美国研究生信英文版

2025-02-05

美国研究生信英文版（7篇）

1.美国研究生信英文版篇一

假定你是李华，你的美国朋友Justin将于下个月来你所在的城市旅游,你已经为他预订了酒店，但因参加考试不能接待他。请根据以下要点给他写一封电子邮件：

1.表达歉意；

2.陈述原因；

3.告知酒店的相关信息。

注意:

1.词数：100左右；

2.可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯。

参考范文

Dear Justin,

I feel really sorry to tell you that I cannot keep you company and show you around my city next month during your stay here, for there will be an important exam. But you don’t have to worry about your accommodations here in my city. I have already reserved a room in Weifang Hotel, which is at No.34 Dongfeng Street and you can easily check in by the name on your passport. For more information about the hotel, you can call the reception desk at 0536-87654321.

Let me know if you need any help and wish you a pleasant journey and enjoy an adventure in my hometown.

Yours,

Li Hua

★ 写给前女友的一封信

★ 道歉信

★ 道歉信格式

★ 作文批改网

★ 英语范文批改

★ 作文批改

★ 男子垒球加油稿

★ 男子引体向上加油稿

★ 作业批改评语

★ 初一作文批改

2.美国研究生信英文版篇二

Although tracing back to its exact origin is practically impossible, foreign direct investment (FDI) is now perceived as a classic form of business across the world. By definition, FDI refers to “an investment made to acquire lasting interest in enterprises operating outside of the economy of the investor” (International Monetary Fund, IMF, 1993) .

By receiving capital, technologies or managerial expertise, developing countries like China and India have benefited from FDI greatly, while at the same time low-cost products have entered advanced economies from developing economies, profiting both Western enterprises and consumers. Therefore, it is widely accepted that FDI is a win-win choice of both home and host countries and “a major catalyst to development” (Organization for Economic Co- operation and Development, OECD, 2002) .

Considering the following two questions, the first being how nations attract FDI and the second being how MNEs decide whereto invest, there exists a short answer for both questions: to minimize risks. Indeed, given their influences in affecting firms’ prof it ability, various risks, such as a sudden political upheaval, a huge fluctuation in exchange rate, or an unfavourable amendment of legal provisions, etc., are primary concerns for investors. Those risks, in particular, are more striking and common in developing countries, as those countries typically have weak and fragile political, economic and legal frameworks. Thus, minimizing risks is a key to success for both nations seeking capitals and MNEs creating FDI.

Section 1 Literature Review

1.1 A Brief Review of the History and Phenomenon of FDI

Foreign direct investment is a major form of international capital fl ows. It involves a physical investment by a company from one country to another (Sullivan and Sheffrin, 2003) . Foreign direct investment distinguishes itself from international portfolio investment by the degree of control of a foreign affiliate (IMF, 1993) . According to the IMF’s definition, when an investment into a foreign company is worth more than 10% of the voting power of the company, the investment is defi ned as a foreign direct investment. In calculation, FDI is commonly divided into three parts: equity capital, reinvested earnings and intr a-company loans. However, UNCTAD (2009) pointed out that countries do not always compile with those three categories when collecting and allocating data.

To understand the incentives behind the decisions of firms in undertaking investments abroad, Seyf (2001) identified the following motivations: to explore new markets; to acquire new technologies;to overcome tariff and other protective restrictions; to enhance efficiency of servicing a foreign market by localizing production; to reduce risk by diversifying market as well as product; to be able to combat the threat of rivals in the international marketplace and so on.

1.2 Theoretical Analysis of Risks Associated with FDI

As noted at the beginning of this paper, given MNEs’ ultimate goal of maximizing profits, various risks which directly affect profitability are the primary concerns of firms who seek offshore investments. Many scholars pointed out that investing aboard carries additional risks compared with investing domestically (Lessard, 1996; Musonera, 2008) . Those additional risks which were frequently mentioned in previous studies include political risk, economic risk, exchange rate risk, legal risk, sovereign risk, and so on.

