The Pearl And The Children In The Scarlet Letter

1333 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: The scarlet letter hester character analysis

Scarlet letter: Pearl and the children
The scarlet letter is a fictional novel and was written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The focus is about in a puritan town Hester commits adultery and has to wear a scarlet letter and have the “burden” of caring for a baby (pearl). The rest of the novel is Hester’s husband (Chillingworth) returns to her after being “captured by native Americans”. Throughout the story Hester refuses to reveal who the child’s father is and Chillingworth wants revenge. This novel is about a women and her sin and how pearl plays a huge part in this novel. Hawthorne depicts pearl as an alien in there society until her father acknowledges her. Pearl is both a blessing and a curse to Hester.
The children in this novel play a variety of roles. They are the ones who should be innocent yet in this …show more content…

We do know and acknowledged that they are kids and they don’t know better but there parents could have told them about the significance and what it means to them, but it shows throughout the novel that the letter A is interpreted into different things and that everyone has their own interpretation of what is means. The children are cold hearted but put it out there, they are cruel and brutally honest about what they think about Hester and pearl. The children also have to see it from Hester’s point of view and know that it’s not easy but she doesn’t want others to hate her for her own choice that she made. Hester preaches “the judgment of god is on me,” answered the conscience stricken priest. (Hawthorne 180). Hester is so stressed out she exclaims “It is too mighty for me to struggle with!” (Hawthorne 180). Hester starts to cry out “Heaven would show mercy” (Hawthorne 180). It seems like the adults in this novel bottle up their emotions and when they let it out it literally kills them inside and out. Hester tries to block out the people but it gets hard for her over time but soon seems to ignore the

Show More
Related

  • Pearl Indoctrination In Scarlet Letter

    672 Words  | 2 Pages

    Hawthorne seems to take a stance removing himself as a narrator from religious or moral partiality. As Hawthorne pursues the idea of a morally oblivious phycology, he creates Pearl. Perhaps Pearl is symbolic of truly raw human nature. Pearl is an unaltered version of mankind; factors of emotional and mortal influence are lost on her. Pearl is like the “control group” in the experiment of the human condition. This is demonstrated when Hawthorne speaks through the guise of Governor Bellingham, “There is no law, nor reverence for authority, no regard for human ordinances or opinions, right or wrong, mixed up with that child’s composition.” (92) Pearl attempts to connect with Hester as she “sob[s] out her love for her mother in broken words, and seem[ed] intent on proving that she had a heart by breaking it,” but she could not imitate human compassion because she had been shown so little herself. Because of the lasting trauma of Hester’s ordeal and her inexperience as a mother, Hester is inattentive and emotionally unavailable during Pearl’s childhood. Primarily because of her mother’s negligence, Pearl is “like a thing incapable and unintelligent of human sorrow” (64) but can still sense how other’s perceive her as strange. Taking into account her lack of remorse and incapability to express genuine sympathy, one might contend

    Read More

  • Scarlet Letter Loss Of Innocence Quotes

    1002 Words  | 3 Pages

    There is nothing more pliable than the mind of a child, and because of the world that she lives in, Pearl has been forced into the deeper understanding of what eternally plasters her mother’s chest; this is even in infancy. “One day, as her mother stooped over the cradle, the infant’s eyes had been caught by the glimmering of the gold embroidery about the letter; and, putting up her little hand, she grasped it, smiling not doubtfully, but with a decided gleam that gave her face the look of a much older child” (Hawthorne 79-80). Though it terrifies Hester, the fact that Pearl is able to identify that the letter exists is only the gateway to the growth of her knowledge of it. This comes into effect more prominently in the following years when she finally begins to comprehend the scarlet letter’s importance. Pearl realizes that because her mother wears the letter, people treat her differently. She does not know why or how, but she knows that it is not right. One person in particular who treats Hester differently is Dimmesdale. Though at the time she does not know her father, Pearl understands that the scarlet letter controls his life just as much as it does Hester’s, but he is not treated differently. Even so, her innocence takes over and questions why he does not have the same burden as Hester. A quote on page 127 can support this: “Pearl

