Abstract:

Nathaniel Hawthorne is one of the most influential American romantic novelists in the nineteenth century. The features of his works are ambiguous morality, abundant visual imagination and the ‘power of blackness’ called by Melville. All of them make him win an eternal and great reputation. His works also attract the attentions of many critics from different times and different schools of thought. The Scarlet Letter is one of the most famous works of Hawthorne. This book becomes the focus of the critics by means of its profound moral implications, meticulous description and mysterious imagination. Moreover, the ambivalent views towards women of the writer implicated in this work also fascinate the readers and the critics.
This paper tries to discuss ambivalent views towards women in The Scarlet Letter from a dialectical perspective by text analysis and historical analysis. The whole passage is divided into five parts, including Introduction and Conclusion. The first part is a brief introduction to Hawthorne, his book named The Scarlet Letter and some domestic and international critical researches on this novel. The second is to analyze the formations of Hawthorne’s attitude towards women. The third and forth parts are to reveal Hawthorne’s pro-feminist and anti-feminist attitude towards women. And the last part is to summarize Hawthorne’s ambivalent views towards women.

Key words: Nathaniel Hawthorne；The Scarlet Letter；Feminism；resistance；religious brief

摘要：

纳撒尼尔·霍桑是十九世纪美国最具影响力的浪漫主义小说家，其作品特征表现为模糊的道德观，丰富的视觉想象以及梅尔维尔所称的“黑暗力量”，这些特征使得他在美国文学历史上获得了经久不衰的盛名。他的作品也一直吸引着世界各地不同时期不同流派的文学批评家的关注。《红字》是霍桑最负盛名的作品之一，其作品特征表现为邃的道德含义，细致的描写和神秘的想象，使得这部作品成为批评家们一直以来关注的焦点。此外，这部作品中体现出的作者矛盾的女性观也极大地吸引着读者和批评家们。
本文将采用文本分析和历史分析的方法，从辩证的角度研究霍桑在《红字》中所体现的矛盾的女性主义观。全文分为五部分（含引言和结论），第一部分为引言，主要介绍作者和作品《红字》，以及国内外对该作品的一些研究；第二部分分析作者矛盾女性观的成因；第三、四部分体现作者对于女性主义的赞同但同时又存在反女性主义倾向的矛盾心态；第五部分则通过对比总结出霍桑在《红字》中所体现出的矛盾的女性主义观。

关键词：纳撒尼尔·霍桑；《红字》；女性主义；抵抗；宗教信仰

Introduction
It is well known that America ushered in the first blooming of literature after the American Revolution. In the 19th century, there sprung up a lot of great writers such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Herman Melville and Walt Whitman. Among these brilliant writers, Nathaniel Hawthorne is considered to be one of the most influential American romantic novelists in the 19th century.
Hawthorne was obsessed with writing since he was in the university, his first novel Fanshawe was published at his own expense in 1825. But he was not recognized by the public until the publication of Twice-told Tales in 1837. Thirteen years later in 1950, Hawthorne became one of American great writers with the publication of The Scarlet Letter. His famous works including The Scarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables, The Blithedale Romance, Mosses from an Old Manse and The Marble Faun.