《红字》英文介绍
《红字》英文介绍
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Hester has committed adultery with a young minister,Dimmesdale,Hester refuses to name her lover and i s sentenced to wear a scarlet A, signifying adulteress(奸妇) , as a sign of s i n .
1 Author 2 Characters 3 Plot 4 Themes
1 Author
Nathaniel Hawthorne ( 纳撒尼尔· 霍桑)
AnAmerican novelist and short story writer
His fiction works are . considered dark romanticism（黑色浪漫主义）
a devoted servant of God
gloomy, weak-minded , s e l f i s h
Dimmesdale
suffering from experience of physical and spiritual disintegration
2 Characters
Hester’s daughter A symbol of the hope Innocent， lovely，lively，smart Moody（情 绪多变的） Mischievous （淘气的） Brave
4 Themes
Sin, Knowledge, and the Human Condition The Nature of E v i l Identity and Society
4 Themes
Adultery I t i s orig inal ly meant to be a symbol of shame.
the scarlet letter简介
the scarlet letter简介
《红字》是纳撒尼尔·霍桑所写的经典小说，首次出版于1850年。
故事背景设定在十七世纪的清教新英格兰，讲述了一个名叫海丝特·普林的女人的生活，她因通奸而被公开羞辱，被迫在胸前佩戴一枚红字“A”作为她的罪恶象征。
小说探讨了罪恶、罪恶感和救赎的主题，以及清教社会的严酷和无情。
海丝特在公开谴责的情况下努力重建自己的生活，同时处理她的非法情事所带来的情感困扰和内疚感。
《红字》被广泛认为是最伟大的美国小说之一，并被改编成了许多电影、电视剧和舞台剧。
它的持久受欢迎程度证明了霍桑的讲故事能力和他在作品中探讨的永恒主题的力量。
红字英文介绍TheScarletLetter
➢ His themes often center on the inherent evil and sin of humanity
➢ His works often have moral messages and deep psychological complexity
Important Work
• Just because of the ending; The Scarlet Letter was defined as nothing but a coarse and vulgar book with ideas that would pervert the minds of readers; when it was published at first However people realized that it was a thoughtful book with great value and worthy to study again and again
• Antinomian 唯信仰论者：主张基督徒可以废弃道德;依靠信仰 来拯救灵魂
• Quaker 教友派：靠内心意识指引的教派
红字故事简介
红字故事简介《红字》是美国作家纳撒尼尔·霍桑创作的一部长篇小说，也是霍桑最著名的作品之一。
小说以17世纪的新英格兰为背景，讲述了一个因婚外情而受到社会谴责的女子的故事。
故事中的“红字”代表了女主人公的耻辱和罪恶，也象征着社会对女性的束缚和压迫。
故事的主人公海丝特·普林（Hester Prynne）因与牧师阿瑟·丹德利（Arthur Dimmesdale）发生婚外情而怀孕，被迫戴上一顶印有“A”字母的红色绣花标志，受到全社会的唾弃和排斥。
在面对严酷的社会道德谴责和身心的煎熬之下，海丝特仍然坚强地生活下去，默默承受着所有的痛苦和羞辱。
而阿瑟·丹德利则在内心的煎熬下慢慢消瘦，最终在内疚和痛苦中离世。
故事通过描写海丝特的坚强和勇敢，以及阿瑟的内疚和懦弱，展现了对道德和宗教的思考，对社会伦理和个人自由的探讨。
作品中还穿插了对当时社会的批判，对宗教枷锁和女性地位的探讨，呈现出了霍桑对人性的深刻洞察和对社会现实的批判。
小说以其深刻的思想内涵和独特的叙事手法，成为了世界文学史上的经典之作。
它不仅在当时引起了轰动，也为后世留下了深刻的启示。
通过对道德、罪恶、宗教、个体与社会的关系等问题的探讨，霍桑揭示了人性的复杂和社会的丑恶，使得这部作品在当今社会依然具有重要的现实意义。
总的来说，《红字》是一部思想深刻、情感丰富的文学作品，它通过对个体命运的描写，探讨了人性的复杂和社会的丑恶，对当代社会仍然具有重要的启示意义。
这部作品不仅在文学史上有着重要地位，也为我们提供了重要的思想和道德的反思，是一部值得深入研究和思考的经典之作。
红字英文介绍The-Scarlet-LetterPPT课件
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Introduction
• The Scarlet Letter told a story of a puritan woman Hester Prynne who was punished to wear a scarlet A which stood for the crime of adultery. The pretty young lady tried to settle down in Boston with her old and ugly husband Chillinggworth, a scholar. But the latter did not appear for years. During this time, Hester committed adultery with a local Minster Dimmesdale, and gave birth to a girl Pearl. Facing the terrible punishment, Hester refused to give her lover’s name away to protect him. Years later, the husband Chillinggworth came to the town and found out the whole truth, and he operated an horror revenge on Dimmesdale, with hiding his own true name. Yet, as the story going, Hester and Dimmesdale became sympathetic figures, while Chillinggworth was a devil at last.
