The Scarlet Letter offers an extraordinary insight into the norms and behavior of the 17th century if American Puritan society. The basic conflicts and problems of its main characters, however, are familiar to readers in the present. The female protagonist, has borne a child out of wedlock and has been jailed for over three months and sentenced to wear a symbol of her adultery, a scarlet “A” on her dress at all times. It concerns about the moral, emotional and psychological effect of the sin on people in general. It’s not simply a love story or a story of sin. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the scarlet letters to symbolize the harshness of Puritan society, showing how they brand sinners for life.
The story happened in Boston about 200 years ago. It narrates love affairs between three persons. The punished woman. Hester Prynne and his husband. Who called himself Roger Chillingworth . He is an old misshapen man and a doctor. Hester does not love him at all. Another man is a young minister, Dimmesdale, who has a high position among ministers and is highly respected among his people in town. Hester and Dimmesdale love each other. But their love is forbidden in that time . It is sinful. Due to this,Hester is punished by society with a letter A on her chest, which considered an evil, a shame.
In this novel, the mainline seems to be around the letter A. Hester is brave enough to face the cruel reality. She is always with a mind of courage. She has been alone with her child for so long , with litter communication. Shame! Hopelessness! Loneliness! Hester has to wear the letter A day after day, seven years as for punishment and ill fame.
When a woman has lived through a difficult experience, her character changes a great deal. If she be all tenderness, she will die. If she survive, the tenderness will leave her .Hester’s charitable deeds and quiet humility have earned her a reprieve from the scorn of the community. The letter on her chest represents her work on earth , always helping others, without expecting any thanks. Never afterwards, does that scarlet letter leave her chest. The townspeople no longer view the letter as a punishment , but rather as representing her great strength and bravery and thy say it means “Able”.
But Arthur Dimmesdale, his sin against Hester and Pearl is that he will not acknowledge them as his wife and daughter in the daylight. He keeps his dreadful secret from all those under his care in the church for seven years for fear that he will lose their love and will not be forgiven. He is too weak to admit his sins. He suffers from mysterious heart trouble, seemingly caused by psychological distress. What’s worse, he is an advisor to the townspeople about their sins.
After Mr. Dimmesdale’s death , no one changes more in appearance than Roger Chilling worth. All his strength and energy has been used to harm his patient . This unhappy man has made his aim in life to add to the suffering of the young minister. When the evil old man no longer has such a purpose, the devil takes him back to the hell . It is a curious subject of observation, however, whether hatred or love are not of the same place. Each takes a great deal of emotion from one person. The two feelings seem basically the same, expect that one is smiled upon by God, while the other is worshipped by the devil.
我这里正好有一篇
The two lovers has ever decided to flee to Europe, where they can live with their dauthter Pearl as a family .They feel a sense of release there. However, their plan fails…… When Hester dies, she is buried next to Dimmesdale. The two share a single tombstone, with a deep colored letter A shining brightly.

　　《红字》是美国小说家霍桑最杰出的代表作，也是整个美国浪漫主义小说中最有声望的权威作品之一。小说的故事发生在十七世纪中期加尔文者派统治下的波士顿，作者从当时的社会现状入手，通过一个感人的爱情故事悲剧来揭露当局对人们精神，心灵和道德的摧残。

　　海丝特·白兰是一个在婚姻上遭到不幸的女人，年轻美貌，却嫁给了身体畸形多病的术士罗杰*齐灵沃斯，夫妻间根本谈不上爱情，后来，罗杰又在海上失踪，杳无音讯，白兰孤独的过着日子。这时一个英俊有气魄的青年牧师，亚瑟*丁梅斯代尔闯入了她的生活，他们真诚的'相爱了，度过了一段隐私但热烈的爱情生活。不久，白兰由于怀孕的隐情暴露，以通奸罪被抓，在狱中生下了女儿小珠儿。

　　按照当时的教规，白兰只有交代奸夫的姓名才能获得赦免，否则将受惩罚。然而执行审讯任务的却正是他的情人。白兰宁愿独自忍受任何惩罚，为了把她和丁梅斯代尔之间的爱情深深地埋在心中，她坚强的挺住了。

