The Scarlet Letter, a novel written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, shows the adverse consequences caused by adultery between Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale and Hester Prynne. Dimmesdale and Hester committed the supreme sin of the Puritan society they belong. They must both deal with the effects of the scarlet letter. Pearl, the daughter of the two lovers, continuously punishes Hester for what she has done. Dimmesdale can only see Hester and Pearl when others will not find out or see. Hester finds a way to support herself and daughter, and at the same time, puts a mark on the possessions of some who are a part of society. The sin of adultery created repercussions that were shared and individually experienced by Reverend Dimmesdale and Hester Prynne.
The scarlet letter is worn by Hester as a repercussion of her adulterous sin to make known her crime of passion throughout the whole story. Hester has the choice to leave town and would no longer have to wear the scarlet letter. ?On the outskirts of the town, within the verge of the peninsula, but not in close vicinity to any other habitation, there was a small thatched cottage? (71). The cottage is Hester?s home. Hester feels by staying, she is not letting society control her and acknowledging what she has done. Hester?s action of staying in town shows her strong, self-determined spirit. Hester refuses to deny the sin because it defines who she is.
Hester decides to live alone as a repercussion of the sin she committed When Hester makes the decision to not go away she has to find a way to support herself. Knowing the town will not help her, Hester turns to needlework to help support herself and daughter, Pearl. The things she makes are very beautiful and delicately done. The families that held...
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...e type of what has seared his inmost heart! Stand any here that question God's judgment on a sinner! Behold! Behold, a dreadful witness of it!? (232-233)
Everyone now knew and just as soon as he revealed the sin, the sin killed him while up on the scaffold.
When Hester and Dimmesdale had an affair, they never knew how much it would affect the rest of their lives, thus their one sin defined their very existence. Hester proves to be a very strong and able person through all the triumphs she faces. She remains a great mother even when Pearl reminds her of what she has done. Dimmesdale continues to see Hester and Pearl, but only when no one else will find out. Dimmesdale can not handle the guilt he keeps inside for seven years and it brings him to his death. Hester and Dimmesdale both commit the sin of adultery, but the sin empowers Hester and kills Dimmesdale.
The central theme in The Scarlet Letter is that manifested sin will ostracize one from society and un-confessed sin will lead to the destruction of the inner spirit. Hawthorne uses the symbol of the scarlet letter to bring out this idea. In the novel, Hester is forced to wear the scarlet letter A (the symbol of her sin) because she committed adultery with the clergyman, Dimmesdale. Because the public's knowledge of her sin, Hester is excluded physically, mentally, and socially from the normal society of the Puritan settlement. She lives on the outskirts of town in a small cottage where she makes her living as a seamstress. Though she is known to be a great sewer amongst the people, Hester is still not able to sew certain items, such as a new bride's veil. Hester also has no interaction with others; instead she is taunted, if not completely ignored, by all that pass her by. Despite the ill treatment of the society, Hester's soul is not corrupted. Instead, she flourishes and improves herself in spite of the burden of wearing the scarlet letter and she repeatedly defies the conventional Puritan thoughts and values by showing what appears to us as strength of character. Her good works, such as helping the less fortunate, strengthen her inner spirit, and eventually partially welcome her back to the society that once shunned her.
Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter tells the story of Hester Prynne, a sinner, living in a puritan society. As punishment, she is forced to wear a scarlet letter on her chest. Her daughter Pearl is the product of her sinful ways, and a constant reminder of her wrongdoing. Pearl’s embodiment of the Scarlet Letter causes her hostile relationships with the world and her mother. However, when Dimmesdale kisses her, he frees her from isolation and allows her to form human connections.
In the beginning, the scarlet letter represents the sinful nature of Hester’s crime, as revealed through the thoughts and feelings of Hester and the townspeople towards the letter. When first wearing the letter in public, Hester portrays herself as indifferent towards the town’s harsh language and detest for her, despite still feeling the intensity of her punishment internally. Hester portrays herself as indifferent towards the town’s harsh language and detest for her, and strong in the difficult conditions. By “wisely judging that one token of her shame would but poorly serve to hide another, she…with a burning blush, and…haughty smile…looked around at her townspeople and neighbours” (Hawthorne, 80).
