More handpicked essays just for you.
The scarlet letter moral story
The morality in the scarlet letter
Character developement of the scarlet letter chapter 2
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
In The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the character Rodger Chillingworth is considered an immoral and evil character because of his malicious and revenge filled actions. He did not start out as an evil person, but it is his backstory that makes him a sympathetic character. The audience sees that he was just a man who became too invested in his studies and lost everything that made him happy. Chillingworth’s poor decisions lead to him losing himself and becoming a cruel and spiteful man who throws his life away. Rodger Chillingworth is classified as an evil character because he intentionally tortures Dimmesdale and watches him suffer. Once Chillingworth latches on to Dimmesdale, he can’t seem to stop poking and prodding at him and …show more content…
Had Chillingworth returned to see Hester with open arms, he might have lived out a full and happy life; Hearing that Hester was impregnated with another man’s child by a complete stranger was terribly painful and emotionally distressing. It drove him to dedicating his life to hunting this man down and murdering him with his own hands. Hester knew he was a very intelligent man, a scholar and a kind and thoughtful person, but she watched him throw away his talent and skill while he pursued Dimmesdale. The readers feel empathy toward Chillingworth because they know that he could have led a very successful life with a family, but he watched from the sidelines as his own wife raised her child without him. Chillingworth returned to Boston expecting a warm welcome and celebration, but instead hid behind a new identity to find out who ruined his life and put his wife on display on the scaffold. Being revealed to his full story changes the readers’ impression of him, because the author shows the audience a side to him that is hidden beneath his cruel exterior. Every character has depth and even though one must dig deep to unveil Chillingworth’s broken and fragile heart, it is still there, and proves him to be a sympathetic
This strategy exemplifies Hawthorne’s theme that sin must be taken responsibility for because being dishonest will only lead to more temptation. Chillingworth does admit to one of his blames of leaving Hester behind, but choosing his temptation over redemption has formed his obsession to making Hester lover’s suffer miserably with guilt, which fuels Roger’s vengeance. Secondly, Chillingworth’s internal conflict was illustrated through the changing of his appearance. Roger was once a kind, well respected, man of science; However, his vengeance has transformed his physical character into a devilish creature. When Hester and Pearl were visiting Governor’s Bellingham’s house, Hester notices the change over Roger’s features, “how much uglier they were, how his dark complexion seemed to have grown duskier, and his figure misshapen” (93).
Chillingworth, the injured husband, seeks no revenge against Hester, but he is determined to find the man who has violated his marrige: “He bears no letter of infamy wrought into his garment, and thou dost; but I shall read it on his heart.” Chillingworth comments: “Believe me, Hester, there are few things.
In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne constantly attributes the qualities of a thief to the mysteriously shady character, Roger Chillingworth. Throughout the novel, we see that regardless of who he is around, or where he is, he is repeatedly referred to countless of times as ?the old Black Man? (131). This nickname that he is given displays quite evidently that Hawthorne had no doubt intended for Chillingworth to assume the role of a cold, and shadowy personage akin to that of a lowly thief. As thieves are well known for and need to be, they are usually silent, stealthy, and more often than not, baffling, in the sense that no one else knows their cunningness and what they really are thinking of when they commit their crimes. These attributes match up directly to Roger?s personality, and throughout the novel, we see that he gradually grows to become the exact impersonation of a thief. The below examples serve to demonstrate these similarities. In the first few chapters, all the way to the tenth chapter, the reader suspects that Chillingworth has a hidden motive in tagging along as Arthur Dimmesdale?s physician. However, toward the end of chapter eleven, we realize that the mysterious Chillingworth was not simply following Dimmesdale around to hear in on other people?s confessions but also to spy on the reverend minister and his activities! After a period of time, the physician digs up something from Dimmesdale?s past that we are not aware of just yet. However, the reaction which we see upon Chillingworth?s face after his discovery is curious indeed, with him ?
The novel The Scarlet letter was written in 1850 by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The author refers Roger Chillingworth as evil, Devil-like, and a fallen man who lost everything in society. Even though Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale is Pearl’s legitimate parents, Roger Chillingworth is the best guardian for Pearl because; he looks at Pearl like his own child, he was not intending to hurt Pearl from the beginning, and gave Pearl all his properties when he died therefore Pearl could have a better life. Roger Chillingworth looks at Pearl reminiscent to his own child. He treated Pearl like his own due to his unsuccess of having a child with Hester.
When asked to describe Roger Chillingworth, peers say he was an upstanding, respectful, concerned citizen. They would have been right, but he didn’t let anyone know just how much he cared. With the loss of Hester, he became filled with anger and jealousy and eventually let his emotions overtake him. At the close of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, the malevolent state of Roger Chillingworth’s heart made him the guiltiest.