　　海丝特·白兰受到了惩罚，她必须终身穿着一件绣着红色A字的外衣。字母A代表通奸(Adultery)一词。白兰带着小珠儿离群独居，在郊外偏僻的茅舍中过者孤寂的生活。而用心险恶的前夫罗杰发现了丁梅斯代尔的反常表现，利用牧师痛苦和矛盾的心情，不断地折磨他，终于丁梅斯代尔在他即将升为主教的前夕，当众宣布了自己的秘密，丁梅斯代尔向周围的人们展露了这首爱情的颂歌。当他把自己的胸衣扯开时，一个猩红的A字烙在他的胸前。他在自己的爱人身边离开了人世。

　　海丝特·白兰，他坚强，有毅力，对爱情忠贞不渝。虽然被统治者认为有罪，但她是清白的，纯洁的。她的精神不断上升，成为真，善，美的化身。她的举动是对封建政权与教权压迫下的爱情，人权和自由的充分肯定。

　　丁梅斯代尔最初与白兰产生了炽热的的爱情，虽然他一度退却了，为自己能够隐蔽的安慰，但内心的痛苦并没有因他的安全而平息，相反，越来越强烈。他与白兰的约会，他在枷刑台上的自我忏悔，他们的逃跑计划，以及最后的公开演说，都成为了丁梅斯代尔向着爱情的祭坛一步步走近的脚印。最后他扯开上衣，人们见到了烙在他胸口的红色A字。这个A字实际上是烙在他的心上的，这是爱情的升华。

　　作者用蔷薇花象征美与善，用监狱象征死亡，用一道光，一只鸟……象征丁梅斯代尔与白兰之间的爱情的结晶——小珠儿，使作品充满着一股迷人的魄力。

　　在作品的最后，在白兰和丁梅斯代尔合用的墓碑上刻着这样一句话:一片墓地上，刻着血红的A字。这句话不可谓不意味深长。

这里有三篇，参考参考哦！！~~
巴斯克维尔的猎犬读后感
report of “The hound of Baskervilles”
Sherlock Holmes is one world famous detective. "Four Signs", "Return Records", "Terrorist Valley" and so on are all Konan Doyle’s most famous stories.
He is good at searching and discovering. He is a very careful person as well. In the stories, he can easily give you the explanation of the things happened just now. Sherlock Holmes is such a person.
“The hound of Baskervilles” is my favourite. There is a legend that a hound used to kill people in the Baskervilles family. Holmes wanted to know more about it because Doctor James asked him for help. During the case, Charles Baskervilles died and the cause of his death may be the hound. After watching the situation in a small house for a period of time, Holmes found the murderer and he is going to murder Sir Henry Baskervilles. Sherlock Holmes, Doctor Watson and Henry Baskervilles killed the hound at last and the murderer who wanted to get the money of the family finally died in the marsh.
It is a very exciting story shows how clever Sherlock Holmes is. Thanks to Konan Doyle, we can read a lot of good detective stories now.
island of gold and silver(金银岛)
——读后感
"island of gold and silver" is a classic masterpiece in the world, is the author of the famous British writer Steven Health (1850-1894). This book describes Jim as a juvenile pedestrian island to find a sea pirate treasure buried money, and with the arrival led to John piracy groups conducted soul-stirring fierce fighting, the story itself. Editorial delicate fluid novels, romantic story novel, readers will stimulate the imagination, allowing readers to experience the wonderful adventure with the world moving heartstrings. Novels praised poor, vagrants, orphans, on the noble, courageous and well-intentioned, who have expanded the evil, cowardly and insidious way to pay tribute to character and good people
华盛顿广场读后感英文版
Despite I’ve not in my childhood yet, I still prefer reading fairy-tale stories. The tales, which accompany with me in my old days, often make me think of some precious experience and sensation which only belong to children. This summer I’ve review this kind of tale, which was published in 1940. It’s the world-famous fairy-tale by the French author, Antoine de St-Exupery, The Little Prince. As many other fairy-tales, the outline of The Little Prince is not very complex. “I”, the narrator of the story, is a pilot whose plane has something wrong and lands in the Sahara. In this occasion, the pilot makes the acquaintance of the little prince, a little boy from another planet, the Asteroid B612. The little prince has escaped from his tiny planet, because he has some quarrel with a rose, which grows on his planet. In that case he left his own planet and took an exploration at some neighbor asteroids. On his all-alone journey, the little prince meets different kinds of people, which includes a king, a conceited man, a tippler, a businessman, a lamplighter and a geographer. From these people he gets a conclusion that the grown-ups are very odd. Following the instruction of the geographer, he descends in the Sahara, on the earth. Unbelievable, this little book moved me a lot. I seldom think about the true meaning of love and life before. Well, now I can say, with my short sixteen-year’s life experience, it’s like the stars in the sky that lit my heart. The little prince is not only an ordinary fairy-tale for children, but also for grown-ups, and our teenagers. Nevertheless, when I read this book, I feel a little sad – about ourselves, whom are losing more and more innocence