The characters Hawthorne develops are deep, unique, and difficult to genuinely understand. Young, tall, and beautiful Hester Prynne is the central protagonist of this story. Shamefully, strong-willed and independent Hester is the bearer of the scarlet letter. Burning with emotion, she longs for an escape from her mark, yet simultaneously, she refuses to seem defeated by society’s punishment. Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale claims the secondary role in The Scarlet Letter; he is secretly Hester’s partner in adultery. Conflicted and grieved over his undisclosed act, he drives himself to physical and mental sickness. He fervently desires Hester, but should he risk his godly reputation by revealing the truth? Dimmesdale burns like Hester. Pearl, the child produced in Hester and Dimmesdale’s sin, is the third main character. She is fiery, passionate, perceiving, and strikingly symbolic; at one point in the novel she is referred to as “the scarlet letter endowed with life!” Inevitably, Pearl is consumed with questions about herself, her mother, and Dimmesdale. The reader follows Pearl as she discovers the truth. Altogether, Hawthorne’s use of intricately complex, conflicted ch...
The Scarlet Letter starts off by throwing Hester Prynne into drama after being convicted for adultery in a Puritan area. Traveling from Europe to America causes complications in her travel which also then separates her from her husband, Roger Chillingworth for about three years. Due to the separation, Hester has an affair with an unknown lover resulting in having a child. Ironically, her lover, Arthur Dimmesdale, is a Reverend belonging to their church who also is part of the superiors punishing the adulterer. No matter how many punishments are administered to Hester, her reactions are not changed. Through various punishments, Hester Prynne embraces her sin by embroidering a scarlet letter “A” onto her breast. However, she is also traumatized deep within from everything she’s been through. Nathaniel Hawthorne depicts this story of sin by using rhetorical devices such as allusion, alliteration and symbolism.
Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter is a study of the effects of sin on the hearts and minds of the main characters, Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, Roger Chillingworth. Hester, Dimmesdale, and Chillingworth. Sin strengthens Hester, humanizes Dimmesdale, and turns Chillingworth into a demon.
Through the use of numerous symbols, Nathanial Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter serves as an allegory for the story of Adam and Eve and its relation to sin, knowledge, and the human condition that is present in human society. Curious for the knowledge of good and evil, Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden, which resulted in the revelation of their “humanness” and expulsion from the “divine garden” as they then suffered the pain and joy of being humans. Just as Adam and Eve were expelled from their society and suffered in their own being, so were Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale in The Scarlet Letter. Hester was out casted and shunned, while Dimmesdale suffered under his own guilt. After knowledge of her affair is made known, Hester is forced to wear a scarlet letter “A” on her chest to symbolize her crime of adultery, and is separated from the Puritan society. Another “A” appears in the story, and is not embroidered, but instead scarred on Dimmesdale’s chest as a symbol of guilt and suffering. Hester’s symbol of guilt comes in the form of her daughter, Pearl, who is the manifestation of her adultery, and also the living version of her scarlet letter. Each of these symbols come together to represent that with sin comes personal growth and advancement of oneself in society as the sinner endures the good and bad consequences.
Elizabeth Kubler-Ross once said, “Guilt is perhaps the most painful companion of death.” This quote truly captures Dimmesdale’s death and journey to death, it is guilt that drives him to the grave and it accompanies him throughout all five grieving stages. Dimmesdale is one of many characters in The Scarlet Letter that is faced with problems both personally and spiritually. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a romantic novel about a young woman, Hester Prynne, who is permanently marked with her sin by a scarlet A she must bare on her chest and also by her daughter Pearl. Hester committed adultery with the young minister of Boston, Arthur Dimmesdale. Hester, and her beloved child Pearl, learn to over come the A and change the meaning of it from adulterer to able, while they are changing the way society views them, Dimmesdale is withering away under the “care” of Rodger Chillingworth, Hester’s past husband. Chillingworth knows about the sin and seeks revenge on Dimmesdale. Dimmesdale is helpless and in a downward spiral. He let the sin become who he is, even though the towns people don’t know of his adultery until his dying breath. The Scarlet Letter is a story about overcoming the darkness that hangs above you and stepping out of the sin or gloom that controls you. For characters like Hester this is a fairly easy thing to handle, but on the flip side characters like Dimmesdale struggle and can not seem to escape their heinous acts and don’t find peace of mind until they die. The Scarlet Letter mainly focuses on the process of overcoming these troubling times and how each individual character handles the pressure, stress, and guilt that come along with it differently. Arthur Dimmesdale is a lost soul after his sin, he expe...
