关键词: 詹姆斯·乔伊斯;; 《一个青年艺术家的画像》; 殖民话语; 抵抗话语; 文化身份; 杂合性; 爱尔兰文学

Abstract:

By locating The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, the autobiographical fiction of the adolescent James Joyce, in the postcolonial space, this paper starts from revealing the colonial discourse and “counter discourse” hidden in the Irish society in the early 20 ^thcentury. The focal point of this paper is the identity crisis of Joyce’s alter ego, Stephen Dedalus, which unveils the whole nation’s anxiety over integrating and reconstructing the Irish national identity. Based on the postcolonial theories of Edward Said, Homi Bhabha, Stuart Hall, etc., the paper elaborates on the essentialist cultural identity constructed by religious institution and all kinds of nationalist movements. The study draws the following conclusions: Stephen refuses to be fixed in the essentialist position, which ignores the irreversible reality of multiple identities and cultural plurality. He embraces the hybrid identity and stays open to all the unknown, foreign and heterogeneous elements in life. Instead of breaking everything into dichotomy, hybrid identity often involves contradictory experiences and alterities, breaking the national boundaries, and defying the binary disciplines. In this way, the hierarchical colonial discourse is disrupted and destabilized. Meanwhile, a new possibility of narrative space and discursive space is created. Stephen’s choice of self-exile is not the denouncement of any “presence” in his identity but the embracement of the interplay of his “presences” in a larger world of hybridity. Although he left Ireland, Joyce kept the dialogue with his mother country all his life.

Keywords: James Joyce; A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man; colonial discourse; counter discourse; cultural identity; hybridity; Irish literature