Abstract

Sister Carrie tells a story about a country girl’s life experiences, and especially displays her love affairs along with the realization of her American dream. This paper  mainly focuses on the analysis of the process during which Carrie gradually transforms from an innocent country girl into a hypocrite driven by her desire. In order to get a deeper understanding of the relations between Carrie’s changes and the special social background, the author compares the life experiences of the main characters with the experiences of those in Great Gatsby. It is in the modern society that is abundant with material goods, people’s spiritual pursuit and view of value sink into a gradually degrading vicious circle. In the process of realizing American style success, people regard their love and ethics as goods, putting them on a trade platform as other material goods. This paper aims to analyze the view of love and value in an industrial society, which is conducive for modern people to promote a healthy code of behavior and establish correct love idea in our daily life.

    Key words: Carrie; industrialization; love failure; ethical degradation

Contents

Abstract

摘要

1 Introduction-1

2 Love failure of Sister Carrie-3

2.1 Infamous and failed love experiences-3

2.2 Distorted and morbid human nature-5

3 Social problems of ethical degradation-7

3.1 The broken American dream-7

3.2 The transitional changes of love view-9

4 Conclusion-11

References-14