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共30篇书评。点击打开。
between Hawthorne's earlier and his later productions there is no solution of literary continuity, but only increased growth and grasp. Rappaccini's Daughter, Young Goodman Brown, Peter Goldthwaite's Treasure, and The Artist of the Beautiful, on the one side, are the promise which is fulfilled in The Scarlet Letter and the House of The Seven Gables, on the other; though we should hardly have understood the promise had not the fulfillment explained it. The shorter pieces have a lyrical quality, but the longer romances express more than a mere combination of lyrics; they have a rich, multifarious life of their own. The material is so wrought as to become incidental to something loftier and greater, for which our previous analysis of the contents of the egg had not prepared us.
The Scarlet Letter was the first, and the tendency of criticism is to pronounce it the most impressive, also, of these ampler productions. It has the charm of unconsciousness; the author did not realize while he worked, that this "most prolix among tales" was alive with the miraculous vitality of genius. It combines the strength and substance of an oak with the subtle organization of a rose, and is great, not of malice aforethought, but inevitably. It goes to the root of the matter, and reaches some unconventional conclusions, which, however, would scarce be apprehended by one reader in twenty. For the external or literal significance of the story, though in strict correspondence with the spirit, conceals that spirit from the literal eye. The reader may choose his depth according to his inches but only a tall man will touch the bottom.
The punishment of the scarlet letter is a historical fact; and, apart from the symbol thus ready provided to the author's hand, such a book as The Scarlet Letter would doubtless never have existed. But the symbol gave the touch whereby Hawthorne's disconnected thoughts on the subject were united and crystallized in organic form. Evidently, likewise, it was a source of inspiration, suggesting new aspects and features of the truth,—a sort of witch-hazel to detect spiritual gold. Some such figurative emblem, introduced in a matter-of-fact way, but gradually invested with supernatural attributes, was one of Hawthorne's favorite devices in his stories. We may realize its value, in the present case, by imagining the book with the scarlet letter omitted. It is not practically essential to the plot. But the scarlet letter uplifts the theme from the material to the spiritual level. It is the concentration and type of the whole argument. It transmutes the prose into poetry. It serves as a formula for the conveyance of ideas otherwise too subtle for words, as well as to enhance the gloomy picturesqueness of the moral scenery. It burns upon its wearer's breast, it casts a lurid glow along her pathway, it isolates her among mankind, and is at the same time the mystic talisman to reveal to her the guilt hidden in other hearts. It is the Black Man's mark, and the first plaything of the infant Pearl. As the story develops, the scarlet letter becomes the dominant figure,—everything is tinged with its sinister glare. By a ghastly miracle its semblance is reproduced upon the breast of the minister, where "God's eye beheld it! the angels were forever pointing at it! the devil knew it well, and fretted it continually with the touch of his burning finger!"—and at last, to Dimmesdale's crazed imagination, its spectre appears even in the midnight sky as if heaven itself had caught the contagion of his so zealously hidden sin. So strongly is the scarlet letter rooted in every chapter and almost every sentence of the book that bears its name. And yet it would probably have incommoded the average novelist. The wand of Prospero, so far from aiding the uninititated, trips him up, and scorches his fingers. Between genius and every other attribute of the mind is a difference not of degree, but of kind.
