从《红字》谈霍桑的女性意识

Hawthorne's Feminist Consciousness Implied in the Scarlet Letter

本文借用女性主义文学批评的理论和方法,对美国著名作家霍桑在他的代表作《红字》中所表现出的女性意识进行探讨。在《红字》中,霍桑揭示出女主人公海丝特在清教男权社会中处于"边缘"地位。批判了男权社会中普遍存在的厌女意识;并且通过把女主人公海丝特的坚强和对不公命运的抗争同男主人公的软弱和对命运的无助进行对比,颠覆了男权社会把女性作为"客体"的传统观念,在自己的想象"红字"世界中为海丝特赢得了一个"主体"的位置。正是通过对海丝特这一女性人物的塑造表达出霍桑潜在的女性主义意识。

This essay is to explore Hawthorne's feminist consciousness implied in The Scarlet Letter. In this novel, by disclosing Hester's marginalized status, Hawthorne shows that misogyny universally exists in the Puritan patriarchy. And he condemns the unfair treatment of women, which stems from male-dominated ideology. In order to restore women's position of subjectivity, Hawthorne subverts the conception of binary oppositions of man and woman in the male-dominated culture by constructing the plot of story and depicting female and male characters. Through the analysis of the representation of the female character, Hester, Hawthorne's feminist consciousness can be detected in The Scarlet Letter.