    Read More

  • Scarlet Letter - Pearl as a symbol

    645 Words  | 2 Pages

    Pearl is a symbol of Hester’s transgressions and even has similar qualities as the sin which she represents. Pearl’s life and behavior directly reflects the unacceptable and abnormal nature of Hester’s adulterous sin. Hester is plagued with more than just a letter “A”; she is given a child from her affair who is just as much a reminder of her sin as the scarlet letter. Ultimately Hester overcomes the shame associated the scarlet letter and creates a sense of family for herself and Pearl. This relationship is integral to the theme of this novel and the development of its characters.

    Read More

  • How Is Pearl Reflected In The Scarlet Letter

    1204 Words  | 3 Pages

    In his novel The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the storyline of Hester Prynne’s adultery as a means of criticizing the values of Puritan society. Hester and her daughter Pearl, whom she conceives out of wedlock, are ostracized from their community and forced to live in a house away from town. The reflections of Pearl in different mirrored surfaces represent the contrast between the way Puritans view her and who she actually is. In the fancy mirrored armor of the society’s elite class, Pearl is depicted harshly as a devilish and evil spawn, unable to live up to the expectations of such a pristine society. However, in the natural reflections of the earth’s surface, Pearl’s beauty and innocence is much more celebrated. The discrepancies between these positive depictions of Pearl as an angelic figure and the Puritans’ harsh judgment of her character suggest that Puritans inflated her oddities and strange habits in order to place her and Hester in a place of inferiority within the community. Hawthorne employs reflection and mirrors in his novel to convey the Puritans’ misconstrual of Pearl as an elfish, evil child and to critique the severity of early Puritan moral codes.

    Read More

  • Pearl's Symbolism In The Scarlet Letter By Nathaniel Hawthorne

    849 Words  | 2 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • Hester Prynne Suffering Quotes

    688 Words  | 2 Pages

    Hester is facing it all, from public scorn to loneliness. Hester becomes an outcast from everyone in a New England colony with her daughter, Pearl. Author, Nathaniel Hawthorne writes of the eventful life of an adulteress in an eighteenth century colony in this fictional classic. Hester Prynne is a young married woman who moved from England to a colony in Massachusetts. While waiting for her husband to arrive, Hester has an affair with a man named Dimmesdale and is put into prison. Hester, even though she is caught in her sin, shows great strength of character; Hester chooses to protect those that she cares about even though it causes her personal suffering. As a result of her strength, Hester causes great change in others around her.

    Read More

  • The Truth Shall Set You Free: The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorn

    909 Words  | 2 Pages

    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...

    Read More

  • The Blameless Pearl in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter

    1121 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Puritan life is based purely on sin. The Puritans believe that all people are sinners and are thus despised and hated by God. Sinners are subject to the worst punishments and suffer the worst torment. In Nathaniel Hawthorne's novel, The Scarlet Letter, several characters serve as models of sinners in agony from their error. Both Arthur Dimmesdale and Hester Prynne bear the punishment of their adultery, which evidenced itself in their daughter Pearl. While Dimmesdale plagues himself with guilt and Hester lives with the brand of the scarlet "A", it is Pearl who receives the worst penalty, suffering for a sin which she did not even commit. The village where she resides associates her with the circumstances of her birth, branding her with a reputation as difficult to bear as her mother's. Although many in Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter endure the results of sin, none have punishment equal to that of little Pearl's.

