名利场英语读后感
Bunyan once in his book named Pilgrim’s Process described a place named ‘Vanity Fair’ where all kinds of vanity are sold, such as houses, lands, honors, preferments, titles,lusts, pleasures and delights of all sorts. As a matter of fact, we are living in such place today. We gradually become the participants of this fair and loyal followers of these hollow things. Espencially our modern grils’ changing view toward marriage, money and social status. They believe that they could easily live a life like a grand lady without making any efforts if they marry a wealthy man. As female college students, how to stick to our own belief and aviod being assimilated by the complex society, Thackeray’s novel Vanity Fair could give us a good instruction. Through the Rebacca’s attitude towards money, social status and marriage, I realize what is most important thing for a female.
Thackeray described the life of ruling classes of England in the early decades of the 19th century, and attacked the social relationship of bourgeois world by satirizing the individuals in the different strata of the upper society. Rebacca（becky） Sharp is a classic example of the money-grubbing instinct. Her only aspiration in life is to gain wealth and position by any means. Thackeray does not regard Rebacca as an exception. Everyone wishes to gain something in the Vanity Fair and acts almost in the same manner as Rebacca.
As an orphan, Rebacca’s birth can easily win our tears. It is an undenible fact that she is quite an ambitious and clever girl. As far as I am concerned, she could easily live a decent life with her own hand. However, because of the society and the innate deficits in her characteristics, she becomes very sophisticate and even tried to suduce her best friend’s brother so that she could win her place in the upper society and other’s admiration. However, for the people in the upper class, Rebacca’s humble birth cuold never be erased even though she married a rich man. In other’s eye, she was just a coquette who was quite good at suducing rich men. Why not use your own hand to create a bright future and win others’ true respect instead of relying on the man’s shoulder.
Rebacca liveed in a society which is ruled by money, everyone was crazy about money, Rebacca was no exception. She held the dream of living a life of a grand lady, wearing luxurious clothes and shining dimonds. In order to realize her dream, she used all kinds of immoral means to win the love of rich men. Finally, she got married with Rawdon Crawley, a good man who will inherit a large sum of money from her ant. However, the old lady refused because Crawley married Rebacca---a woman of low social status. Rebacca and her husband live a quite luxurious life in Pairs even though they could not make the both ends meet. Finally, Mr.Crawley was put in to prison because of heavy debets, while Rebacca started searching for another rich man who can pay for her luxurious bills. Rebacca betrayed her soul in the process of pursuiting money and gradually forgot the meaning of love.
Marriage is a holy thing in everyone’s life, but if you regard marriage as a good method of gaining money and improving your social status, you will suffer a lot from it. Although you live a decent life and gain other’s admiration,you may never be ture happy because you never know what is love and responsibilty. Rebacca’s marriage is a good example. She took a quite easy attitude towords marriage. Her marriage was just a method which helped her get in to the upper class and live a rich life. Ther is no wonder that she was so cruel to her husband and flirted with another rich man when her husband was in the prison. Here I want to mention another female----Amelia, a girl of simple mind. In Rebacca’s mind she was a fool. At first, she held the same view as Rebacca. Her husband’s death in the war made her become a sorrowful widow. Till one day Rebacca told her that her husband once asked Rebaccato run with him. Amelia was angry and married a man who has taken care of her for several years uncomplainly. Amelia is not a cold hearted women, although her dream of being a grand lady had vanished,but she experienced a life of being truly loved. While for Rebacca, she will forever lived in the Vanity Fair and never has the chance to experience this kind of love. In my eye , Amelia is wiser than her.
Rebacca is a tragic female during that period. Although this novel ended with a happy ending--- Rebacca got marriad with Amelia’s brother and inherited a large sum of money, liveed a grand lady’s life ---who dare to say that Rebacca will stop betraying her soul and keep away from Vanity Fair? I would like to give an advice to her and to the grils in our modern society: please keep always from Vanity, and take a correct attitude towards money, social status and marriage. Money is not every in our life. The improvement of our social status needs our own efforts instead of relying on others. Mrriage is a holly thing in our girls’ life, which requires our responsibility and loyalty. Or we will forever live in a hollow world and the dream of vanity will finally destory us.