xx年《红字》英文+中文读后感范文
As I finished reading "The Scarlet Letter" by Nathaniel Hawthorne in XX year, I found myself absorbed by its powerful, lingering themes and striking images.这一年，我读完了纳撒尼尔·霍桑的《红字》，感觉自己身临其境，深深被它强大而深远的主旨和惊人的画面所吸引。
The novel is set in Puritan Boston, where Hester Prynne,a young woman, is ostracized and forced to wear a scarletletter "A" on her dress as punishment for being an adulteress. As the story unfolds, we are introduced to Hester's former lover, Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, and the vengeful husbandof Hester, Roger Chillingworth. Through their journeys and struggles, Hawthorne tackles the themes of sin, guilt, redemption, and the human condition.小说的背景是纯洁主义的波士顿，在这里一名年轻的女子海斯特·普林因通奸被社会驱逐，被迫在衣服上佩戴着一个红字母“A”作为惩罚。
随着故事的展开，我们遇到了海斯特的情人，神父亚瑟·丹姆斯代尔，以及她的丈夫罗杰·钱林沃斯的复仇。
霍桑通过他们的旅程和斗争，探讨了道德、罪恶、救赎和人类的本质。
红字简介及个人看法
事重述》
Main characters
a. Hester Prynne b. Arthur Dimmesdale
海丝特· 白兰（heroine）
阿瑟· 丁梅斯代尔（hero）
罗杰· 奇灵沃斯(Main Villain) 珠儿(daughter)
c. Roger Chillingworth d. Pearl
The Scarlet Letห้องสมุดไป่ตู้er
简介及个人看法
(1804—1864)
Biography:
Born July 4, 1804
first work Fanshawe, in 1828 marrying Sophia Peabody in 1842
Scarlet Letter in 1850
entered Bowdoin College in 1821
个人对红字“A”的看法
• 第一点，“A”毫无疑问有“Adultery”（通奸罪）的意思 • 第二点，“A”也可以理解为“Affection”（情感），女主大胆而反叛的爱情，相
比于当时大多数清教徒生活的清淡乏味，无疑是极为炫目的。而且，牧师名字 （Arthur Dimmesdale）的首字母也是“A”。 • 第三点，“A”也有“Alone”的意思，女主从监狱里出来后，是处于被孤立、被 歧视的社会状态的。 • 第四点，“A”有着“Aid”“Admirable”“Angel”的意思，女主凭借出众的刺绣 手艺养活了自己和珠儿，并把大部分所得捐赠给需要的穷人。日复一日，年复一 年，他以自己的美德赢得了人们的尊重和敬爱，而她胸前的红“A”字，亦不再是 代表着耻辱与罪恶的枷锁，而是象征着她善良、纯真、无私、友爱这些美奺品质 的勋章～
Died May 19, 1864
The_Scarlet_Letter《红字》作品分析
The Scarlet LetterHistorical ContextThe Transcendentalist MovementThe Scarlet Letter, which takes as its principal subject colonial seventeenth-century New England, was written and published in the middle of the nineteenth century. Hawthorne began writing the novel in 1849, after his dismissal from the Custom-House, and it was published in 1850. The discrepancy between the time represented in the novel and the time of its production has often been a point of confusion to students. Because Hawthorne took an earlier time as his subject, the novel is considered a historical romance written in the midst of the American literary movement called transcendentalism (c. 1836-60).The principle writers of transcendentalism included Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, and W. H. Channing. Transcendentalism was, broadly speaking, a reaction against the rationalism of the previous century and the religious orthodoxy of Calvinist New England. Transcendentalism stressed the romantic tenets of mysticism, idealism, and individualism. In religious terms it saw God not as a distant and harsh authority, but as an essential aspect of the individual and the natural world, which were themselves considered inseparable. Because of this profound unity of all matter, human and natural, knowledge of the world and its laws could be obtained through a kind of mystical rapture with the world. This type of experience was perhaps most famously explained in Emerson's Nature, where he wrote, "I become a transparent eyeball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part and parcel of God." Even though Hawthorne was close to many transcendentalists, including Emerson, and even though he lived for a while at the transcendentalist experimental community of Brook Farm, he was rather peripheral to the movement. Hawthorne even pokes fun at Brook Farm and his transcendentalist contemporaries in "The Custom-House," referring to them as his "dreamy brethren indulging in fantastic speculation." Where they saw the possibilities of achieving knowledge through mystical experience, Hawthorne was far more skeptical. Abolitionism and RevolutionMore important to Hawthorne's literary productions, and particularly The Scarlet Letter, was abolitionism and European revolution. These, in Hawthorne's view, were episodes of threatening instability. Abolitionism was the nineteenth-century movement to end slavery in the United States. Though it varied in intensity, abolitionism contained a very radical strain that helped to form a climate for John Brown's capture of Harpers Ferry in 1859. (John Brown intended to establish a base for armed slave insurrection.) The rising intensity and violence of abolitionism was an important cause of the Civil War. Hawthorne's conservative position in relation to abolitionism did not necessarily mean that he was pro-slavery, but he did quite clearly oppose abolitionists, writing