Political Risk

One common concept given to political risk is known as “the actions of national governments which interfere with or prevent business transactions, or change the terms of agreements, or cause the confiscation of wholly or partially foreign owned business property” (Weston and Sorge, 1972) . In this context, political risk partially represents the concept of legal risk. Especially, in many developing countries, administrative authorities hold tremendous in fluencesover the operation of the judicial systems, which means that some judicial actions against foreign firms may be reflections of political decisions. However, Robock (1971) criticized the opinion by pointing out that “political fluctuations which do not change the business environment significantly do not represent risk for international business”.

Economic Risk

Economic risk of host countries ranks high in the list of risks associated with FDI, as Musonera (2008) claimed that “the level of economic activity of a country sets the stage for business operations.” Mel drum (2000) defined economic risk as a significant change in the economic structure or growth rate that produces ama jor change in the expected return of an investment. This definition makes it clear that FDI are subject to the economic factors of host countries, as it affects the profitability of MNEs.

Exchange Rate Risk

Exchange rate risk has become an increasingly highlighted risk since the collapse of the Brett on Woods system in the early1970s which marked the end of fixed exchange rates regime among world’s major economies (Schmidt and Broll, 2008) . In general, exchange rate risk refers to “the effect that unanticipated exchange rate changes have on the value of the firm” (Giddy and Dufey, 1997) . More specifically, it is a risk stemming from changes in the exchange rates for different currencies and affecting investments and business operations of companies undertaking international business (BNET, 2007) .

Legal risk

A sound legal environment is considered to be crucial to investors, especially foreign investors, in operating their businesses.Perry-Kessaris (2003) pointed out that it is common to argue that the direction of FDI to some extent depends on the effectiveness of destination countries’ legal systems. Contrary to such a sound legal environment which possesses characteristics including transparency, certainty, accountability, and consistency, etc., legal risk arises from uncertainty due to “legal actions or uncertainty in the applicability or interpretation of contracts, laws or regulations” (Risk glossary. com, 2004) .

1.3 Previous Empirical Studies on the Relationship between Risks and FDI

Ramcharran (1999) pointed out that there are two types of empirical studies–“survey method”and“statistical analysis”in analyzing the correlation between country risk and FDI. In using the survey method, researchers typically request a large number of executives from different multinational firms to rank or list risks which may affect their overseas investment decisions. By employing this method, Basi (1963) , Aharoni (1966) , and Agodo (1978) among others found that the risk mangers concern the most is political risk.Obviously, a common criticism regarding the survey method is solely dependent on respondents’subjectivity (Kobrin, 1979; Brewer, 1981) .

The statistical analysis requires the use of econometric techniques. Ordinary least square estimation is a fundamental technique applied by researchers when studying the relationship between country risk and FDI. Also, panel data is often employed and fixed or random effect can be applied depending on the current circumstances.

2 Empirical Studies

2.1 Methodology

This paper studies the relationship between risks and FDI focusing on the U.S. outward FDI fl ows in 43 developing countries during the period of 1984 to 2007. The choice of this period allows the empirical analysis of this paper to be based on a more recent time spam than most of previous studies. In analyzing the impact of various risks on FDI flows, panel dataset is employed in this paper. As Hsiao (2003) and Baltagi (2005) identified, applying panel data analysis has the following advantages. Firstly, panel data analysis controls individual heterogeneity in the way illustrated later. Secondly, effects that are not detectable in cross-sectional or time-series dataset will be captured by panel data analysis. Thirdly, more complicated behaviour al models are able to be constructed and tested in panel data analysis. Finally, panel data analysis offer smore variability, reduces collinearity among variables, and enhances degrees of freedom and efficiency.

The regression model applied in the estimation is stated as follow:

wherei=1, 2, ..., N , andt?1, 2, ..., T .

In the model, Yit is the amount of U.S. outward FDI to countryiat time t , X is a vector of variables including controls as well askey variables that are under primary interest. ?i is the time invariant country specific characteristics and?it is the error term that varies both across time and countries.