As a respected physician, Chillingworth was “a man of skill in all Christian modes of physical science, and li... ... middle of paper ... ... powerful grip over him, dies peacefully, and Chillingworth dies soon after. To plot revenge in any situation is harmful. Chillingworth’s plot of revenge brings the downfall of Dimmesdale, as well as his own.
One of the various ways Chillingworth serves as the devil’s advocate is by being the antithesis of Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, the palpable Jesus figure of the narrative. Chillingworth keenly sets out to devastate Dimmesdale, as Hawthorne informs us when referring to Chillingworth's unearthing of Dimmesdale's secret, “All that guilty sorrow, hidden from the world, whose great heart would have pitied and forgiven, to be revealed to him, the Pitiless, to him, the Unforgiving!” The capitalization of the words "Pitiless" and "Unforgiving" confirm that Chillingworth is Satan in human form. Symbolically, on an additional, more perceptible note, Chillingworth steals one of Dimmesdale's gloves and drops it on the scaffold in the middle of the town. The sexton returns it to Dimmesdale saying, "Satan...
Roger Chillingworth himself represents revenge. Some even believe him to be representative of evil or Satan. What is ignored in the cases of interpreting him as Satan or as evil is the fact that he has been cruelly wronged by both Hester and Dimmesdale. Because Hester and Dimmesdale are portrayed as protagonists in the novel, Chillingworth is automatically classified, because of his opposition towards the two, as antagonist. He is not actually this at all when regarded without the negative connotations under which he is crushed within the book.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel, The Scarlet Letter many aspects of evil and sin are reflected through the characters Arthur Dimmesdale and Roger Chillingworth. Dimmesdale and Chillingworth made their own choice of being a sinner and being evil. Therefore, that is what Hawthorne believed to be the definition of evil and sin; an individual chooses to do an action that is considered sinful. Although Dimmesdale and Chillingworth both portray evil and sin they portray it in two completely different forms. Dimmesdale is shown as being a secret sinner throughout the novel, but with the evil torturing that he receives from Chillingworth and himself it drives him to the point where he then becomes a public sinner. It is better for an individual to confess their sin than to bury it deep down.
In the literary classic, The Scarlet Letter, readers follow the story of a Puritan New England colony and the characteristics of that time period. Readers begin to grasp concepts such as repentance and dealing with sin through Nathaniel Hawthorne’s indirect descriptions of these detailed and complex characters by their actions and reactions. The character Roger Chillingworth symbolizes sin itself and deals with internal conflict throughout the course of the story. The narrator describes Chillingworth in a critical attitude to reveal to the reader the significance of repentance and revenge by the use of many literary techniques such as
Villains come in all forms of malevolence throughout all types of literature. They help to drive the plot of the story and influence the themes and purposes as desired by the author. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the character assigned the appellation of Roger Chillingworth is the main antagonist. He is first seen attending the public humiliation of Hester Prynne, who is the protagonist of the book. Chillingworth is established as a physician whom Hester had previously cheated on. Throughout the novel, Chillingworth is seen as being controlling over Arthur Dimmesdale, who testifies to one of the book’s main themes of guilt. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s historical drama The Scarlet Letter renders Roger Chillingworth as the villain who
The theme Hawthorne builds up in Chillingworth is not simply his pain and torment. It is a more important representation of the weakness in the values of the people in Puritan times, and how their perseverance for "justice" skewed their views on life and forgiveness. Because of his mindset, Chillingworth torments himself with his goal to destroy Dimmesdale just as much as Dimmesdale tortures himself for their seven years together. Chillingworth is ruining his own life and does not realize it, because he no longer sees the value in life as he tries to ruin one.
Torturing Dimmesdale did not relieve Chillingworth from his suffering, it only inflamed his own tortured
In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, the reader is able to observe how one sin devastates three lives. Hester, Dimmesdale, and Chillingworth are all guilty of succumbing to temptation, anger, and desire, causing all to fit the definition of a sinner. Yet, Chillingworth's iniquities raise him up above Hester and Dimmesdale on the level of diabolic acts.
As the novel progressed, Chillingworth fits the profile of ‘vengeance destroys the avenger’. When Roger Chillingworth is first introduced to the reader, we see a kind old man, who just has planted the seeds for revenge. Although he did speak of getting his revenge, when Hester first met her husband in her jail cell, she did not see any evil in him. Because Hester would not tell him who she had slept with, Chillingworth vowed that he would spend the rest of his life having his revenge and that he would eventually suck the soul out of the man, whom she had the affair with. “There is a sympathy that will make me conscious of him. I shall see him tremble. I shall feel myself shudder, suddenly and unawares” (Hawthorne, 101) As the novel develops, Roger Chillingworth has centered himself on Arthur Dimmesdale, but he cannot prove that he is the “one.” Chillingworth has become friends with Dimmesdale, because he has a “strange disease,” that needed to be cured; Chillingworth suspects something and begins to drill Dimmesdale. “… The disorder is a strange one…hath all the operation of this disorder been fairly laid open to me and recounted to me” (Hawthorne, 156).