著者

吉田 一穂 Kazuho Yoshida 桃山学院大学兼任講師

出版者

桃山学院大学総合研究所

雑誌

英米評論 (ISSN:09170200)

巻号頁・発行日

no.18, pp.41-65, 2003-12

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In 1857, Charles Dickens (1812-70) revisited the Marshalsea prison to look back upon the past and make a necessary atmosphere in Little Dorrit (1857). The Marshalsea prison was the place which Dickens could not forget in his lifetime. Dickens returned to his father's experience of debt again while he was drawing the portrait of the Father of the Marshalsea, William Dorrit, as 'a very amiable and very helpless middle-aged gentleman.' John Dickens, Charles's father, was a cheerful person but he had no sense of economy. He was imprisoned in the Marshalsea prison, and Charles had to work at Warren's Blacking warehouse, which gave him an agony and despair. Dickens seems to change the relationship between his father and him into the relationship between William Dorrit and Amy in Little Dorrit. William Dorrit who is called 'the Father of the Marshalsea prison, is proud of the title although he is a prisoner for debt. Amy as a 'Little mother' of his father and the chief support of the family, shows consideration for her father ; she is a protector of her father and his respectability. Indelibly marked by the more than twenty years to which the Circumlocution Office has condemned William Dorrit behind those walls, it is forever impossible for him, even when he is released, to lose those psychological scars. In Book 2, Chapter 19, 'The Storming of the Castle in the Air', William returns to the identity in the Marshalsea prison. William Dorrit who lived for many years, there is a victim of social system. Arthur who becomes a prisoner of the Marshalsea prison in Book 2, Chapter 27, is also a victim of social system. Arthur who has invested in the business of Merdle, goes bankrupt after he killed himself. Arthur is a victim of Calvinism which drives people to the condition of confinement, and is a prisoner of the wicked religion of Mrs. Clennam. Dickens showed how Arthur could be released from the cultural ideology of Calvinism which made him an indecisive man and how he could get freedom. In Book 2, Chapter 29, Amy visits Arthur who went bankrupt and became the prison of the Marshalsea prison. Amy gives him motherly love. What has to be noticed is that Amy says to Mrs. Clennam, 'Be guided only by the healer afflicted and forlorn, the patient Master who shed tears of compassion for our infirmities', before the house of Mrs. Clennam collapses. The words of Amy show the forgiveness of sin as a theme of Little Dorrit. Moreover, the representation of nature emphasizes the relief by Jesus Christ just before the house of Mrs. Clennam collapses : "From a radiant centre over the whole length and breadth of the tranquil firmament, great shoots of light streamed among the early stars, like signs of the blessed later covenant of peace and hope that changed the crown of thorns into glory." Amy delivers Arthur from the ideology of Calvinism which Mrs. Clennam brought him. In Little Dorrit, Dickens attacked the Christianity of Mrs. Clennam which deprived Arthur of his liberty and imprisoned his mind. Mrs. Clennam adopts Arthur, the love child of Mrs. Clennam and his love, to raise him in righteousness and retribution, but her Christianity which justifies her scheme of retribution does not bring her and Arthur happiness. Dickens demonstrated that people could be released from vengeful feelings by a practice of forgiveness of sin as Jesus Christ had done, through showing how Arthur could be released from the influence of the vengeful thoughts of Mrs. Clennam with the help of Amy.