Abstract
This paper endeavors to analyze the multiple identities of Kate Brown in her summer self-discovery journey in Doris Lessing’s The Summer before the Dark. In the perspective of identity theory, this paper mainly inquires into protagonist Kate’s multiple identities under three layers of summer journey – confusion and loss, fragmentation and paradox, and integration and self-acknowledgement, who ultimately realizes perfect sublimation from female’s traditional identity as wife and mother to a new identity owning spirits of independence, ego, confidence, courage, freedom and liberation. Through the study of multiple identities, this paper throws new light on the influences of identities on individual’s behaviors and psychology and the significance of different identities endowing individual with different rights and obligations.
Keywords   multiple identities   self-discovery   journey   confusion   fragmentation   integration

本文分析了英国作家多丽丝•莱辛的小说《天黑前的夏天》中女主人公凯特•布朗在她寻找自我的夏季旅程中所展现的多重身份。通过身份理论的视角，本文主要分析了女主人公凯特在夏日旅程三个层次——困惑和失落、分裂和矛盾、融合和自我认同中的多重身份变化，最终实现从最初的妻子、母亲女性传统身份向拥有独立、自我、自信、勇气、自由、解放精神的新身份的完美升华。本文通过对多重身份的研究，为身份对个体行为和心理的影响，以及不同身份赋予个人不同的权利和责任的意义提供了进一步阐述。
关键词  多重身份   自我发现   旅程   困惑   分裂   融合

Doris Lessing, one of the most prominent and energetic writers in contemporary English literature, appeals to a large reading public all over the world with her prolific writing of various thematic exploration, distinctive perspectives and daring experimental narration.
After the publication of her first work The Grass is Singing, there have been by now over 20 novels, 11 short story anthologies, 10 collected literary works, 5 dramas and 1 poetic anthology bobbing up. Owing to Lessing’s outstanding contributions to literature, she has been awarded many great awards. In 2001, Lessing was awarded the David Cohen Prize for a lifetime’s achievement in British Literature.