that slavery was "one of those evils which divine Providence does not leave to be remedied by human contrivances."What Hawthorne feared were violent disruptions of the social order like those that were happening in Europe at the time he wrote The Scarlet Letter. The bloody social upheaval that most interested Americans began in France in 1848. This, and other revolutions of the period, pitted the lower and middle classes against established power and authority. While the revolutions eventually failed, they were largely waged under the banner of socialism, and it was this fact that caused concern in America; as one journalist wrote, as quoted by Bercovitch, here there were "foreboding shadows" of "Communism, Socialism, Pillage, Murder, Anarchy, and the Guillotine vs. Law and Order, Family and Property." Critics have recently pointed to Hawthorne's guillotine imagery in "The Custom-House" (where he even suggests the tidle "The Posthumous Papers of a Decapitated Surveyor" for his tale) and metaphors of his own victimization as some evidence of his sympathies with regard to revolution and social order.The Puritan ColoniesThe novel was written in the mid-nineteenth century, but it takes the mid-seventeenth century for the events it describes (1642-49). The Massachusetts Bay Colony was established by John Winthorp (whose death is represented near the center of the novel) and other Puritans in 1630. They sought to establish an ideal community in America that could act as a model of influence for what they saw as a corrupt civil and religious order in England. This sense of mission was the center of their religious and social identity. Directed toward therealization of such an ideal, the Puritans required a strict moral regulation; anyone in the conmmunity who sinned threatened not only their soul, but the very possibility of civil and religious perfection in America and in England. Not coincidentally, the years Hawthorne chose to represent in The Scarlet Letter were the same as those of the English Civil War fought between King Charles I and the Puritan Parliament; the latter was naturally supported by the New England colonists.Plot summaryThe novel takes place during the summer in 17th-century Boston, Massachusetts in a Puritan village. A young woman, named Hester Prynne, has been led from the town prison with her infant daughter in her arms and on the breast of her gown "a rag of scarlet cloth" that "assumed the shape of a letter." It was the uppercase letter "A". The Scarlet Letter "A" represents the act of adultery that she has committed and it is to be a symbol of her sin—a badge of shame—for all to see. A man, who was elderly and a stranger to the town, enters the crowd and asks another onlooker what's happening. He responds by explaining that Hester is being punished for adultery. Hester's husband, who is much older than she, and whose real name is unknown, has sent her ahead to America whilst settling affairs in Europe. However, her husband does not arrive in Boston, and the consensus is that he has been lost at sea. It is apparent that, while waiting for her husband, Hester has had an affair, leading to the birth of her daughter. She will not reveal her lover's identity, however, and the scarlet letter, along with her subsequent public shaming, is the punishment for her sin and secrecy. On this day Hester is led to the town scaffold and harangued by the town fathers, but she again refuses to identify her child's father.[2]The elderly onlooker is Hester's missing husband, who is now practicing medicine and calling himself Roger Chillingworth. He settles in Boston, intent on revenge. He reveals his true identity to no one but Hester, whom he has sworn to secrecy. Several years pass. Hester supports herself by working as a seamstress, and her daughter Pearl grows into a willful, impish child—in Hawthorne's work, Pearl is more of a symbol than an actual character—and is said to be the scarlet letter come to life as both Hester's love and her punishment. Shunned by the community, they live in a small cottage on the outskirts of Boston. Community officials attempt to take Pearl away from Hester, but with the help of Arthur Dimmesdale, an eloquent minister, the mother and daughter manage to stay together. Dimmesdale, however, appears to be wasting away and suffers from mysterious heart trouble, seemingly caused by psychological distress. Chillingworth attaches himself to the ailing minister and eventually moves in with him so that he can provide his patient with round-the-clock care. Chillingworth also suspects that there may be a connection between the minister's torments and Hester's secret, and he begins to test Dimmesdale to see what he can learn. One afternoon, while the minister sleeps, Chillingworth discovers something undescribed to the reader, supposedly an "A" burned into Dimmesdale's chest, which convinces him that his suspicions are correct.