in this form appeared his earliest notable production, “The Chinese Letters,” later republished as “The Citizen of the World”.

27. The Citizen of the World  《世界公民》, 1760-61  a series of letters written by a Chinese gentleman, Lien Chi  criticism of English manners and mores.

28.  This work shows the influence of Montesquieu’s. ( 《孟德斯 鸠》 ) Persian Letters. ( 《波 斯人信札》 )

29. The Traveler ■ 1764 ■ The traveler-narrator ■ fails to find happiness abroad ■ concludes that it is to be found in one's own mind: “Our own felicity we make or find.”

30.  The Vicar of Wakefield (1766)  In 1768 appeared his first attempt at drama, “The Good-Natured Man,” which met with fair success.  The Deserted Village (1770)  Nostalgic poem about the passing of a simpler, happier, rural past.

32.  In 1773 “She Stoops to Conquer” was presented at Covent Garden and scored a great triumph.  Initially the play was titled Mistakes of a Night She Stoops to Conquer

33. Main characters  Charles Marlow  Kate Lumpkin  George Hastings  Tony Lumpkin

34. 3. The Vicar of Wakefield Picture ： Choosing the Wedding Gown by William Mulready, an illustration of Ch. 1

35. 1. Introduction  most commentators interpret the story as a satire on the kind of sentimental novel that was popular at the time.  However, Goldsmith's satiric touches are so subtle that the novel has also been read as a sentimental, pastoral novel.

36. 2. Plot  Set in rural 18th-century England, The Vicar of Wakefield chronicles the life of Vicar Charles Primrose, his wife Deborah, and their children.

37.  Narrated by the protagonist, the novel recounts the reversal of the Vicar's modest fortunes and a series of blows to the family's unity.

38.  Daughter Olivia marries a scoundrel who subsequently deserts her.  The family looses all their money, and son George must end his engagement.

39.  The family is forced to move to a smaller house, which catches fire.  Primrose is injured saving his family.

40.  Although destitute, Primrose finds the inner strength to rise above circumstances and to comfort those around him.

41.  The novel ends with a series of improbable resolutions that restore the Vicar and his family to their previous happiness and good fortune.

42. 3. Main Themes  The Vicar of Wakefield presents an almost unique challenge to readers and critics: it can and has been read as an entertaining, sentimental account of pastoral England with a strong moral.

43.  Alternately, some commentators assert that the novel is a satire of this genre and that Primrose is not meant to evoke sympathy but ridicule.

44.  Goldsmith does focus on moral matters and on the relationship between people and their religion.  The plot is similar to the biblical story of Job from the Old Testament: Primrose suffers misfortunes but does not despair.

45.  He holds fast to his faith and in the end regains all that he has lost.  In addition, Goldsmith addresses various social concerns, most notably penal reform, as well as manners, behavior, and the hypocrisy and snobbery of a rigidly stratified class system.