By using panel dataset, this paper applies “fixed effect” in estimating the regression equation above. It is assumed the country specific effect?i is correlated with the explanatory variables. One of the major advantages of using fixed effect is that this econometric technique eliminates the country specific characteristics before estimation. If such characteristics exist, the regression results are likely to be biased. For example, a MNE’s decision to invest into a particular country may be based on that country’s specif iclocation and culture. However, those country specific features may well correlate with variables that are included in the regression equation, making the estimation results biased because some of the effects of time invariant variables that are not included in the equation have been absorbed by variables that are included in the equation.The following steps illustrate how the within estimation solves this potential problem. Firstly, by taking the equation above and average across time we obtain

Secondly, by subtracting (2) from (1) we have

It can be seen from (3) that the country specific characteristic ηiis eliminated. Therefore, (3) is the final equation to be estimated and the technique is referred as fixed, or within estimation. Furthermore, robust standard error is applied through the Fixed Effect estimations.

Based on the above model and the availability of data, the general form of the estimation equation can be written as below:

FDI = FDI (economic risk, political risk, control variables)

where economic risk is measured by inflation rates of host countries, political risk is measured by the in dices of bureaucracy quality and democratic accountability of host countries, both issued in the International Country Risk Guide (ICRG) . Control variables include gross domestic product (GDP) per capita and exchange rates of host countries.

It is important and necessary to include variables which also affect flows of U.S. outward FDI along with various risk factors in the regression estimation. This is because if those variables are excluded, their effects on the flows of U.S. outward FDI will be captured by the error term. Given the potential correlation between those variables and various types of risks, the error term in there gression equation will be correlated with the key risk variables that are under primary interest. As a result, it leads to the violation of Gauss-Markov conditions which biases the estimation results.

The reason why exchange rates act as a control variable here rather than a measure of exchange rates risk results from the unavailability of daily, monthly or quarterly exchange rates between the U.S. and host countries, which restricts the calculation of volatilities of exchange rates used to measure exchange rates risk.

According to above analysis, an appropriate empirical model for analyzing the relationship between flows of the U.S. outward FDI and political and economic risks can be given in the following linear form.

wherei=1, 2, ..., N , andt?1, 2, ..., T .

In the equation, USFDIit denotes flows of U.S. outward FDI into country i in year t ; INFit denotes inf lation rate of country i in yeart ; BQit bureaucracy quality of country i in year t ; DAit denotes democratic accountability of country i in year t ; EXRATEit denotes average off icial exchange rate in a year between the U.S. and country i in year t ; country i in year t ; country i in year t ;GDPPCit denotes GDP per capita of country i in year t . Besides, β 0 is a constant; βs are estimated coeff icients of each variable; ε is an error term with a zero conditional mean.

The justification of all independent variables is shown as follows:

1. Inflation rate. Acting as a proxy of economic risk, inflation rate is expected to have a negative correlation with flows of U.S.outward FDI. That is, other things being equal, when a country’s inflation rate increases, especially when it increases sharply, U.S.outward FDI to that country is expect to decrease, because a higher inflation rate indicates lower macroeconomic stability and higher risk, vice versa.

2. Bureaucracy quality. Bureaucracy quality is an indicator of political risk. According to the PRS Group (2009) who is responsible for the conducting of ICRG, bureaucracy quality measures “the institutional strength and quality of the bureaucracy”. It is rated between 0 and 4 with 0 indicating the lowest bureaucracy quality and the highest political risk because of drastic changes in policy or interruptions in government services (ICRG, 2009) and 4 indicating the highest bureaucracy quality and the lowest political risk. Thus, it is expected to have a negative correlation between bureaucracy quality and FDI. That is, other things being equal, when a country is assigned a low rating of bureaucracy quality, suggesting the country has high political risk, fl ows of U.S. outward FDI to that country is expected to be low, vice versa.

3. Democratic accountability. Democratic accountability is another proxy of political risk. It measures the responsiveness of a government to its citizens such that the irresponsiveness may cause the failure of the government (ICRG, 2009) . Countries are rated between 0 and 6 in terms of their democratic accountabilities. The higher a country is rated, the lower the political risk of that country possesses and vice versa. Hence, a negative correlation between democratic accountability and f lows of U.S. outward FDI is expected.