[2]Dimmesdale's psychological anguish deepens, and he invents new tortures for himself. In the meantime, Hester's charitable deeds and quiet humility have earned her a reprieve from the scorn of the community. One night, when Pearl is about seven years old, she and her mother are returning home from a visit to the deathbed of John Winthrop when they encounter Dimmesdale atop the town scaffold, trying to punish himself for his sins. Hester and Pearl join him, and the three link hands. Dimmesdale refuses Pearl's request that he acknowledge her publicly the next day, and a meteor marks a dull red "A" in the night sky. It is interpreted by the townsfolk to mean Angel, as a prominent figure in the community had died that night, but Dimmesdale sees it as meaning adultery. Hester can see that the minister's condition is worsening, and she resolves to intervene. She goes to Chillingworth and asks him to stop adding to Dimmesdale's self-torment. Chillingworth refuses. She suggests that she may reveal his true identity to Dimmesdale.[2]Later in the story, while walking through the forest, the sun would not shine on Hester, although Pearl could bask in it. They then encounter Dimmesdale, as he is taking a walk in the woods that day. Hester informs Dimmesdale of the true identity of Chillingworth and the former lovers decide to flee to Europe, where they can live with Pearl as a family. They will take a ship sailing from Boston in four days. Both feel a sense of release, and Hester removes her scarlet letter and lets down her hair. The sun immediately breaks through the clouds and trees to illuminate her release and joy. Pearl, playing nearby, does not recognize her mother without the letter. She is unnerved and expels a shriek until her mother points out the letter on the ground. Hester beckonsPearl to come to her, but Pearl will not go to her mother until Hester buttons the letter back onto her dress. Pearl then goes to her mother. Dimmesdale gives Pearl a kiss on the forehead, which Pearl immediately tries to wash off in the brook, because he again refuses to make known publicly their relationship. However, he too clearly feels a release from the pretense of his former life, and the laws and sins he has lived with.The day before the ship is to sail, the townspeople gather for a holiday put on in honor of an election and Dimmesdale preaches his most eloquent sermon ever. Meanwhile, Hester has learned that Chillingworth knows of their plan and has booked passage on the same ship. Dimmesdale, leaving the church after his sermon, sees Hester and Pearl standing before the town scaffold. He impulsively mounts the scaffold with his lover and his daughter, and confesses publicly, exposing the mark supposedly seared into the flesh of his chest. He falls dead just after Pearl kisses him.[2]Frustrated in his revenge, Chillingworth dies a year later. Hester and Pearl leave Boston, and no one knows what has happened to them. Many years later, Hester returns alone, still wearing the scarlet letter, to live in her old cottage and resumes her charitable work. She receives occasional letters from Pearl, who was rumored to have married a European aristocrat and established a family of her own. Pearl also inherits all of Chillingworth's money even though he knows she is not his daughter. There is a sense of liberation in her and the townspeople, especially the women, who had finally begun to forgive Hester of her tragic indiscretion. When Hester dies, she is buried in "a new grave near an old and sunken one, in that burial ground beside which King's Chapel has since been built. It was near that old and sunken grave, yet with a space between, as if the dust of the two sleepers had no right to mingle. Yet one tombstone served for both." The tombstone was decorated with a letter "A", for Hester and Dimmesdale.Character ListHester Prynne A young woman sent to the colonies by her husband, who plans to join her later but is presumed lost at sea. She is a symbol of the acknowledged sinner; one whose transgression has been identified and who makes appropriate, socio-religious atonement.