An Analysis on Social and Individual Harmony in A Farewell to Arms—From the Perspective of Ecofeminism

Abstract

Ecofeminism is the third wave of feminism after the first wave of feminism - liberal feminism in the 19th century and the second wave of feminism - radical feminism in the 1960s and 1970s[8]. Ecofeminism-the combination of the ecological environment movement and the feminist movement emphasizes the study of the internal relationship between the women oppressed by the patriarchal society and nature ruled by it. With the continuous development of industrial civilization, in the modern society, in order to develop social economy, human beings grab a large amount of natural resources resulting in that the growth and recovery of natural resources cannot keep pace with the speed of acquiring resources. While people seizes resources, waste gas, waste water and other pollutants produced by industrial and agricultural production are discharged into the nature, which seriously pollutes the natural environment, reduces the biodiversity and destroys the ecological balance. Such behavior further intensifies the contradiction between human and nature. We value the relationship between women and nature because there are certain commonalities between them. First of all, as the subject of procreation and rearing, women bear children with their own bodies. And we usually call nature as “mother”, endowing it with female characteristics. It is the creator of living things. It constantly produces resources needed by all living things on the earth and feeds everything with its own body. In this way, women are in accordance with nature. Secondly, in the patriarchal society, both of them are the objects of oppression hence there is an intrinsic bond between them. In this paper, the author analyzes the change of the relationship and the change of psychology between the hero Henry and the heroine Catherine in war background and in natural background which is destroyed by human. Meanwhile, the relationship between social environment and natural environment itself also is being pointed out. In such a way, the author intends to arouse the awareness of readers that the importance of achieving harmony between men and women as well as keeping balance between nature and the society, thus human beings may eventually find an approach to this haunting dilemma.