4. GDP per capita. GDP per capita represents the size of a country’s economy. One of the main incentives for MNEs to invest abroad directly is to gain access to foreign market. As a result, countries with higher GDP per capita are likely to attract more FDI from the U.S., ceterisparibus. To ana lyse the effects of different risk son U.S. FDI outflow, it is necessary to control for GDP per capita of the host countries, otherwise, estimated coefficients may be biased as different forms of risks of a country is likely to be correlated with its level of GDP pe

5. Exchange rate. Exchange rate is measured in terms of local currency units per U.S. dollar, so that an increase in exchange rate indicates a depreciation of a host country’s currency. As explained earlier, exchange rate is a control variable in the regression, which means that it acts as a general determinant of the flows of U.S.outward FDI. Thus, exchange rate is expected to positively correlate with the flows of U.S. outward FDI, ceterisparibus. The rationale behind this expected relationship is that when a country’s currency depreciates, foreign firms homed in another country with a relatively stronger currency would have their production costs reduced and profitability increased.

2.2 Data Sources

The flows of U.S. outward FDI are obtained from the website of the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) of the U.S. Department of Commerce. The data have been adjusted into constant 2000 U.S.dollars in the unit of million.

Variables including inflation rate, GDP per capita and exchange rate come from the World Development Indicators (WDI) in the version of June, 2009. WDI is conducted by the World Bank and published on the Bank’s website. In the empirical studies, inflation rates of individual countries are given in decimal. Data of GDP per capita are in constant 2000 U.S. dollars. Exchange rates are real exchange rates derived from official ones. The reason of using official exchange rates is that although they may undervalue or overvalue domestic currencies, given MNEs have to transfer funds through legal channels in most cases, it is these rates concerning MNEs.

As noted previously, two risk measures of bureaucracy quality and democratic accountability are conducted by the International Country Risk Guide, a product of the PRS Group.

2.3 Data Description

Table 1 illustrates the statistics of variables contained in the regression which shows numbers of observations, means, standard deviations, minimums and maximums of both dependent variable and independent variables. While the dependent variable of the flows of U.S. outward FDI and three independent variables of GDP per capita, inflation rate, and exchange rate has substantial variation, the other two independent variables, namely bureaucracy quality and democratic accountability, only have very small variations because of their rating-based characteristic.

Table 2 presents the correlation matrix of independent variables included in the regression equation. The correlation coefficients among those independent variables are in the range of -0.0815to 0.3337, indicating it is unlikely to have the problem of severe multicollinearity.

2.4 Empirical Results

*** Statistical signif icance at 1% level; ** Statistical signifi cance at 5% level; * Statistical signifi cance at 10% level

Table 3 displays the parameter estimates of both risk factors and control variables by using fixed-effect. Satisfactorily, coefficients of all variables have the signs as theories suggest and are statisticallysignifi cant 10% significant level with bureaucracy quality and GDP per capita being significant at 5% and 1% levels respectively.

Looking separately, inflation rate, which acts as a measure of economic risk, indicates that higher economic risk of a country tends to reduce f lows of FDI from the U.S. to that country, ceterispari bus.As two political risk indicators, the coefficients of bureaucracy quality and democratic accountability suggest that U.S. investors are very concerned by a foreign country’s political risk. In other words, when a country’s political risk level is lifted by a professional institution, such as the PGS group in this case, f lows of U.S. Outward FDI to that country tend to decrease substantially. This finding is consistent with the results of recent empirical studies that political risk and flows of U.S. outward FDI are positively correlated with each other. In terms of control variables, GDP per capita indicates that when a country’s market gets bigger, U.S. investors will make more investment to that country, in part to serve the purpose of exploring a new market or better serving a foreign market. The coefficient of exchange rate demonstrates that exchange rate does not affect flows of U.S. outward FDI strongly. One reason may be U.S. firms’ capacities to use hedging instruments against some unfavourable exchange rate movements.