（Hester Prynne is the central and most important character in The Scarlet Letter. Hester was married to Roger Chillingworth while living in England and, later, Amsterdam — a city to which many English Puritans moved for religious freedom. Hester preceded her husband to New England, as he had business matters to settle in Amsterdam, and after approximately two years in America she committed adultery with the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale.The novel begins as Hester nears the end of her prison term for adultery. While adultery was considered a grave threat to the Puritan community, such that death was considered a just punishment, the Puritan authorities weighed the long absence and possible death of her husband in their sentence. Thus, they settled on the punishment of permanent public humiliation and moral example: Hester was to forever wear the scarlet letter A on the bodice of her clothing.While seemingly free to leave the community and even America at her will, Hester chooses to stay. As the narrator puts it, "Here, she said to herself, had been the scene of her guilt, and here should be the scene of her earthly punishment; and so, perchance, the torture of her daily shame would at length purge her soul." According to this reasoning, Hester assumes her residence in a small abandoned cottage on the outskirts of the community.While the novel is, in large part, a record of the torment Hester suffers under the burden of her symbol of shame, eventually, after the implied marriage of her daughter Pearl and the death of Chillingworth and Dimmesdale, Hester becomes an accepted and even a highly valued member of the community. Instead of being a symbol of scorn, Hester, and the letter A, according to the narrator, "became a type of something to be sorrowed over, and looked upon with awe, yet with reverence too." The people of the community even come to Hester for comfort and counsel in times of trouble and sorrow because they trust her to offer unselfish advice toward the resolution of upsetting conflict. Thus, in the end, Hester becomes an important figure in preserving the peace and stability of the community.）Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale Dimmesdale is the unmarried pastor of Hester's congregation; he is also thefather of Hester's daughter, Pearl. He is a symbol of the secret sinner; one who recognizes his transgression but keeps it hidden and secret, even to his own downfall.（Arthur Dimmesdale is the young, charismatic minister with whom Hester commits adultery. Unlike Hester, who bears the child Pearl by their affair, Dimmesdale shows no outward evidence of his sin, and, as Hester does not expose him, he lives with the great anguish of his secret guilt until he confesses publicly and soon after dies near the end of the novel.Dimmesdale is presented as a figure of frailty and weakness in contrast to Hester's strength (both moral and physical), pride, and determination. He consistently refuses to confess his sin (until the end), even though he repeatedly states that it were better, less spiritually painful, if his great failing were known. Thus Dimmesdale struggles through the years and the narrative, enduring and faltering beneath his growing pain (with both the help and harm of Roger Chillingworth), until, after his failed plan to escape to Europe with Hester and Pearl, he confesses and dies.）Pearl Pearl is the illegitimate daughter of Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale. She is the living manifestation of Hester's sin and a symbol of the product of the act of adultery and of an act of passion and love.（Pearl is the daughter of Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale. Necessarily marginal to Puritan society and scorned by other children, she grows up as an intimate of nature and the forest. Symbolically recreating the scarlet letter, Hester, in opposition to her own drab wardrobe, dresses Pearl in brilliant, decorative clothing such "that there was an absolute circle of radiance about her."Like most characters in The Scarlet Letter, Pearl is complex and contradictory. On the one hand, as the narrator describes, she "could not be made amenable to rules." At one moment in the novel, her disregard of authority takes the form of a violent game where she pretends to destroy the children of the Puritan elders: "the ugliest weeds of the garden [she imagined were the elders'] children, whom Pearl smote down and uprooted, most unmercifully." On the other hand, at a climactic point in the narrative, where Hester discards the