兒童形象的再思：論《永恆之王》中的童年再現

Abstract

《永恆之王》雖是二十世紀最家喻戶曉的英語亞瑟王文學作品，但其學術評價始終曖昧不明。本論文聚焦《永恆之王》中兩種截然不同的童年形塑，經由文本分析指出，《永恆之王》的童年書寫雖悖離兒童文學傳統形象，其詮釋卻具有原創性與革命性。本文採用雷蒙．威廉斯的文化物質主義理論架構，首先提出兒童文學中的規訓傳統與童真形象的建構；其次，相互比較《永恆之王》中亞瑟與奧克尼兄弟的童年與兒童文學傳統形象。二十世紀早期，囿於兒童文學傳統與時代氛圍，兒童文學仍多半是規訓的工具與成人慾望的投射場域，然而，《永恆之王》作者特倫斯．韓伯瑞．懷特在此框架之中，質疑了童真的價值，並更進一步描繪了顛覆傳統兒童形象卻更寫實的奧克尼兄弟。由懷特與眾不同的童年再現而論，《永恆之王》超越了他身處時空的桎梏，並可作為近年來新興的童年研究之早期文本。

The Once and Future King, one of the most well-known twentieth-century Arthurian retellings, has been considered a popular yet ambiguous children's book for some subversive elements involved in the narrative. Probing into childhood representations in this tetralogy, this study aims to answer the ambiguity of this text in children’s literature and proposes that The Once and Future King is one of the early examples of radical yet revolutionary children’s books. Based on Raymond Williams’s cultural materialism, this thesis first distinguishes the discipline and the construction of childhood innocence in children’s literature, and then compares and contrasts White’s childhood representations to these literary conventions. With his two childhood accounts, the author T. H. White attempts to disrupt childhood innocence and furthermore advocates attention to the child in life. Recent decades have seen the validation of childhood studies, and The Once and Future King is proposed to be read in this new light on the child.