第二篇：名利场读后感
My Review on the Book Vanity Fair
Ⅰ.Introduction
1.1 Social background
Since the Industrial Revolution in the second half of the 18th century, the class structure of English society had undergone radical changes. The Industrial capitalists began to play a more important role and vied for political power with the old aristocracy. Due to the support of the people this struggle of power ended in the victory of bourgeoisie over the aristocracy. With the development of capitalism, there arose a powerful working class, though the conflict between labour and the capital was for some time the background of the struggle between the feudal and bourgeois classes. But from the thirties of the 19th century, the struggle between the workers and capitalists became the feudalmental contradiction in English social life.
Now England became a typical capitalist country. Having consolidated its positions at home, the British bourgeoisie strengthened its policy of colonial expansion in all parts of the world, successively competing for markets with other powerful countries of the world. So England was experiencing at the same time an aggravation of contradiction both at home and abroad. In spite of the parliamentary reform in 1832, the living conditions of workers did not grew better but steadily worse. In 1834 there was the passage of the Poor Law. According to it, the inhuman work-houses were established, in which the poor people had to do heavy tasks and live no better than in jails. The great misery of the workers led to an upsurge of labour movements and the organization of the workers into unions. In 1836 arose the working-class movement known as Chartism. In 1837, the workers formulated their political demands in The People’s Charter. The people’s parliaments gathered in 1837 and on The People’s Charter there were over a million signatures of workers. During the forties, the revolutionary events on the European continent led to a strengthening of the English working-class movement. But the late forties witnessed the decline of Chartism owing to the defeat of the revolutions on the Continent and the easing of social tension in England.
The crying social contradictions were reflected in the writers’ work of the time.
1.2 Brief introduction of the author
Thackeray was a representative of critical realism in 19th-century England. Vanity Fair was his masterpiece.
William Makepeace Thackeray was born at Calcutta in 1811. His father, Richmond Thackeray, had been an Indian civil servant, as had William's grandfather. His mother was nineteen at the date of his birth, was left a widow in 1816, and married Major Henry Carmichael Smyth in 1818. At the age of six, Thackeray was sent to be educated in England. On his way to England from India, the small Thackeray saw Napoleon on St. Helena. His attendance at a school run by a Dr. Turner gave him experience later used in Vanity Fair. Always an independent spirit, he went his own way, attending various schools, but leaving Cambridge without taking a degree. His relatives wanted him to study law; he leaned toward the fine arts. At Trinity College, Cambridge, he contributed to a little paper called The Snob.
A visit to Weimar bore fruit in the sketches of life at a small German court which appears in Vanity Fair. In 1832, he inherited a sum which amounted to about five hundred pounds a year. The money was soon lost — some in an Indian bank, some at gambling, and some in two newspapers, The National Standard and The Constitutional.
About 1834, Thackeray went to Paris and took up the study of art. He had early shown talent as a caricaturist. His pencil was at its best in such fantastic work as is found in the initial letters of the chapters in his books, and in those drawings made for the amusement of children.
He married Isabella, an Irish girl, daughter of Colonel Matthew Shawe, who enchanted him with her singing, and who was the model for Amelia in Vanity Fair. Three daughters were born, one dying in infancy. After the birth of the third child, Mrs. Thackeray's mind was affected and she had to be placed with a family who took care of her. The little girls were sent to Thackeray's mother in Paris. Although Mrs. Thackeray outlived her husband by thirty years, she did not recover. As A young man with a ruined fortune and a tragic marriage, Thackeray was forced to earn his life with his pen. Politically Thackeray was a radical, advocating social reform and democracy. In his opinion, the existing society was corrupted as well as corrupting. He took it as his duty to expose the vices of his age, especially those in the upper-middle class. And He also regarded snobbery and the money-grabbing as the chief vice in his society. He criticizes the social moral that makes up the society. His criticism embraces people of all social strata; his social-climbers and snobs and money-grabbers can be found in any class. He always speaks in an ironical, sarcastic and cynical tone of an on-looker. He used his pen to disclose the darkness of society, and the Vanity Fair is a vivid and satire embodiment of that time and society.