Every story may be viewed under two aspects: as the logical evolution of a conclusion from a premise, and as something colored and modified by the personal qualities of the author. If the latter have genius, his share in the product is comparable to nature's in a work of human art,—giving it everything except abstract form. But the majority of fiction-mongers are apt to impair rather than enhance the beauty of the abstract form of their conception, -- if, indeed, it possess any to begin with. At all events, there is no better method of determining the value of a writer's part in a given work than to consider the work in what may be termed its prenatal state. How much, for example, of The Scarlet Letter was ready made before Hawthorne touched it? The date is historically fixed at about the middle of the seventeenth century. The stage properties, so to speak, are well adapted to become the furniture and background of a romantic narrative. A gloomy and energetic religious sect, pioneers in a virgin land, with the wolf and the Indian at their doors, but with memories of England in their hearts and English traditions and prejudices in their minds; weak in numbers, but strong in spirit; with no cultivation save that of the Bible and the sword; victims, moreover of a dark and bloody superstition,—such a people and scene give admirable relief and color to a tale of human frailty and sorrow. Amidst such surroundings, then, the figure of a woman stands, with the scarlet letter on her bosom. But here we come to a pause, and must look to the author for the next step.
For where shall the story begin? A "twenty-number" novel, of the Dickens or Thackeray type, would start with Hester's girlhood, and the bulk of the narrative would treat of the genesis and accomplishment of the crime. Nor are hints wanting that this phase of the theme had been canvassed in Hawthorne's mind. We have glimpses of the heroine in the antique gentility of her English home; we see the bald brow and reverend beard of her father, and her mother's expression of heedful and anxious love; we behold the girl's own face, glowing with youthful beauty. She meets the pale, elderly scholar, with his dim yet penetrating eyes, and the marriage, loveless on her part and folly on his, takes place; but they saw not the bale-fire of the scarlet letter blazing at the end of their path. The ill-assorted pair make their first home in Amsterdam; but at length, tidings of the Puritan colony in Massachusetts reaching them, they prepare to emigrate thither. But Prynne, himself delaying to adjust certain affairs, sends his young, beautiful, wealthy wife in advance to assume her station in the pioneer settlement. In the wild, free air of that new world her spirits kindled, and many unsuspected tendencies of her impulsive and passionate nature were revealed to her. The "rich, voluptuous, Oriental characteristics" of her temperament, her ardent love of beauty, her strong intellectual fibre, and her native energy and capacity,—such elements needed a strong and wise hand to curb and guide them, scarcely disguised as they were by the light and graceful foliage of her innocent, womanly charm. Being left, however, for two years "to her own misguidance," her husband had little cause to wonder, when, on emerging from the forest, the first object to meet his eyes was Hester Prynne, "standing up, a statue of ignominy, before the people." She "doubtless was strongly tempted to her fall;" and though the author leaves the matter there, so far as any explicit statement is concerned, it is manifest that, had he written out what was already pictured before his imagination, the few pregnant hints scattered through the volume would have been developed into as circumstantial and laborious a narrative as any the most deliberate English or French novelist could desire.
For his forbearance he has received much praise from well-meaning critics, who seem to think that he was restrained by considerations of morality or propriety. This appears a little strained. As an artist and as a man of a certain temperament, Hawthorne treated that side of the subject which seemed to him the more powerful and interesting. But a writer who works with deep insight and truthful purpose can never be guilty of a lack of decency. Indecency is a creation, not of God or of nature, but of the indecent. And whoever takes it for granted that indecency is necessarily involved in telling the story of an illicit passion has studied human nature and good literature to poor purpose.

