Abstract

William Somerset Maugham travelled in China from 1919 to 1920. The travel notes On a Chinese Screen was one of the fruits of his Chinese tour. There are 58 essays in this book, long or short, which could be used as raw materials of a marvellous novel were put together into a travel corpus. This essay is going to take this travel notes as a research object, starting from the perspective of China’s current situation, the typical British’s pride and prejudice, values and aesthetic tendency and Maugham’s emotional domination, to discuss the complex contradictions and changes of the "Chinese image" in Maugham's works, and analyzes the causes of this image.   

Key words: Maugham, On a Chinese Screen, ideal romanticism, Orientalism, pre-given foreign resources

CONTENTS

Abstract

摘要

I. Introduction -1

1.1 An introduction to the author: research background both at home and abroad-1

1.2 An introduction to the travel essays On A Chinese Screen-2

II.  The Twisted Chinese Image-3

2.1 People-3

2.2 Landscape and architecture-4

   2.2.1 Ideal romanticism: Travelling on the boat..4

   2.2.2 The dwelling house ..5

   2.2.3 Little Utopia: Opium Den .6

III.  Causes of Chinese Image in Maugham' s Eyes-6

3.1 Orientalism: Self-esteem of “the empire on which the sun never sets”-6

3.2 The use of pre-given foreign resources-7

3.3 The author's own emotional domination-7

       3.3.1 Nostalgia-7

       3.3.2 Pessimistic attitude towards the Industrial society-8

IV.  Conclusion-8

References-11