摘 要

《吹小号的天鹅》是美国著名作家埃尔文·布鲁克斯·怀特的一部儿童文学作品，主要描写了一只哑天鹅路易斯成长的艰辛历程。本文围绕路易斯成长过程以及其成长原因两个方面分析赏析这只动物的成长。 第一部分分析路易斯如何从一只自卑的哑天鹅逐渐变得自信、自律，最终成为一只成熟而有魅力的天鹅的过程。第二部分探讨了在路易斯成长过程中，爱是一个至关重要的因素。除了爱，偿还小号的债务也是激励其成长的动力。怀特用自己独特讲述故事的方式，给孩子们展示了一只天鹅的蜕变过程。他告诉孩子们陷入困境时要勇敢，保持积极乐观的心态，努力克服困难。

关键词： 埃尔文·布鲁克斯·怀特；《吹小号的天鹅》；路易斯；成长

Contents

1. Introduction------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1

2. Demonstration --------------------------------------------------------------------------------2

2.1 The growth -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------2

2.1.1 To be confident ----------------------------------------------------------------------------2

2.1.2 To be self-disciplined---------------------------------------------------------------------5

2.1.3 The meaning of growing up--------------------------------------------------------------5

2.2 The reasons for growing up ----------------------------------------------------------------6

2.2.1 Family love---------------------------------------------------------------------------------7

2.2.2 Paying back the debt----------------------------------------------------------------------9

1. Conclusion------------------------------------------------------------------------------------10

Notes---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------11

Works Cited-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------12

Bibliography--------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------13

A Study of Louis in The Trumpet of the Swan

1. Introduction

Elwyn Brooks White, a famous American writer, was born in New York in 1899. He travelled about trying all sorts of jobs before he joined The New Yorker magazine and became a writer. He joined the staff in 1927 of the magzine and continued to contribute for six decades. Best recognized for his essays and unsigned “Notes and Comment” pieces, he gradually became one of the most important contributors to The New Yorker at a time when it was arguably the most important American literary magazine. He kept animals on his farm in Maine and some of these creatures crept into his books, such as Stuart Little which was published in 1945. His most famous book is Charlotte’s Web which first appeared in 1952 and has been in print ever since. Stuart Little received a lukewarm welcome from the literary community at first due to the reluctance to be endorsed by Anne Carroll Moore, the retired but still powerful children’s librarian from the New York Public Library. However, both books went on to receive high acclaim, and in 1970 jointly won the Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal. In the same year, he published his third children’s novel, The Trumpet of the Swan.

The Trumpet of the Swan is the most popular one of White’s three children’s works. The story was inspired by a report in the New York Times in 1965. A pair of rare trumpet swans in Philadelphia Zoo had five little swans, and were also displayed in some pictures. Attracted by those swans, White wrote to an old friend in Philadelphia to express how eager he wanted to go to Philadelphia and asked his friend to take some photos for him, from which the story was conceived. White made up a swan born without voice, and imaginatively described the growth of the swan. In 1973, it received the Sequoyah Award from Oklahoma and the William Allen White Award from Kansas, both of which were awarded by students voting for their favorite book of the year. This book tells mainly the growth of Louis, who suffers his dumbness from birth, but he tries his best to gain a voice, and finally becomes a successful swan and acquires his true love.

For White’s works, researchers abroad pay more attention to his prose and its style. For instance, Christopher Lehmann Hauput has published “The Appreciation of E. B. White”. While domestic researchers have devoted their focus to the translation of the three children’s books as well as the combination of fantasy and reality in the stories. For example, Sun Yu’s “Animals in Fantasy Fictions of E. B. White” and Li Meijing’s “White Language Arts in White Works” are two of this kind. Yet for the specific characters in the book of The Trumpet of the Swan, criticism at home and has not explored further. Therefore, the focus of this thesis will be on the changes that occur in the process of Louis’s growth. This thesis will be divided into two parts. The first part probes into the remarkable personality changes in Louis, and the second part quests about the driving forces for his growth. In general, this essay is to show the great transformation in a little swan.

2. Demonstration

2.1. The growth