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1、An Analysis of Nancys Dual Personality in Oliver Twist English Education, Class OneStudent Number:20081115020012Analysis on Nancys Dual Personality in Oliver TwistAbstract: Nancy is a rather complex figure Dickens has made out. Though she was a criminal trained by Fagin and must have done countless
2、evils, she was not yet morally dead. And the beauty of her human nature was inspired by Oliver.Key words: Oliver Twist, Nancy, kindness、IntroductionOliver Twist, one of the most famous works of Charles Dickens, is a novel reflecting the tragic fact of the life in Britain in 18th century.The author w
3、ho himself was born in a poor family wrote this novel in his twenties with a view to reveal the ugly masks of those cruel criminals and to expose the horror and violence hidden underneath the narrow and dirty streets in London.Charity and love are themes because even though Oliver is treated horribl
4、y by most people, he is shown love by a few good people. Those people are Mr. Brownlow, Mrs. Maylie, and even Nancy.Well, talking about Nancy, she is a rather complex figure. Though she was a criminal trained by Fagin and must have done countless evils, she was not yet morally dead. And the beauty o
5、f her human nature was inspired by Oliver. From her stopping Silks to beat Oliver, and risking her life to save Oliver, we could see a spirit trying to get rid of evils and atoning. Though she couldnt choose her background and her born social statue; though she couldnt refuse not to be along with Fa
6、gin, but at the end of her life, she could choose how to die nobly. And she did make her death meaningful and enjoy the peace of mind in the paradise.、BackgroundNancy was corrupted at a young age by Fagin, the receiver of stolen goods who persuades downtrodden youths to do his bidding. Her exact age
7、 is not mentioned in the book, although she has evidently been a thief for 12 years (and began when she was half of Olivers age), and is visibly in her teens or mid 20s in film versions of the novel. Nancy is one of the members of Fagins gang that few, if any, know about in Londonsomething referred
8、to by Sikes when he and Fagin, concerned that Oliver might inform on them, are trying to convince her to attend his impending trial after he is mistakenly arrested for pick pocketing (No one around here knows anything about you). Her excuse for not attending is that she does not wish anyone to know
9、about her; nevertheless, she winds up attending it, presumably after having been physically threatened by Sikes. In the novel it is alluded to that she is a prostitute and she drinks heavily. She is described thus when she first appears a couple of young ladies called to see the young gentlemen; one
10、 of whom was named Bet, and the other Nancy. They wore a good deal of hair, not very neatly turned up behind, and were rather untidy about the shoes and stockings. They were not exactly pretty, perhaps; but they had a great deal of color in their faces, and looked quite stout and hearty.She is beate
11、n to death by Sikes because he mistakenly believes that she has informed on him, when the truth is that she has been trying not to involve Sikes in her efforts in order to ensure his safety. Nancy, who is fiercely protective of Oliver and harbours a great deal of motherly affection and pity for him,
12、 has been trying to prevent him from being kidnapped a second time, after Oliver has finally managed to find safety in the household of the Maylie family, whom Sikes tried unsuccessfully to rob. She gives Rose Maylie and Mr. Brownlow, Olivers benefactor, information about Olivers evil half-brother M
13、onks, who is in league with Fagin. However, she has managed to keep Bills name out of it. But Fagin has sent a spy out after her, and when the spy reports on what he has heard and seen, Fagin, furious at what she has done, tells Sikes about her actions. However, he twists the story just enough to ma
14、ke it sound as if she informed on him, knowing that this will probably result in her being murdered and thus silenced. It is her murder and the subsequent search for Sikes, her killer, that helps bring down Fagins gang.Nancy commits one of the most noble acts of kindness in the story when she ultima
15、tely risks her life to help Oliver. Her character represented Dickens view that man, however tainted by society, could still retain a sense of good. One of the main reasons Dickens puts Nancy in Oliver Twist is so that she can be contrasted with the pure, gentle, yet also conniving if needed Rose Ma
16、ylie.、AnalysisNancy might be the most complicated character of the novel. Despite being a relatively minor character, she has a very important role to play shes the source of the information about the plot between Monks and Fagin to ensnare Oliver.Why does she help Oliver? Well, thats whats so compl
17、icated. She seems to be reminded of her own lost innocence when she looks at Oliver. Soon after Oliver is stolen back from Mr. Brownlows house, she jumps to his defense for the first time, and yells at Fagin: I thieved for you when I was a child not half as old as this (pointing to Oliver). I have b
18、een in the same trade, and in the same service, for twelve years since; dont you know it? Speak out! Dont you know it? This passage is the first that tells us Nancys age: if Olivers around ten or so at this point, and shes been in Fagins employ since she was half that age, she must have started when