    Read More

  • Liberation from Sin through Pearl in The Scarlet Letter

    1580 Words  | 4 Pages

    This, as Arthur Dimmesdale almost prophetically expresses in the early scenes of Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, was the role of Pearl, the elfish child borne of his and Hester Prynne's guilty passion. Like Paul's thorn in the flesh, Pearl would bring trouble, heartache, and frustration to Hester, but serve a constructive purpose lying far beyond the daily provocations of her childish impishness. While in many respects a tormentor to Hester, Pearl was also her savior, while a reminder of her guilt, a promoter of honesty and true Virtue; and while an embodiment of Hester's worst qualities, a vision of a better life for Hester and for herself.

    Read More

  • Scarlet Letter, Pearl

    750 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Scarlet letter is a novel written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The plot focuses on sin in the Puritan society. Hester Prynne, the protagonist, has an affair with Reverend Dimmesdale, which means they are adulterers and sinners. As a result, Pearl is born and Hester is forced to where the scarlet letter. Pearl is a unique character. She is Hester’s human form of her scarlet letter, which constantly reminds her of her sin, yet at the same time, Pearl is a blessing to have since she represents the passion that Hester once had.

    Read More

  • Unrelenting Selflessness In The Scarlet Letter, By Nathaniel Hawthorne

    769 Words  | 2 Pages

    One of Hester’s greatest qualities is her unrelenting selflessness. Despite her constant mental anguish due to her sin, the constant stares and rude comments, and the

    Read More

  • What Is Pearl's Condition In The Scarlet Letter

    1251 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Scarlet Letter Analysis In the book, The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne committed adultery and later gives birth to a girl named Pearl. She was thrown in prison and stayed in there for a long period of time. As a punishment, Hester has to go on the stocks and hold the baby for hours. While she was standing, she seen her husband, that she thought was dead come out of the forest with an indian. He went to get revenge on the lover.

    Read More

  • Children in the Scarlet Letter

    649 Words  | 2 Pages

    Pearl and the other Puritan children have a huge role in Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. Pearl is displayed as very different from any of the other children in the book. The attitudes of the children tell the reader a lot about the lives of the Puritans. The story emphasizes that children were to be seen but not heard however, Hester chooses to let Pearl live a full and exciting life. Hester does not restrict pearl or hide her from anyone or anything. This is part of the reason that Pearl becomes such a colorful child. People see Pearl as a child of sin; the devil’s child. Pearl is quite the opposite. She is a happy and intelligent little girl. Pearl is born with an incredible sense of intuition. She sees the pain her mother feels but does not understand where the pain is coming from. Pearl knows somehow deep in her heart that Dimmesdale is her father. She takes a very strong liking to him. This makes it much harder on dimmesdale to work through the guilt seeing what a beautiful thing came from his terrible secret. Pearl serves as a blessing to and a curse to Hester. Hester Prynne loves her daughter dearly but she is a constant reminder of the mistakes she has made.

    Read More

  • Changes of Hester Prynne in Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter

    495 Words  | 1 Pages

    The guilt that now rests in Hester is overwhelming to her and is a reason for her change in personality. The secrets Hester keeps are because she is silent and hardly talks to anyone. “Various critics have interpreted her silence. as both empowering. and disempowering. Yet silence, in Hester’s case, offers a type of passive resistance to male probing”

    Read More

  • Nathaniel Hawthorne's Use of Pearl in The Scarlet Letter

    440 Words  | 1 Pages

    Hawthorne uses Pearl to work on the consciences of both her mother Hester and her father Arthur Dimmesdale. He uses her to work on Hester’s conscience throughout the novel by little comments made or actions taken by Pearl that appear to be mean or spiteful towards her mother. For example, Pearl laughs and points at her mother’s scarlet letter as if making fun of it or to make Hester feel bad about it. Hawthorne also uses Pearl’s perceptiveness to point out very straight forwardly, her mother’s sin of adultery. Pearl has almost a supernatural sense, that comes from her youth and freewill for seeing things as they really are and pointing them out to her mother. Pearl is a living version of her mother's scarlet letter. She is the consequence of sin and an everyday reminder to her through her actions and being.

    Read More

More about The Pearl And The Children In The Scarlet Letter

Open Document