3. Conclusion

3.1 Evaluation

Admittedly, although the results of empirical studies are rather reasonable and satisfactory, there exist several drawbacks in the paper. One major shortcoming, as mentioned in the section of introduction, is the severe data limitation which prevents the paper from studying more risks together and comprehensively. Exchange rate risk and legal risk were not included in the empirical studies, instead, they were analyzed theoretically in the section of literature review.

Moreover, as shown in table 2, the independent variables of bureaucracy quality and democratic accountability are measure dat a limited scale and thus have very small variations as a result of their rating-based characteristic, therefore the variables are not as informative as otherwise they would be, causing the regression results less precise. However, if measurements of the two variables were rated at a larger scale, they would be more informative and the preciseness of the regression’s estimates can be improved.

3.2 End Remarks

It has been widely recognized that FDI benefits both enterprises who operating business abroad and countries who receive foreign capitals. However, a common issue that draws attentions from firms and countries is the various risks associated with FDI. Indeed, empirical results of this paper demonstrate that when risks of a country undermine the prof it ability of foreign firms, it also means that the attractiveness of the country to foreign fi rms falls. Furthermore, the results show that political risk has substantial influence on the direction of a foreign firm’s overseas investment, regard les show political risk is measured. Besides, although economic risk is measured by inflation rate only, the result still highlights the adverse impact of economic risk on the f lows of U.S. outward FDI.

There is no doubt that political risk and economic risk are not the only risks concerning a foreign investor. Subject to the severe limitation of data, this paper fails to empirically assess other risks associated with FDI. However, the paper does not arbitrarily lead to the conclusion that other risks have no effect on FDI. To the contrary, given the feature that political risk overlaps with legal risk to some extent, together with the fact that this overlapping is more striking in developing countries who are also the subject of this paper, it can be argued that the high coefficients of two political risk factors hint the possible existence of the effect of legal risk on FDI.

摘要：外商直接投资已经被视作企业在全球扩张中的一种典型方式。通过吸收国外资金, 技术或者管理经验, 外商直接投资已经成为所在国家经济发展的潜在催化剂。与此同时, 外国公司和他们的公司所属国也将会从外商直接投资中获得更大的利益, 更低的成本等等。所以, 这就不难看出外商直接投资已经日益成为一种对两国经济发展双赢的投资方式。然而, 在对外投资的过程中, 外国企业以及公司所属国家不得不面对一些问题, 那就是如何将风险最小化。事实上, 在这个过程中, 风险是多种多样的, 例如, 政治风险, 经济风险, 汇率风险以及法律风险, 所有的这些都将会影响外商直接投资的方向因为它将会导致企业的盈利能力下降。通过基于于1984年至2007年间, 美国企业对全球43个发展中国家投资的固定样本数据作为参考, 本文的实证结果能够统计地证实风险与外商直接投资流存在反向关系。

关键词：风险,外商直接投资,美国数据

参考文献

[1]Busse, Matthias and Carsten Hefeker, 2005.“Political Risk, Institutions and Foreign Direct Investment”, HWWA Discussion Paper 315.

[2]Fitzpatrick, Mark, 1983.“The Definition and Assessment of Political Risk in International Business:A Review of the Literature”, Academy of Management Review, 1983, Vol.8, No.2, pp.249-254.

[3]Goldberg, Linda S., 1993.“Exchange Rates and Investment in United States Industry”, The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol.LXXV, No.4.

3.一“信”在手,横行美国篇三

令人头疼的推荐信

出国留学的人都找人写过推荐信,美国的每所大学都要这个东西,一封两封还打发不了,通常要求提供三封以上。推荐信是“准留学生”准备文件时最头疼的一项。国内的专家、教授即使答应推荐你,也大多只是在信上签个字而已,信件的内容要你自己准备。以第三者的口气,用外语将自己变着法儿地吹捧三次,绝对不是“小菜一碟”。

等到申请绿卡时,对推荐信的要求就更绝了,需要提供六封以上不说,其中还必须至少包括一封“独立推荐信”,让没和你一起工作过、对你并不熟悉的专家学者来写,证明你如何杰出、美国如何离不开你。这个甚没道理的规定,不知使多少“准移民”望而却步。