19、 she was five. And so now, twelve years later, shes seventeen. Awfully young to be as jaded as she is, dont you think? She tells Rose later that shes younger than she looks, though old in sin.Dickens rarely gives us a glimpse of what Nancys thinking or feeling he tells us what shes doing, but thats
20、about it. We have to infer the rest. So when she says or does something that looks inconsistent, or hysterical, we have to be almost as befuddled as the rest of the gang. For example, when Sikes is trying to get her to stop taking Olivers side, he says: Do you know who you are, and what you are? Oh,
21、 yes, I know all about it, replied the girl, laughing hysterically, and shaking her head from side to side with a poor assumption of indifference.So here, Nancys basically laughing because she cant do anything else she hardly finds it funny. But again, Dickens doesnt actually say what shes thinking
22、or feeling, or give us what literary critics call a sympathetic inside view. He describes only what her actions are as a perceptive observer might view them.Its also important to note that Dickens never not once uses the word prostitute or whore to describe either Bet or Nancy. This is the closest h
23、e comes, and its through Sikes, who asks Nancy if she knows who and what she is. The implication is pretty obvious shes a prostitute, and therefore hardly a moral person to take Oliver under her wing but Dickens never comes out and says it. Why is that? Dickens doesnt shy away from showing the grisl
24、y murder in all its gory detail, or from describing thefts and frauds and other crimes. Is it just Victorian sexual repression that keeps him from saying that Nancy is a prostitute? That could be part of it. After all, Dickens wants his audience to feel sympathy for Nancy by the end, and a Victorian
25、 reader might object to feeling sympathy for a whore.When Nancy meets with Rose alone and then with Rose and Mr. Brownlow at the bridge, she has to make a difficult choice. They offer her a safe passage to a foreign country, where she could live in peace and solitude, far from her old life, and secu
26、re from Fagin, Sikes, and the others. Shes terrified of Sikes, and loathes Fagin. So why does she say no? Is it pride? Does she not want to take handouts from them? Maybe. Earlier in the novel, before her first conversation with Rose, were told that pride is the vice of the lowest and most debased c
27、reature no less than of the high and self-assured. So OK it could be pride.Or is it love? She tells Rose that it is at the end of their first meeting. She explains: When such as me, who have no certain roof but the coffin-lid, and no friend in sickness or death but the hospital nurse, set our rotten
28、 hearts on any man, and let him fill the place that parents, home, and friends filled once, or that has been a blank through all our wretched lives, who can hope to cure us?Sounds like a pretty appalling version of love, but OK that could be it. Or is it Fate with a capital F? Nancy seems to think s
29、o at their final meeting she says, I am chained to my old life. I loathe and hate it now, but I cannot leave it. I must have gone too far to turn back . This idea of having gone too far to turn back seems pretty much in keeping with the rest of the novel once you turn down the wrong path, theres no
30、turning back, even if it means returning to your violent and menacing lover only to be brutally murdered. This novel seems to take a pretty bleak view of forgiveness and redemption, despite the apparent hopefulness of the final lines.、ConclusionOliver Twist conclusively demonstrates that Dickens acc
31、epted the prevailing doctrine that the novel should be directed toward social reform. Dickens was not，however，a propagandist espousing utopian pan aces for the ills of the worldHe bitterly attacks the defects of existing institutions- government，the law，education，penal systems and mercilessly expose
32、s the injustice and wretchedness inflicted by themBut he does not suggest the overthrow of the established order; neither does he offer any concrete alternatives or solutions. In many ways，he still belonged to his age and showed the limits of petty bourgeois outlookHe criticized the vices of capital
33、ist society from the viewpoint of bourgeois humanism ，but failed to see the necessity of a hitter struggle of the oppressed against their oppressorsHe believed that all the evils of the capitalist world would be remedied if only men treated each other with kindness，justice, and sympathetic understan
34、dingHe thought that the whole social question would be solved if only every employer reformed himself according to the model set by the benevolent gentlemen in his novels and if only the rich used their power and wealth sympathetically to assist the poor to escape from poverty. In spite of this weak
35、ness，however，Charles Dickens still remains the great writer of his ageRalph Fox，the revolutionary English critic, said：”In Dickens they(the English writers of the 19th century)had a genius who restored to the novel its full epic character, whose teeming mind created stories，poems and people which ha
36、ve forever entered into the life of the English- speaking world. Some of his characters have assumed an almost proverbial existence，they have become part of our modern folk lore, and that surely is the highest any author can achieveHe can only do it by genius，humanity and a feeling for the poetry of life.”