簡明美國文學教程（簡體書）

For a longtime Hawthorne was preoccupied by a bitter feelingabout his family guilt. As a moralist and allegorist he probed deeplyinto the human , concerning himself with the of sin andsuffering from crime. He was adept at psychological exploration andwas regarded as an interpreter of the history of New England.
Symbolism was one of Hawthorne's and profound skillwith which he enriched the meaning in his fiction. A black veilthe wickedness of mankind; a marble heart-represents an's unpardonable sin; a garden of poisonous flowersrepresents. The use of symbols, on the one hand, made the themeof his writing more durable, but on the other, caused his characters tobe recalled as the embodiment of psychological traits or moralconcepts more than as living .
Residence at Concord had led to a close friendship with RalphWaldo Emerson, the philosopher and poet. A later stay at Lenox,Massachusetts, brought him into contact with Melville. Whilst livingin Lenox he published two lore novels, The House of the Seven Gables(1851) and The Blithedale Romance (1852). In later life he went toEurope, first working as Consul at Liverpool and then living in Italy,the scene and inspiration of his last completed novel, The MarbleFaun (1860). He died at Concord in 1864.
Hawthorne was the finest literary embodiment of the NewEngland in which he was so deeply imbued. He inheritedcharacteristic Puritan preoccupations-with sin, with guilt and withsecrecy-and became at once their chronicler and their critic. His bestwork is carefully and tightly organized, blending elements of realism,allegory and symbolism into a that he himself likes to call'romance'. Hawthorne's major achievements are the four novels-TheScarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables, The BlithedaleRomance and The Marble Faun-yet his stories should not beneglected. Amongst the best are: 'The May-Pole Of Merry Mount','Endicott and the Red Cross', 'The Minister's Black Veil', 'YoungGoodman Brown ', and 'Rappaccini's Daughter'.