推荐信里的是非恩怨

在美国读书,平时一定要和导师搞好关系,因为他不仅管着你的现在,还在很大程度上影响着你的未来,继续深造、就业、申请绿卡……只要需要推荐信,你就难免有求于他。

有个朋友读博士读到一半时,老婆怀孕了,母亲在国内生病住院,经济压力一下增加了许多。这位朋友私下跑到一个公司去应聘,职位、待遇什么的都谈好了,万事俱备,就差他导师的一封推荐信。朋友和导师正式谈起这件事时,导师正需要人手干活,听说他要走,很不高兴,在他的百般央求之下写了推荐信,可公司收到这封信后就变了卦,表示不再需要他了。

朋友后来和导师闹得不可开交,坚决要求拿个硕士学位就走人。后来闹到系里去,硕士学位最终拿到了,可在找工作时却因为没有推荐信而颇费周折,最后总算在一个偏远的地方找到了一份起薪很低的工作。

许多机构要求写推荐信的人直接将推荐信寄去,里面是褒是贬,被推荐的人并不知道。

多年前发生了震惊中美的卢刚校园杀人案,卢刚杀导师的原因之一,据说就是他曾去应聘一份工作未能成功,因此怀疑导师在推荐信里写了不利于他的话。案发后,那个用人单位公开了那封推荐信,里面其实充满了对卢刚的溢美之词。

媳妇熬成婆,婆婆不好当

推荐信这个规定,并不仅仅针对外国人,而是美国的“普遍规定”。美国高中生申请读大学,需要提供中学老师的推荐信。每到高中学生申请大学时,老师们就忙得不亦乐乎,要给上百个学生写推荐信。据说,老师们大多备有固定的“格式信”,只是针对不同的学生,修改其中的一些修饰语。想想也是,如果每封信都单独写,大概得天天坐在那儿,别的什么都别干才行。

有一天,我看到老公在电脑上敲敲打打,很专心的样子,就隨口问了一句:写什么呢?他回答:写推荐信。

啥?又要换工作?搬家?

老公“嘿嘿”一声:想到哪儿去了,是为实验室里一个技术员写推荐信,他要去读博士。我忍不住笑道:“多年的媳妇熬成婆,也轮到咱给别人写推荐信了。”

仔细想想,我也口头推荐过别人。开干洗店那阵子,我有个十分要好的朋友刚刚读完会计本科,四处找工作,因为没有工作经验,一时难以找到合适的。后来她问我,可否在履历表上写上在我的店里做过会计。这位朋友非常能干,在国内已有硕士学位,为了找工作才又在国外读了本科。我常说,哪个公司雇了她就偷着乐吧,所以愿意帮她的忙,还把店里的账目给她过目,让她心中有数。

4.研究生英文信格式篇四

下面是一个推荐信模版，它可以帮助你写好一封英文推荐信。

salutation

如果你的推荐信是要给某一个人的，你应该加上称呼，例如dear dr. smith, dear mr. jones，等等。如果你的推荐信非常general，你在称呼的地方写to whom it may concern 或者不写称呼也可以。

paragraph 1

推荐信的第一段应该说明你和被推荐人的关系，包括你是怎么认识他/她的，还有你写这封推荐信的资格。

paragraph 2

英文推荐信标准格式:推荐信的第二段应该包括被推荐人的个人信息，说明他/她的资格、能力，还有你为什么要为他/她写推荐信。如果必要的话，可以分几段来描述细节。

paragraph 3

如果是推荐被推荐人应聘某个职位，推荐信应该描述这个人的能力能适合他/她所要求的职位。可以参考招聘广告上对职位的要求和被推荐人的`简历一起来写。

summary

主要内容叙述清楚后，还应该加一个简短的总结。总结部分应该再简述一下你为什么要推荐这个人。可以写上i highly recommend the person，i recommend the person without reservation 或者其他类似的话。

conclusion

英文推荐信的结尾部分应该写上你愿意提供更多的详细信息，要注明你的电话号码，联系方式和email address。

最后，还要写上下面这一段:

sincerely,

writers name

title

5.工作信英文版篇五

推荐信主要由雇主撰写，有些雇主则会要求员工自行撰写推荐信供其参考。

以下是推荐信包含的内容：

第一部份：说明推荐者与你的`关系

第二部份：详列你的工作职责

第三部份：推荐者对你表现的评语

第四部份：推荐者对你的支持及能力的确认

范本：

To Whom It May Concern

It has been a great pleasure for me to work with Ms. Cheng Lok Yiu, who has been a marketing officer with our company between the year and .

