Generation gap

Generation gap is a common problem in modern society.It is caused by many and varied factors.But I think the main responsibility lies with parents.

父母比我们年龄大，所以无论是生理上还是心理上，都要比我们成熟。父母的经历和经验也比我们丰富，做事也比我们谨慎、周密。所以他们有能力采取适当的措施同子女进行沟通。如果父母 没有做到这些而使自己与子女之间产生“代沟”，那么主要的责任在于父母。

Physically,Parents are older and mature than us.They always do things cautiously and carefully. Besides,they have more experience than we do, therefore they have the ability to take appropriate measures to communicate with their children. If the parents do not do that with their children but choose to keep the generation gap between their children, the main responsibility should lie with parents.

从思想上讲

父母不理解子女，不知道子女想什么、要什么？父母只是以自己特有的家长地位，强制性的要求子女做他们不愿意做的事，从而压制了子女心中的各种想法。认为自己说的话或是做的事都是合乎常理的，都是对的，这就会使父母与子女产生“代沟”。

From the perspective of option, parents do not understand their children and they do not know what their children are thingking .They are in their own unique position and compel their chilren to do what they don't like to. Since parents stamp on a child's idea ,the generation gap between parents and chilren arises.

从现代教育上讲

子女所要接受的教育很多，而家庭教育则是子女接受教育中最为重要的教育内容之一。在谈及家庭教育必然要谈到父母与子女的关系问题。我们知道，一个良好的家庭环境必然会形成一个和睦而又温暖的家庭。如果家庭中各成员之间产生隔阂，必然会对子女的成长造成一定的影响。父母的言行和品德对子女有很大的影响。从子女一出生，父母就成了子女的启蒙老师，从此他们就担负着培养和教育子女的责任和义务，同时也是他们承担的社会责任。而父母的失职就可能给家庭蒙上一层阴影，造成家庭冷漠不和，以及子女的悲观、消极思想。 In terms of family education ,parents play an important part in the relationship between parents and children. We know that a good family environment is bound to form a harmonious and warm family. What parents say and behave has a great influence on their children

Negligence of the parents can cause children's pessimistic and negative values.This is also one of the factors causing the generation gap.

From the above arguments,we can draw a conclution that the generation gap is largely due to parents.

第二篇：Completion and Openness on Great Expectation

Completion and Openness

On Great Expectations

In his masterpiece Great Expectations, Dickens is criticized by many as changing the ending to cater to the reader’s taste. He tends to make the ending like a conclusion, in which everyone is happy so that the readers can be satisfied. This may be true at first glance, but in fact, the revised ending of Great Expectation forms a mixture of completion and openness, adding merits to the novel’s artistic value.

In Dickens’ original ending, Estella’s life was described as very unhappy and suffering. When Pip met her again in London, he was rather giving a moral lesson.

“I was very glad afterwards to have had the interview; for in her face and in her voice, and in her touch, she gave me the assurance that suffering had been stronger than Miss Havisham's teaching, and had given her a heart to understand what my heart used to be.”

The words “used to be” suggests that there was no remains of love left. However, Dickens’ friend, the novelist Edward Lytton, suggested that such an unhappy ending would dissatisfy most readers, who always kept a slice of hope in their hearts that Pip and Estella could finally be united. Dickens thus changed his ending into a “more acceptable” one.

“We are friends," said, I rising and bending over her, as she rose from the bench. "And will continue friends apart," said Estella. I took her hand in mine, and we went out of the ruined place; and, as the morning mists had risen long ago when I first left the forge, so the evening mists were rising now, and in all the broad expanse of tranquil light they showed me, I saw the shadow of no parting from her.”

As to the two ending of Great Expectations, it is difficult to judge which one is better, but we may suggest that even Dickens himself is not sure whether Pip and Estella should come together at last. The fact is that the second ending is vague in meaning. The statement of reunion is made by Pip himself, which could only express his own will, but could not prove what will happen in the future.

Bakhtin suggests that the important feature of the novel is that it never reaches the “last word of closure”. It has a “spirit of process and inconclusiveness”. A good ending is not a simple conclusion of the story, but leaves some unsolved questions for the readers to think about and to interpret.The characters will not disappear when we finish reading the last page, but continue to live in our mind. Such inconclusiveness of

the ending is welcomed by the 20th Century modern novelists. However, when we use such an idea to analyze Great Expectations, we can find a mixture of both closure and openness to make the novel more attractive. The novel has a circularity of the narrative structure: the ending of the story is innately connected with the opening. It is the similarity between the opening and the ending that creates a sense of organic totality and completion, and it is the discrepancy of the two that suggests the openness of the novel.

We can find the mixture of completion and openness in both versions. The second is more obvious. Pip takes Estella’s hands and they go out of the ruins of Satis, leaving behind all their past unhappiness, and walking into the tranquil moonlight, symbolizing the openness of their future. The setting of the first ending is profound: the old Pip walks with young Pip in London, a place where he has experienced the forming of illusion and the disillusionment. The old Pip must see his childhood as a simple and lovely boy from young Pip, and this is a recollection of the opening, where the young “old Pip” appears for the first time. But what is different is that a real “great expectation” is waiting for the young Pip. His father is Joe and his mother is Biddy, who can provide him with a warm family and proper education. He also has a good guide, his uncle, who can keep him from distorted, but not Mrs. Havisham and Jaggers. If the story went on , the old Pip would gradually hid and disappear behind the heavy curtain of history, and so would Joe and Biddy, and the new life shall begin for the young Pip. The ending is a symbol of farewell, a farewell which should have been done 13 years ago. Mrs. Havisham, Magwitch, and now it is Estella and Pip. It is the end of their story, along with the decayed Satis and all the darkness of the past. The original ending symbolizes a real ending of one generation and the beginning of another.

By using circular structure, the ending of the novel recalls the opening in an opposite and contradictory way, providing us with both completion and inconclusiveness of the novel. They should not be regarded as drawbacks, but the finishing point which gives the novel a deeper meaning.