Not only does she have to live in a small cottage on the outskirts of the town, but she must also solely take care of Pearl. In order “to supply food for her thriving infant and herself. It was the art … of needle-work.” This shows how Hester was fully capable of supporting herself. Having managed to keep Pearl and herself alive, she becomes more independent of others. Hester shows independence in thought. She compares to the townspeople by having a sense of pride of having the scarlet letter, a feeling that gave them fear. They react to her showing off of the letter by saying, “little will she care what they put upon the bodice of her gown! … and so walk the streets as brave as ever!" Here, Hester is spoken about as a rebel who deserves to die for breaking their law. The townspeople were scared about her lack of publicly shown shame of her punishment. This was also the reason why there became the legend of the scarlet letter, as Hester was unique in not showing public shame in wearing the scarlet letter. “Lonely as was Hester's situation, and without a friend on earth who dared to show himself, she [...] incurred no risk of want.” Here, Hester is described as lonely, yet she has developed no need of them. She has become so independent that she no longers seeks friendship. This is important because it makes her have to learn to do things on her own and be able to not seek help to risk discovery of the
Sin is all around and people perceive sin and the punishment it requires differently, many desire to redeem themselves after committing a sin especially those of devout religions. Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale commit sins and devote their lives to redeeming themselves of their sins. Each of these characters deal with their sins differently, but they both feel a need for absolution from their guilt, sin, and their harm of others around them. While Hester goes about her path of redemption by helping others and never giving up Pearl’s father's identity, Dimmesdale thinks he can forge his path and heal his soul by being the best minister possible; he thinks that this will be enough to obtain forgiveness for what he has done and enough to improve his own vision of himself.
As Hester wears the scarlet letter, the reader can feel how much of an outcast Hester becomes. When walking through town, “…she never raised her head to receive their greeting. If they were resolute to accost her, she laid her finger on the scarlet letter and passed on” (Hawthorne, 127).She believes that she is not worthy of the towns acknowledgments and chooses to ignore them. The guilt that now rests in Hester is overwhelming to her and is a reason of her change in personality.
Scarlet Letter Research Paper Is Hester right or wrong for committing adultery? Leaving her husband and to be humiliated? Hester was very bad and what will that do to her? She committed adultery and Hester was an object of the story. “The Scarlet Letter” and book was written in 1850 and Nathaniel Hawthorne is the author of the book.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s book, The Scarlet Letter takes place during the 1600’s in a puritan society. Nathaniel Hawthorne is extremely obsessed with Puritanism and enjoys making books about Puritanism. A Puritan society is a society based strongly around religion. The main characters in this book are Hester Prynne, Reverend Dimmesdale, Roger Chillingworth, and Pearl Prynne. Hester Prynne committed adultery with Dimmesdale and she is married to Chillingsworth. She had a child, who is Pearl. Hester must wear a Scarlet Letter due to committing adultery as a reminder of the wrongs she has done. In Hawthorne’s book, he will use the symbolism of a burr, the Scarlet Letter, and Dimmesdale to contribute to the overall theme of guilt.
The greatest sin committed by any character in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter was that of Arthur Dimmesdale. Although Hester Prynne and Roger Chillingworth wronged each other, the person that did evil against both of them was Dimmesdale. Not only did Dimmesdale have relations with Hester Prynne though he knew that she was still married, but he never came forward as the companion in her sin.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, there are many moral and social themes develped throughout the novel. Each theme is very important to the overall effect of the novel. In essence, The Scarlet Letter is a story of sin, punishment and the importance of truth. One theme which plays a big role in The Scarlet Letter is that of sin and its effects. Throughout the novel there were many sins committed by various characters. The effects of these sins are different in each character and every character was punished in a unique way. Two characters were perfect examples of this theme in the novel. Hester Prynne and The Reverend Dimmesdale best demonstrated the theme of the effects of sin.