As a marketing officer of our company, Ms. Cheng is responsible for a number of job duties ranging from promoting our company products, exploring and establishing business relationship with potential clients.

Apart from being a good team member, Ms. Cheng also displayed considerable initiative and approached her work thoughtfully and intelligently. Ms. Cheng also impressed me of being able to rise above the call of duty on certain occasions and was more than capable of taking up extra responsibilities.

Your favorable consideration and assistance to Ms. Cheng will be very much appreciated.

Yours faithfully,

Agnes Chow

Head

Marketing Department

6.美国文学中的哥特小说(英文) 篇六

Gothic fiction has its root in England.The English author Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto (1764) is generally considered to be the first true gothic novel.Thus is born the gothic tradition in literature, not only limited in England, but widespread in continental Europe, such as in France and Germany, and soon it gains popularity in America.Up to 1790s, with the publication of The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) and The Italian (1797) by Ann Radcliffe and Matthew Lewis’The Monk (1796) , gothic fiction has been created in its standard form as an important genre of literature and gradually begins to exert its influence on writings in other countries, especially in Germany and in America.

With its profound historical, cultural and literary sources, gothic fiction flourishes rapidly and develops everlastingly in America.On the one hand, the early immigrants in America Continent often struggle for hunger, cold, plague and death.American history witness them explore and conquer in such a strange and dangerous environment.On the other, American fiction springs up at the very time that gothic fiction is at its peak in England and Europe.Thirdly, realism doesn’t have important effect until 1870s in America, nor does it enjoy supremacy as in England.Therefore, romanticism is prevailing for a long time.Above all, the most significant reason attributes to the Puritanism tradition in American history and culture.Most of the early settlers are puritans who flee to America in order not to be persecuted.Thus puritans are greatly enhanced with the best examples of Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692 and the Great Awakening led by Jonathan Edwards between 1703 and 1745.As far as to 19thcentury, Puritanism continues to develop, especially in the South, which, fundamentally accounts for the growth of gothic fiction in America.

The first influential novelist is Charles B.Brown who sets gothic fiction in American surroundings.His best-known work Wieland (1798) , also the fist gothic novel in America, shows“sensational violence, dramatic intensity and intellectual complexity”.Compared to gothic fiction in England of 17thcentury, an obvious difference lies in that people’s inner fear is deeply rooted in their heart rather than out of external horrible things or environment which is often showed in England.Since the very beginning American gothic novel goes on a distinctive way.As it pays more attention to people’s inner and psychological beings after 1830s, in England it turns to be more realistic and socialized.

Washington Irving, the first American author who gains real fame in Europe, creates the scarifying Headless Horseman in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.He is inspired by Sir Walter Scott and German gothic novels, and in turn his works encourage authors such as Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Edgar Allan Poe, a black-feathered literary master of the macabre, reinterprets the Gothic innovatively in his period.With the idea that“terror is not of Germany, but of the soul”, he goes deep into the inner self and searches the individual for himself.In his creepy short stories, such as The Tell-Tale Heart, The Fall of the House Usher, The Premature Burial and Black Cat, he explores the“terrors of the soul”and revisits classic gothic transition of decay, death and madness.The great contribution he has made to the development of gothic fiction is that he associates the exploration of moralities with soul searching.He places characters in certain surroundings he has created, exploits the power of terror to enter into their spiritual mind, and then reveals primitive instinct and basic needs and finally explores the conflict between good and evil from different aspects.

