On The Symbolic Meaning In Hawthorne’s Works The Scarlet Letter

Nathaniel Hawthorne was the most important American romantic representative in the late nineteenth century, and was one of the greatest novelist in the history of American literature.He was famous for his deep thoughts and excellent writing skills in American, Britain and the world’s literary world so far. Hawthorne’s literary works and the artistic achievement have a great impact on his time and today. The Scarlet Letter is not only his long novel representative, but also is the writer’s first works, which focuses on the performance of the author thought and artistic features.it is both Hawthorne’s best work and is also Americans pride at that time. The Scarlet Letter was published in1850, after which Hawthorne became famous soon, and turned the most important recognized writer. In the second year the novel was translated into German, after three years it had the French translation version. During these years it has been translated into many languages, and it is also adapted into drama and opera. So many critics and readers showed great appeal to the advent of the works. Many literary critics used different theory to analyze the works.Hawthorne’s influence on the world literature is very important. One is skillful use of symbolism in his novel creation; The other one is the psychologica analysis of the characters in the disorder of mental and moral. His novels are unique in the ideological content and artistic technique.However, Hawthorne and his works are always the focus of criticism. Critics study them from different angles and levels, but all the critics gave the highest evaluation to The Scarlet Letter. In recent years,there are many domestic and foreign academic articles which are writing about the symbolic significance of The Scarlet Letter, if we want to explore the deeper significance through the surface, it is not a simple thing. it must involve many disciplines and theoretical problems. I have a special connectiong with the novel The Scarlet Letter, so I ventured to chose it as a subject.Hawthorne used symbolism widely in The Scarlet Letter and made four major figures together skillfully with the only word "A".The use of symbolism in the story is full of mystery, enriches the ideological content of the works, and increases the novel’s artistic charm, leaves imaginational space and infinite aftertaste to the readers. This paper explores the symbolic significance of the scarlet letter "Hawthorne" as the breakthrough point, discusses the symbolism in The Scarlet Letter in performance, from the analysis of romanticism and psychological point of view, I give a detailed analysis of the symbolic significance of works, the unique feathurc of the symbolism in The Scarlet Letter, from a different side suggests that theme of The Scarlet Letter. This article is composed of introduction, three chapters and conclusion part.The former part of the introduction mainly focuses on Hawthorne’s personal experiences and his works The Scarlet Letter’s brief introduction; the latter part simply explains the symbolic significance and its effect.The first chapter, based on the modern romance red letter A has different symbolic significance with the story’s development; initially represented the "adultery", later evolved into "able, angel" and the "heroic warrior woman"The second chapter, a detailed explanation of the four main characters’symbolic significance. They are Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, Roger Chillingworth, Pear.The third chapter, a careful analysis of the main characters of the naming of the symbolic significances, respectively Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale. Roger Chillingworth, Pear.In the conclusion part of this paper I further concluded that on the basis of summing up:The Scarlet Letter’s biggest success thanks to the skillful use of symbolism and the excellent control ability, Hawthorne’s rich and unique symbolism opened a symbolic novels as an independent literary variety precedent. Hawthorne became one of the founder of modern literature of symbolism, also makes The Scarlet Letter become the United States of America’s first cross-border book, won the world reputation in literary works.I also summarize the symbolic significance of the scarlet letter "A", main characters’, the main characters’names, symbol in this work, the function and characteristic of polysemy, symbolic system and metaphorical symbol and the influence on later wrters and their works of Hawthorne’s symbolism.At last, I point out that Hawthorne,because of some limitations of himself, tried to found his solution to the problem with religion, even believed that sin is universal, but in any case, Hawthorne’s superb artistic techniques——Symbol——is worth exploring and studying.