Ⅱ.Summary of the book
Amelia Sedley, of good family, and Rebecca Sharp, an orphan, leave Miss Pinkerton's academy on Chiswick Mall to live out their lives in Vanity Fair — the world of social climbing and search for wealth. Amelia does not esteem the values of Vanity Fair; Rebecca cares for nothing else. Rebecca first attempts to enter the sacred domain of Vanity Fair by inducing Joseph Sedley, Amelia's brother, to marry her. George Osborne, however, foils this plan; he intends to marry Amelia and does not want a governess for a sister-in-law. Rebecca takes a position as governess at Queen's Crawley, and marries Rawdon Crawley, second son of Sir Pitt Crawley. Because of his marriage, Rawdon's rich aunt disinherits him. First introduced as a friend of George Osborne, William Dobbin becomes the instrument for getting George to marry Amelia, after George's father has forbidden the marriage on account of the Sedley's loss of fortune. Because of George's marriage, old Osborne disinherits him. Both young couples endeavor to live without sufficient funds. George dies at Waterloo. Amelia would have starved but for William Dobbin's anonymous contribution to her welfare. Joseph goes back to his post in India, claiming such valor at Waterloo that he earns the nickname "Waterloo Sedley." Actually he fled at the sound of the cannon. Both Rebecca and Amelia give birth to sons. Rebecca claims she will make Rawdon's fortune, but actually she hides much of her loot, obtained from admiring gentlemen. When she becomes the favorite of the great Lord Steyne, she accumulates both money and diamonds. In the meantime innocent Rawdon draws closer to Lady Jane, wife of Rawdon's older brother, Pitt, who has inherited from the rich aunt. When Rawdon discovers Rebecca in her treachery, he is convinced that money means more to her than he or the son whom she has always hated. He refuses to see her again and takes a post in Coventry Island, where he dies of yellow fever. Because her parents are starving and she can neither provide for them nor give little Georgy what she thinks he needs, Amelia gives up her son to his grandfather Osborne. William Dobbin comes back from the service, reconciles old Osborne to Amelia, whereat Osborne makes a will leaving Georgy half of his fortune and providing for Amelia. Rebecca, having lost the respectability of a husband, wanders in Europe for a couple of years and finally meets Joseph, Georgy, Amelia, and William on the Continent. Rebecca sets about to finish what she started to do at the first of the book — that is, to ensnare Joseph. She does not marry him, but she takes all his money and he dies in terror of her, the implication being that she has, at least, hastened his death. At the end of the book Rebecca has the money necessary to live in Vanity Fair; she appears to be respectable. William has won Amelia. Rebecca has been the one who jolted Amelia into recognition that George, her first love, wasn't worthy. Little Rawdon, upon the death of his uncle Pitt and his cousin Pitt, becomes the heir of Queen's Crawley. Little George, through the kindness of Dobbin, has lost his distorted values obtained in Vanity Fair.
Ⅲ. Comments on the book
In this novel, I like the name of novel “Vanity Fair” and the subtitle “A Novel without a Hero”. When I see the name, I understand the main idea of the novel. The Victorian egoistic, hypocritical, and money-grabbing aristocratic and commercial society is a vanity fair. It is not only a show of Thackeray’s cynical view toward life but also a declaration of that the epoch in which capitalists or aristocrats posed themselves as heroes. For instance, Amelia Sedley is a fool; her husband has slept with Becky Sharp, but she still sticks to her loyalty to him and keeps Dobbin waiting for her hand.
At the same time, the writer adopts a great number of rhetorical devices to describe the two main figures’ words, expression and behavior. That makes the sentences vivid and arouses the readers’ interest in reading. The images, plot and language show the hidden paradox of sensuality and redemption. The book gives me a whole view of the nobility’s life which is pretty extravagant. Reading between the lines, I can find that Becky is a beautiful, strong-willed and cunning young woman who is determined to make her way to the upper society. To get rid of poverty, Becky makes every possible effort, by hooking or by crooking. She is a great believer of Be yourself and on your way! Given in the modern society, Becky is an ambitious woman. She is not afraid of failure. However, because of the lack of a perfect plan, she failed in the end. Becky is a tragedy in character. By contrast, Amelia Sedley is a good-natured, loveable though simple-minded young girl. She does not understand what life is. She is portrayed as a coward. She is pitiful but happy. She does not run counter to her fate, but yield herself up to it quite contently. Yet God blesses her. She comes across a perfect man Dobbin and gets married to him at last.
