摘　要

《红字》是美国文学史甚至世界文学史上的一大巨作，其内容涉及爱情、清教、复仇等各个方面。作者霍桑将小说的主题定位为罪恶，从主人公被判通奸罪开始，她经过自己的善行和努力改变了自己在人们心目中的形象：从丑陋变为高尚；从被人看不起到受人们敬仰。在霍桑的小说中，他笔下的人物都是在真实与非真实间扮演着自己的角色，从而构成整个生动的故事。这些正是他对象征手法的运用，并由此引起了读者的关注与共鸣。《红字》正是由于这些象征手法的运用成为了美国文学史上最早最重要的浪漫主义文学作品之一。字母“A”作为最具代表的例子是因为它在小说中含义的变化。本文将从红字“A”的多种象征意义出发，讨论字母A的象征意义。通过对这些象征意义的学习，让我们更加了解当时社会的昏暗，更加了解霍桑这位文学巨人的写作手法，从而促进对英美文学的学习积极性。

关键词：《红字》；霍桑；情节；象征

Abstract

The Scarlet Letter is a foremost romantic literature work in the American history even world literature history. It concerns about love、Puritanism and revenge among the three main characters. The authror set the theme of the novel as “sin”, from the very beginning of the punishment being adultery of the protagonist , her attempts to change her image in people's mind: being ugly to gracious; from being looking down upon by others to get respects from others. In Hawthorne’s novel, every character plays his or her role freely and they are always between “true” and “untrue”. Since all his employment of symbolism in his works, he causes the attention and resonance of the readers. The Scarlet Letter has been one of the most important romantic novels in the American literature history because of its symbolism. The changing symbolic meanings throughout the novel are best expressed by the letter A. This essay will discuss the changing symbolic meanings of the scarlet letter A from the diversity of symbolism in this novel.Trough the careful leaning of the symbolism in the novel,we can know more about the darkness of the society in that period and get into a deeper touch with the author Hawthorne’s writing skill,what will cause the enthusiasm of us to study the English and American literature.　　

Key words: The Scarlet Letter; Hawthorne; plot; symbols

1 Introduction
Nathaniel Hawthorne is one of the famous novelists in the American Renaissance period. He was deeply influenced by Puritanism consciousness, Transcendental philosophy, and mysticism. The Scarlet Letter makes Hawthorne as well known all over the world as a piece of his masterwork. It reflects the pursuing of happiness and love.
1.1 The purpose of this paper
During the nineteenth century, Nathaniel Hawthorne is an excellent Romantic novelist in America. He has been greatly influenced by Puritanism consciousness, Transcendental philosophy, and mysticism. Hawthorne was the first one who used a creative expression of "Symbolic Romanticism" in the America literature history. He was so suspicious of the whole world that his works are all full of symbolisms. What's more, he tries to express his true understanding of the world by giving a symbolic meaning to an objective thing, intending to reveal the hidden meaning through the symbols.