Abstract:John Fowels is considered as one of the most innovative writer in British from 1960s. The French Lieutenant’s woman is one of his representative works. This paper focuses on the male protagonist's pursuit of freedom. It reveals people’s anxiety, hesitation and agony for getting the freedom in the ugly world by analyzing the male protagonist's self-recognition, a series of conflicts in the process of his self-recognition, transcendence. In The French Lieutenant’s woman, Charles’s freedom that he finally got shows Fowels’s eternal pursuit and desire of freedom. It also tells us people always face kinds of pressure in reality, and if we want to find our own freedom, we should stay true to ourselves, keep our own unique personality. And for freedom we could abandon something we have.  

Key words: self-recognition; freedom; transcendence

中文摘要:约翰福尔斯被认为是英国二十世纪六十年代以来最具有创新精神的作家之一。《法国中尉的女人》是他的代表作之一。本文集中研究男主人公对自由的追寻，通过分析《法国中尉的女人》中男主人公查尔斯对自我的认识、在自我认识过程中所遭遇的一系列冲突和最终他对自我、对社会的超越来探讨他对自由的追寻，从而揭示了荒诞丑恶的世界中为获取自由而陷入的焦急不安、彷徨和痛苦，小说中，查尔斯最终获得的自由表现了福尔斯对自由和完美的追求和渴望。同时也告诉我们在现实生活中，总是会面临各种各样的压力，如果想找到属于自己的自由，我们应该保持自我，维护自己独特的个性，并且为了自由我们可能会需要放弃一些本来拥有的东西。

关键词：自我认识；自由；超越