scarlet letter on the floor of the forest, it is Pearl who dramatically insists that she resume the potent symbol. The form of her insistence is particularly important, for, against her mother's request, she does not bring the letter to Hester, but obstinately has Hester fetch the letter herself. This moment demonstrates one of the central conflicted themes of the novel about the authoritarian imposition of law and the willing subjection to it, or even embodiment of it. In this scene Pearl becomes the figure of authority to whom Hester willingly, if symbolically, obeys. Pearl eventually leaves with Hester for Europe (though Hester returns), where, it is implied, Pearl stays and, with the aid of Chillingworth's inheritance, is married to nobility.）Roger Chillingworth The pseudonym assumed by Hester Prynne's aged scholar-husband. He is a symbol of evil, of the "devil's handyman," of one consumed with revenge and devoid of compassion.（Roger Chillingworth is the alias of Hester's husband. The two were married in England and moved together to Amsterdam before Hester preceded Chillingworth to America. Chillingworth is a man devoted to knowledge. His outward physical deformity (a hunchback) is symbolic of his devotion to deep, as opposed to superficial, knowledge. His lifelong study of apothecary and the healing arts, first in Europe and later among the Indians of America, is a sincere benevolent exercise until he discovers his wife's infidelity, whereupon he turns his skills toward the evil of revenge.Chillingworth is introduced near the very start of the narrative, where he discovers Hester upon the scaffold with Pearl, the scarlet letter upon her chest, and displayed for public shame. After surviving a shipwreck on his voyage to America, he lived for some time among the Indians and slowly made his way to Boston and Hester. Upon discovering Hester's "ignominious" situation, Chilling-worth declines to announce his identity and instead chooses to reside in Boston to find and avenge himself on Hester's lover. When Dimmesdale becomes ill with the effects of his sin, Chillingworth comes to live with him under the same roof. Reneging on an earlier promise, Hester eventually discloses Chillingworth's identity to Dimmesdale. Soon after Dimmesdale publicly confesses his sin and, as Chillingworth puts it, "Hadst thou sought the whole earth over there was no one place so secret, —no high place nor lowly place, where thou couldst have escaped me, —save on this veryscaffold!" Thus, his vengeful victory taken from him, Chillingworth soon dies, though not before leaving all of his substantial wealth to Pearl.）Governor Bellingham This actual historical figure, Richard Bellingham, was elected governor in 1641, 1654, and 1665. In The Scarlet Letter, he witnesses Hester's punishment and is a symbol of civil authority and, combined with John Wilson, of the Puritan Theocracy.Mistress Hibbins Another historical figure, Ann Hibbins, sister of Governor Bellingham, was executed for witchcraft in 1656. In the novel, she has insight into the sins of both Hester and Dimmesdale and is a symbol of super or preternatural knowledge and evil powers.John Wilson The historical figure on whom this character is based was an English-born minister who arrived in Boston in 1630. He is a symbol of religious authority and, combined with Governor Bellingham, of the Puritan Theocracy.Character Analysis1.Hester PrynneWhat is most remarkable about Hester Prynne is her strength of character. While Hawthorne does not give a great deal of information about her life before the book opens, he does show her remarkable character, revealed through her public humiliation and subsequent, isolated life in Puritan society. Her inner strength, her defiance of convention, her honesty, and her compassion may have been in her character all along, but the scarlet letter brings them to our attention. She is, in the end, a survivor.Hester is physically described in the first scaffold scene as a tall young woman with a "figure of perfect elegance on a large scale." Her most impressive feature is her "dark and abundant hair, so glossy that it threw off the sunshine with a gleam." Her complexion is rich, her eyes are dark and deep, and her regular features give her a beautiful face. In fact, so physically stunning is she that "her beauty shone out, and made a halo of the misfortune and ignominy in which she was enveloped."Contrast this with her appearance after seven years of punishment for her sin. Her beautiful hair is hidden under her