It is the same case with Nathaniel Hawthorne to uncover moral and spiritual conflicts in his works.Descended from Puritans, he appears to be more direct than Poe in reflecting and criticizing Puritanism.Moreover, his feelings about Puritanism are mixed as expressed in those works of gothic flavor, such as Young Goodman Brown, The Minister’s Black Veil, and The House of Seven Gables.As a Puritan, he reveals the evil which does exist universally in human beings.In addition, he also criticizes that humanities are destroyed by Puritanism.

At the end of the 19th century, Ambrose Bierce and Robert W.Chambers are two notable writers in the Gothic tradition.Bierce inherits the horrific and pessimistic tradition of Poe and Chambers indulges himself in decadent style of Wilde and Machen.

The 20th century sees a much more prosperous gothic fiction in America than in England.Writers of different schools, such as William Faulkner, John Hawkes, Thomas Pynchon, Toni Morrison, H.P.Lovecraft, Stephen King, Thomas Harris and Anne Rice all employ gothic tradition or create gothic fiction.A subgenre of the Gothic writing style, Southern Gothic comes into being combining some Gothic sensibilities with the setting and style of the Southern United States.Famous Southern writers include William Faulkner, Harper Lee, and Flannery O’Connor.Tennessee Williams described Southern Gothic as a style that captured"an intuition, of an underlying dreadfulness in modern experience."

One of the most influential writers of the 20thcentury, William Faulkner, focuses his works on his native state of Mississippi to uncover the decline and decay of the aristocratic South.His works, including A Rose for Emily, As I Lay Dying, Sanctuary, Light in August, Absalom, Absalom!and Intruder in the Dust all bears Southern Gothic tones.He ranks the most important one in Southern writers and deeply influences his followers such as Richard Wright, Carson Mc Cullers, Flannery O’Connor, Toni Morris and Anne Rice who further develop the distinctive Southern Gothic.

Besides Faulkner, Southern black writers find gothic style a strong tool to condemn and criticize slavery and racism.For example, Richard Wright’s Native Son, the first book of an AfricanAmerican writer to enjoy widespread success, sees the terrible result of racial inequality and social injustice by using gothic horror.Toni Morris, in her masterpiece Beloved, paints a dark and powerful portrait of the dehumanizing effects of slavery through ghost story, violent scenes and haunted houses.

Modern gothic writer Anne Rice chooses Vampire, the otherworldly beings rather than human to explore sexual and romantic desire and the spiritual world.Her Interview With The Vampire is the best selling vampire novel, in which she observes and expresses the modern world from the vampire’s perspective and then emphasizes that the modern world and the morally degraded people are more horrible than vampires.

Gothic novel is the roots from which modern horror fiction takes.What’s more, it holds a close relationship with science fiction to show people’s fear towards what they have created;it enters into other media as well such as the theatre, the films and the music.In recently years, with the widespread internet, the gothic tradition enjoys a broader stage to continue its exciting, thrilling, weird and grotesque stories.However, whatever the story it may be, the theme is always the same, that is to portrait the confrontation of good and evil and the exploration of morality with soul searching.It always reveals the evil which destroys humanities, threatens or degenerates human beings.Unfortunately, people have become used to it and often turn a blind eye, sometimes even take the evil for the good.Only by the shocking gothic novel can wake them up to be aware of the evil and danger around them.Where there is evil, there is gothic fiction.Its future can be seen not only in American literature, but also in all literatures.

摘要：哥特传统广泛地存在于英美文学中。该文首先探讨了英美文学中哥特小说的起源, 进而分析其在美国文学中发展壮大的原因, 而后梳理出美国文学中哥特式小说的代表作家及其代表作, 最后指出, 哥特小说致力于揭露人类如何去面对善恶以及深刻的道德探索。

关键词：哥特小说,美国文学,恐惧

参考文献

[1]http://www.answers.com/topic/gothic fiction.

[2]金莉, 秦亚青.美国文学[M].北京:外语教学与研究出版社, 1999.

[3]肖明翰.英美文学中的哥特传统[J].外国文学评论, 2001 (2) .