Abstract

    Nathaniel Hawthorne is an outstanding romantic novelist in the United States in the 19th century. His masterpiece The Scarlet Letter, a landmark in the history of American literature, is Hawthorne’s representative work to embody his literary thought and art and with strong religious color. The novel describes a love tragedy in the North American colonies of New England in the middle of the 17th century. In this work, Hawthorne combined the influence of Christian thought, not only in the technique of art but also in his adept use of biblical images and allusions. Hawthorne skillfully transplanted the biblical archetype to create the characters and plots of the novel, forming a strong intertexuality with the Bible.
The Scarlet Letter has attracted great attention since its publication in 1850, and treatise on it is numerous. Domestic research on it mainly focuses on the theme of moral, religion and human nature with the theory of new criticism, psychoanalysis and feminism. However, very few people attempt to use archetypal criticism to interpret the works. On the basis of previous studies, this paper will to analyze the Bible archetypes hidden in The Scarlet Letter with the theory of archetypal criticism from two aspects—characters and plot, including Adam-Eve archetype, Satan archetype, scapegoat archetype, the archetype of conflict between good and evil, etc. Based on the analysis, the thesis will further explain the Christian influence on western literature in particular, on Hawthorne and his works so as to illustrate the wide application biblical archetypes in The Scarlet Letter.

Key Words:  Hawthorne  The Scarlet Letter  Bible archetype  character  plot

摘要

    纳撒尼尔·霍桑(Nathaniel Hawthorne)是美国19世纪杰出的浪漫主义小说家。他的代表作《红字》是美国文学史上划时代的作品，是霍桑文学思想和文学艺术的代表作，富有浓厚的宗教色彩。小说描写了17世纪中叶发生在北美殖民地新英格兰的一幕爱情悲剧。在创作这部作品时，霍桑不仅从思想上深受基督教的影响，在艺术手法上也娴熟地运用了《圣经》的意象和典故，将圣经原型巧妙地移植到作品中，使小说人形物象和故事情节与圣经原型形成了强烈的互文性。
自从1850年这部小说的发行以来，《红字》就引起了极大的关注，评论著作数不胜数，其数量之多在美国文学史上名列前茅。国内评论家也用新批评主义、精神分析、女权主义等理论来解析作品的道德主题、宗教观和人性观等等。然而，很少有人尝试用原型批评的方法去解析这部作品，国内此类文章更是少见。在前人研究的基础上，论文将运用弗莱原型批评理论，从作品的人物和情节两方面着手，分析隐藏在《红字》中的圣经原型，如夏娃一亚当原型，替罪羊原型，撒旦原型，善恶冲突原型等。通过对《红字》中各种圣经原型的分析，论文将进一步阐释基督教对西方文学特别是霍桑及其作品的影响，论证《红字》中大量圣经原型存在的必然性。
 
关键词: 霍桑；《红字》；圣经原型；人物；情节