【正文】 , but an island of refuge f rom sleepless night, chaos, loneli nes, ol d age, the meaninglesnes of lif e, and i m pending death. In some novels and stori es, some char acters are symboli c. Such charact er s usual y appear br iefl y and remai n sl ight ly myst er ious. In Joseph Cornar d’ s Heart of Darknes, a steamship pany t hat hi res men t o wor k in Congo maintains i n it s wait ing room two women who kni t。 its syl labl es, the nar at or tel s us, “cast an Eastern enchant ment over me.” Even a local e, or a f eature of physi cal topography, can pr ovide ri ch symboli c suggesti ons. The caf233。 they point, they hi nt , or , as Henry James put it , t hey cast l ong shadows. Symboli sm The term symbol ism refers t o the use of symbols, or to a set of r el at ed symbols, which is one of the devices that enrich short f ict ion and pensat e for its bri ef ness i n space. 2. There are two broad types of l it erary symbols Symbol is gener al ly acknowl edged to be one of the most fr equently employed devices i n poetr y. In works of f iction it is no less f requent and no less i mpor tant . The fact is t hat, when a reader reads a wor k of f iction, his f ocus is mostl y cast upon the plot, the charact er , and the language used, so t hat the symbol s are automat ical ly backgr ounded on t he r eader ’s par t. But in some novel s and st or ies, the symbol ism looms so large that he r eader wil l f ai l t o get a pr ehensive under st anding of the work wit hout payi ng special at enti on t o the symbol s. The Scarlet Let er by Nat haniel Hawthorne is one of such works. The very t itl e points t o a doubl e symbol : t he scarl et let er A worn by Hester conveys a mult iple of senses which dif er greatly f rom what it l iteral y st ands f or , and the wor k event ual y devel ops into a test and cr it que of symbols t hemselves. Thomas Pynchon’s V. continues along much the same li ne, t esti ng an alphabeti cal symbol . Another example is Herman Mel vi l e’ s MobyDick, i n whi ch t he huge white whale in t he t itl e of the book acquires gr eater meaning than t he l iter al di ct ionar y defi ni ti on of an aquatic mammal. It al so suggests more t han the devil , t o whom some of the charact er s liken it. The huge whale, as the stor y unfolds, es to i mpl y an amplit ude of m eani ngs: among t hem t he f or ces of nature and t he whol e universe. Liter ar y symbols are of two broad types: one type incl udes t hose embodying uni versal suggest ions of m eani ng. Flowing water suggests t ime and eternit y, a jour ney i nt o the under wor ld and r et ur n fr om it is interpr et ed as a spiri tual experi ence or a dark night of the soul, and a kind of r edempti ve odyssey. Such symbols are used widel y (and somet imes unconsciously) in west er n li ter ature. The ot her t ype of symbol secures it s suggest iveness not fr om qualit ies inherent i n itself but fr om the way i n whi ch it i s used i n a gi ven wor k, i n a special context . Thus, in Moby Dick the voyage, the land, and t he ocean ar e objects pr egnant with meani ngs that sem almost i ndependent of t he author ’s use of them in the story。 he hi nt s that some sad, passionat e spir it is brooding as it wat ches t he passing pr ocesion of humanity. Such an object is a symbol: in li terature, a symbol is athing that r ef er s or suggests more than its l iteral meaning. There are quite a l ot of symbols t hat appear i n or dinar y lif e, for the use of symbol is by no means of l imi ted to li terature and art . For inst ance, a dove is a symbol of peace, t he f l ag i s the symbol of a countr y, and the cross i s t he symbol of the Christi an r el igion. These ar e symbols adopted by a whole society and are r ecognized by al members of such a society. There are other kinds of symbol s, such as f igur e 3, which may be abstrac t symbols. But symbol s i n lit er at ure works ar e dif ferent f rom eit her of the other types. Gener al ly speaki ng, a lit er ar y symbol does not have a mon soci al aceptance, as does the fl ag。 for inst ance, the ways sentences are connect ed. This is t he i nt er nal or ganizat ion of a text. Under cont ext , r oughl y the mat er ial, mental, per sonal , i nt er acti onal , soci al , i nsti tutional , cultural, and histori cal si tuat ion in which the di scourse is made, we consider t he external relati ons of t he l iterary t ext or a par t of the text, seei ng i t as a discour se presupposing a soci al r elati on between i ts par ticipant s ( author and reader, charact er and char acter, charact er and r eader , etc.) , and a shar ing of knowledge and assumptions by par ti ci pant s. Cohesi on: Does the text contain l ogical or ot her li nks between sent ences (eg coordinating conjunct ions, linking adver bi al s) , or does it tend t o repl y on i mpl icit connections of meaning? What sort of use is made of cr oss reference by pr onouns (she, it , t hey, etc), by substi tute forms ( do, so, et c) , or el lipsis? I s ther e any use made of el egant var iation—the avoidance of r epet it ion by substi ut ion of a descripti ve phrase ( as “the ol d lawyer” substi ut es f or t he r epet it ion of an earl ier “Mr Jones”) ? Are meaning connecti ons reinforced by r epet it ion of words and phr ases, or by repeatedl y using wor ds f rom t he same semanti c f ield? Cont ext: Does the writ er addr ess the reader dir ectl y, or t hr ough the wor ds or thought s of som e f icti onal char acter? What li nguisti c cl ues (eg fir st per son pronouns I , m e, m y, mi ne) ar e t her e of the addreser addr essee relati onshi p? What ati tude does t he aut hor im pl y t owar ds his/ her subject ? If a charact er ’s words or t houghts are r epresent ed, is t his done by di rect quot ati on, or by some other method (eg indi rect speech, f ree indi rect speech)? Ar e t her e si gnifi cant changes of st yl e