《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。

写读后感要注意
首先要设置一个境界 把你读的文章引出来 后面加一句 读了之后深受感触等话语
再把文章的主要内容概括出来
然后把你的想法另起一段写出来 要是自己的真情实感
然后结合自己的生活实际谈谈你对这个文章的观点
最后升化主题
简单说就是四个步骤：引,议,联,结.

Do you know a little girl's dream of how absurd do? A boring afternoon, watch the rabbits on a Chuaizhuo with this lovely little girl began her fantasy trip. The little girl who? She is "Alice in Wonderland" in the hero - Alice.
The first reading of "Alice in Wonderland", I have a special feeling fresh. Alice's dream of strange, absurd fun, filled with a variety of strange illusions: the ability to change into small body, composed of the Kingdom of the cards can be able to penetrate the mirror world, people forget the name of the small trees, etc. and so on. All this is like our children a colorful dream, deeply attracts us, let us begin to imagine the wings, had enough of the addiction. As I often fantasy: I am a lovely spirit, all day long in the universe to observe a beautiful planet. It was such a wonderful feeling ah! My understanding of "Alice in Wonderland" in the kitchen of the Duchess was impressed. Alice and frogs in particular, the servant of dialogue, let me think that it is laugh.
Re-reading of "Alice in Wonderland," this story, I also found that Alice is a very cute little girl. She innocent and lively, full of curiosity; she also had a compassion and know how to tell right from wrong. In the Alice who can see that our children's pure nature.
Because the entire story is full of fantasy, but the hero is so lovely, pure, how much it closer to our children's lives ah, so I think not only I like this book, I believe other small partners will certainly will be like.
Published in 1865 said, "Alice in Wonderland" and the 1871 book "Alice mirror Hero" swept along with the entire world, has joined after being translated into a variety of Shakespeare's most English language works.
All this is a fairy tale film after one hundred years later in children's literature still shine with brilliant splendor reasons. And that cute little good hero is one of a pearl. She may not be very smart, but she has a pure love, for a gosling are polite. Coupled with her pair of bright eyes, a vivid images leap off the paper girl.
绝对原创，看我写的手老酸了，再加两分吧 爱丽丝漫游奇境记

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.