When I read to the part where Becky seduced Amelia’s husband, I felt a strong hatred for Becky inside myself. When it comes to that Amelia was abandoned by her husband, I had my sympathy for her. When I finished reading, I had deep feelings. I could not help asking myself: ‘What kind of person am I? The Becky or the Amelia?’ Fortunately, I am none of them. As James Allen puts it: ‘Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so shall you become. Your vision is the promise of what you shall one day be; your ideal is the prophecy of what you shall at last unveil.’ I will bravely seek after the happiness like Becky, but never in her way.
Although Vanity Fair was written in the 19th century, the novel is still of reflective value to our real world. In our society, people are unable to see things clearly. They are confused because their minds are full of wealth, power, vanity or so-called love. This love is like a game, not a true love. It’s easy for us to encounter some Beckys in the real world. Becky is a representative of people who are governor-oriented or money talks. In their mind, power and money means everything. They can give up all for positions and money. In the novel, to enter the upper class, Becky sets morality aside to seduce Amelia’s husband. She is a negative example which reminds us what is not to be done. On the contrary, Amelia stands for those people who are spineless. They are conventional and tend to accept the reality as it is. They have no intention to struggle for something better. And therefore, it’s difficult for them to have a place in the world.
However, as a female, I think Becky is very brave. Everyone longs for happiness. Everyone pursues happiness. Thus, what Becky has done are only for her simple aim----happiness. Because she comes from an ignoble family, she has to try her best to do everything. She has only herself to rely on. She believes that a woman of low birth can marry into the purple. Due to her strong-mindedness, she never gives up when difficulties arise, though sometimes she is in the wrong way.
Nowadays, people are going after fame and fortune. Once you have owned one of them, others will pay social attention to you, which makes you arrogant and proud and forget who you are.
That's what Becky does. On one hand, she is full of ideas and intelligence. On the other hand, she is dangerous and cunning. It is true that every one should try his best to achieve what he is pursuing. But we should do it in a proper and moral way. And whatever we do, we shouldn't forget that love and humanity should remain the most cherishable elements in our life.
Amelia is a kind, warm-hearted and tolerant person. She gets well along with each other. If Becky Sharp can own all these virtues she can also live a good life. However，something happens in life is inevitable. It is her poor family background that makes Becky become so audacious.
Vanity Fair is a trap that everyone is likely to step into however careful he may try to be. Thackeray has drawn a lifelike tableau of the Vanity Fair in reality in the novel. That is the reason why the novel has been popular for so many years.
Besides, the novel reminds me of one popular American TV series Gossip Girl. In the TV series, it also describes the life of the upper society. The young people lose themselves in the vanity fair. They craze to vie with each other. They look down upon the poor. They say evil words about others, even about their best friends. They are all self-approbation and self-centered. They always want others to surrender to them. Though they may, sometimes, feel lonely inside, the struggle for money, position and famous brands captures more of their attention and effort. Like Becky, they achieve their aims by hook or by crook.
Therefore, I ask: ‘vanity fair, how can we come in and go out of this place?’ Up to now, I still find it difficult to tell whether it is good or bad. Through his novel Vanity Fair, maybe Thackeray would like to tell us that we are supposed to have the right attitudes towards fame and fortune. We cannot give up all just for money and position. Otherwise, we would be abandoned by our families and friends. Moreover, we should understand one thing----No one can be happy without a friend. Thus, friends are far more important in our life. We should cherish our friendships at hand, because it would not follow you for life.
Furthermore, we, as women of the new era, should make our voice heard to the world: ‘We are not weak; we are the masters of this world!’ We should bravely seek after our happiness, but in a proper way. Meanwhile, we should be independent. We cannot always rely on others. We should have our own dreams, our own aspiration. In doing so, happiness will be there waiting for us.
Today we are living in a harmonious society; we should keep our purity and humanity. Fame and fortune are important, but they are not everything. Love and humanity are of more importance for a peaceful life. We should trust each other, help each other, and take care of each other.
The author concludes his book by saying: ‘Ah! In the vanity fair, things are empty! In this world, who are happy among us? Who also can attain all his wishes? Even so, who will be satisfied with what he has had? Dear friends, please use your action to find out the answer.’ Yes, it is time for us to reflect and take action.
Now, I have found out my answer. It is to strive, to seek, to find, but never to yield.