cap, her beauty and warmth are gone, buried under the burden of the elaborate scarlet letter on her bosom. When she removes the letter and takes off her cap in Chapter 13, she once again becomes the radiant beauty of seven years earlier. Symbolically, when Hester removes the letter and takes off the cap, she is, in effect, removing the harsh, stark, unbending Puritan social and moral structure.Hester is only to have a brief respite, however, because Pearl angrily demands she resume wearing the scarlet A. With the scarlet letter and her hair back in place, "her beauty, the warmth and richness of her womanhood, departed, like fading sunshine; and a gray shadow seemed to fall across her." While her punishment changes her physical appearance, it has a far more profound effect on her character.What we know about Hester from the days prior to her punishment is that she came from a "genteel but impoverished English family" of notable lineage. She married the much older Roger Chillingworth, who spent long hours over his books and experiments; yet she convinced herself that she was happy. When they left Amsterdam for the New World, he sent her ahead, but he was reportedly lost at sea, leaving Hester alone among the Puritans of Boston. Officially, she is a widow. While not a Puritan herself, Hester looks to Arthur Dimmesdale for comfort and spiritual guidance. Somewhere during this period of time, their solace becomes passion and results in the birth of Pearl.The reader first meets the incredibly strong Hester on the scaffold with Pearl in her arms, beginning her punishment. On the scaffold, she displays a sense of irony and contempt. The irony is present in the elaborate needlework of the scarlet letter. There are "fantastic flourishes of gold-thread," and the letter is ornately decorative, significantly beyond the colony's laws that call for somber, unadorned attire. The first description of Hester notes her "natural dignity and force of character" and mentions specifically the haughty smile and strong glance that reveal no self-consciousness of her plight. While she might be feeling agony as if "her heart had been flung into the street for them all to spurn and trample upon," her face reveals no such thought, and her demeanor is described as "haughty." She displays a dignity and grace that reveals a deep trust in herself.In this first scene, Dimmesdale implores her to name the father of the baby and her penance may be lightened. Hester says "Never!" When asked again, she says "I will not speak!" While this declaration relievesDimmesdale and he praises her under his breath, it also shows Hester's determination to stand alone despite the opinion of society. Hester's self-reliance and inner strength are further revealed in her defiance of the law and in her iron will during her confrontation with the governor of the colony.Despite her lonely existence, Hester somehow finds an inner strength to defy both the townspeople and the local government. This defiance becomes stronger and will carry her through later interviews with both Chillingworth and Governor Bellingham. Her determination and lonely stand is repeated again when she confronts Governor Bellingham over the issue of Pearl's guardianship. When the governor determines to take Pearl away from her, Hester says, "God gave me the child! He gave her in requital of all things else, which he had taken from me . . . Ye shall not take her! I will die first!" When pressed further with assurances of Pearl's good care, Hester defiantly pleads with him, "God gave her into my keeping. I will not give her up!" Here Hester turns to Dimmesdale for help, the one time in the novel where she does not stand alone.Hester's strength is evident in her dealings with both her husband and her lover. Hester defies Chillingworth when he demands to know the name of her lover. In Chapter 4, when he interviews her in the jail, she firmly says, "Ask me not! That thou shalt never know!" In the forest scene, even Dimmesdale acknowledges that she has the strength he lacks. The minister calls on her to give him strength to overcome his indecisiveness twice in the forest and again as he faces his confession on Election Day.What is the source of this strength? As she walks out on the scaffold at the beginning of the novel, Hester determines that she must "sustain and carry" her burden forward "by the ordinary resources of her nature, or sink with it. She could no longer borrow from the future to help her through the present." Her loneliness is described in