《红字》是美国浪漫主义作家Nathaniel Hawthornes（霍桑）的代表作。
　　我读到的这个版本可能是删节版，因为书中只写了一个有关通奸的故事，而我在以前课本的印象中依稀记得该书应由四个不同的有关通奸的故事组成，不去管它。今此只对我读到的这个故事略抒牢骚。
　　故事的情节其实相当简单，出场人物也绝不复杂，我却不得不佩服霍桑大师用最少的人物描摹出的一件平凡的事情背后的匠心独运。他那精巧又不乏叛逆与鞭笞的文笔勾起了我一气呵成读完全书的冲动。
　　没读过此书的朋友大概不知道书名“红字”一词的含义，就其英文本义“The Scarlet Letter”来讲即红颜色的大写字母之意。实际指代红色的大写字母A（英文“adultery「通奸」”一词的缩写）。但这也仅仅是其书其文的表面含义，实质其包蕴扩展的隐含意却更为开阔，由于我对此书的窥视不深，不敢乱谈。
　　小说的主人公Hester Prynne以一个饱受舆论、世俗观与宗教谴责唾弃的犯有通奸罪行的少妇出场，她虽然含垢忍辱，却敢于面对现实、乐观人生。她对自己所犯下的错误只有觉悟却毫无后悔。她的坦然与坚强、勇敢与超脱刻画出了一个超呼同类的新殖民地女性的不俗性格。她的思想中饱含着强烈的反抗与挣扎精神，虽然凭借一己微薄之力无法斗争到底，但已表现出鲜明的反清教反世俗的立场。由此可以看出霍桑对清教历史、清教徒是进行了否定与憎恶的剖析的。
　　小说的另一位主人公Dimmesdale自始至终都备受良心的谴责和对自己不负责任的行为给她人造成的恶果的愤怒及对自己无限敬仰的上帝的信念的徘徊迷惘。与她的情人Hester Prynne相比，身为牧师的他实在是谨小慎微到不敢面对现实却又在痛苦埋怨的折磨中不断自惭的地步。每当读到牧师的内心独白时，急得我恨不能把当页纸撕碎，我的脑子便不时冒出这样的疑问，“两位主人公为什么不私奔呢？如果一开始就选择私奔，逃到一个陌生的地方进行全新的生活，不好吗？赶快私奔啊！”。霍桑当然没有这样安排剧情，因为Dimmesdale身为牧师的宿命只能决定他最后以悲剧的结局收场。即便当小说尾声两位主人公总算萌生我所期盼的私奔想法时，作者也没让他俩善终。我想，这也许正是大师文章结构的绝妙之处。我太过忽视Dimmesdale对上帝的依赖与崇拜，他的所有个人言行无时无刻不在受着《圣经》制约，他不得不用神职人员的教理来规范净化自己的品德与心灵，他对上帝的虔诚与忠实不允许他出卖自己的灵魂、背弃自己的信仰、搪塞自己的过失。所以，牧师虽然隐藏了七年通奸的罪恶，但他内心所受的折磨与打击其实要远盛于Hester Prynne.对此我只能表示惋惜，我对牧师性格的归纳是：内向并由于爱情的永恒始终无法凌驾于上帝的恩泽之上。否则，本书的结局不该那么悲惨。
　　当然，霍桑还在文中巧妙地安排了一个处心积虑却也同样充满悲剧色彩的人物Roger Chillingworth，作为Hester Prynne的丈夫，在得知其妻的通奸罪恶事实后，所逐步表现出来的老谋深算、恶毒狡诈的对情敌Dimmesdale的复仇计划，实在令人发指。即使当最后牧师心力衰竭步向天堂之际，Roger Chillingworth仍不忘对牧师咆哮，“Thou hast escaped me”，大概对Dimmesdale没有死在至少没有完全死在自己精心报复安排之下仍有很大的不甘于不平。本来作为受害者出场的Roger Chillingworth却导演着整个故事的发展流向并最终成为一名害人的恶魔。Roger Chillingworth自书中开头体察出牧师与其妻情感的微妙关系后所表现出来的种种失常的心态与恶毒的计划，其心何其孽也，全为“情”字所困。看来如果一个读书人，当他把书本知识转嫁到报复的才能中去时，应是相当可怕的事。
　　Pearl是Hester Prynne和Dimmesdale通奸的产物。小女孩是天真无辜的。她是书中能给读者不经意的眼泪揩上一丝手绢或携上一缕轻风的人物。作为一个还在懵懂之中的儿童，Pearl不理解母亲Hester Prynne胸前绣着的红字的含义。但却始终对红字充满了好奇与向往，甚至当Hester Prynne一次扔掉红字后大显脾气表达出极度的不习惯。作为两位主人公悲剧的结晶物，她在天真中深刻而又缓慢地体察着这个奥妙无情的世界，也许她对红字还不能理解透彻，但我相信，如果故事还能发展下去，她一定会为母亲的红字正名并洗刷耻辱的。
　　霍桑对人物内心矛盾的刻画十分到位。文中不断使用象征手法，与之同期的作家爱默生、梭罗、麦尔维尔等风格迥异、特点鲜明。其人饱读群书、其文洒脱怪异。喜欢美国文学的朋友，霍桑的作品，不可放过。