the Chapter 5 as she considers how she can support herself and Pearl, a problem that she solves with her needlework. Yet she continues to lack adult companionship throughout her life. She has nothing but her strength of spirit to sustain her. This inner calm is recognized in the changing attitude of the community when they acknowledge that the A is for "Able," "so strong was Hester Prynne, with a woman's strength."A second quality of Hester is that she is, above all, honest: She openly acknowledges her sin. In Chapter 17, she explains to Dimmesdale that she has been honest in all things except in disclosing his part in her pregnancy. "A lie is never good, even though death threaten on the other side!" She also explains to Chillingworth that, even in their sham of a marriage, "thou knowest that I was frank with thee. I felt no love, nor feigned any." She kept her word in carrying her husband's secret identity, and she tells the minister the truth only after she is released from her pledge. This life of public repentance, although bitter and difficult, helps her retain her sanity while Dimmesdale seems to be losing his.Finally, Hester becomes an angel of mercy who eventually lives out her life as a figure of compassion in the community. Hester becomes known for her charitable deeds. She offers comfort to the poor, the sick, and the downtrodden. When the governor is dying, she is at his side. "She came, not as a guest, but as a rightful inmate, into the household that was darkened by trouble." Yet Hester's presence is taken for granted, and those that she helps do not acknowledge her on the street.Hawthorne attributes this transformation to her lonely position in the world and her suffering. No friend, no companion, no foot crossed the threshold of her cottage. In her solitude, she had a great deal of time to think. Also, Hester has Pearl to raise, and she must do so amid a great number of difficulties. Her shame in the face of public opinion, her loneliness and suffering, and her quiet acceptance of her position make her respond to the calamities of others.In the end, Hester's strength, honesty, and compassion carry her through a life she had not imagined. While Dimmesdale dies after his public confession and Chillingworth dies consumed by his own hatred and revenge, Hester lives on, quietly, and becomes something of a legend in the colony of Boston. The scarlet letter made her what she became, and, in the end, she grew stronger and more at peace through her suffering.2.Arthur DimmesdaleDimmesdale, the personification of "human frailty and sorrow," is young, pale, and physically delicate. He has large, melancholy eyes and a tremulous mouth, suggesting great sensitivity. An ordained Puritan minister, he is well educated, and he has a philosophical turn of mind. There is no doubt that he is devoted to God, passionate in his religion, and effective in the pulpit. He also has the principal conflict in the novel, and his agonized。
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Handsome
Minister（牧师）
a devoted servant of God gloomy, weak-minded , selfish suffering from experience of physical aand spiritual disintegration
Dimmesdale
2
Characters
Young Beautiful Brave
Chillingworth
Hester
A rebel of puritan(反清教伦理)
Help neighbors and the poor
She pursued happiness.
2
Characters
Young
Pearl
2
Characters
Hester’s daughter A symbol of the hope Innocent，lovely，lively，smart Moody（情绪多变的） Mischievous （淘气的） Brave
Pearl
3
Plot
Hester has committed adultery with a young minister,Dimmesdale,Hester refuses to name her lover and is sentenced to wear a scarlet A, signifying adulteress(奸妇), as a sign of sin.
4
Themes
Sin, Knowledge, and the Human Condition The Nature of Evil Identity and Society
4
Themes
Adultery
It is originally meant to be a symbol of shame.
Dimmesdale suffered physical and mental torture(折磨).
Chillingworth hides his identity and revenge himself on Dimmesdale.
4
Themes
通过人物的悲剧命运，揭露17世纪殖民地的 残酷现实，批判清教主义道德虚伪,表现对 人性本质的理解与同情，对爱情进行赞美， 探讨“善”与“恶”哲理。
Able
As time goes by, Hester has added to the letter another meaning through her own efforts.
Angel
Gradually，it becomes indeterminate（模糊的）：ቤተ መጻሕፍቲ ባይዱpeople even regard it as angle.
1
2 3
Author
Characters Plot Themes
4
1
Author
Nathaniel Hawthorne (纳撒尼尔·霍桑) An American novelist and short story writer His fiction works are . considered dark romanticism（黑色浪漫主义）
2
Characters
Chillingworth
Hester
Dimmesdale
Pearl
2
Characters
Old Ugly
Scholar
Deformed shoulders（畸形的肩膀）
Chillingworth
Distorted soul(扭曲的灵魂)
He is interested in revenge.