The Scarlet Letter Essay

"In our nature, however, there is a provision, alike marvelous and merciful, that the sufferer should never know the intensity of what he endures by its present torture, but chiefly by the pang that rankles after it (84)." What is found evident in this quote concerning Hester Prynne, Hawthorne’s main protagonist, in The Scarlet Letter is that while she suffers so on the opening scaffold scene, it is but human nature to bless the individual with a defense system tool which is both peculiar and compassionate. In Hester’s moment of deep heartbreak, her defenses stopped her from realizing how much she hurt at that moment. It is only afterward that she will be forced to deal with it. The scaffold scenes in the novel, The Scarlet Letter, penned by Nathaniel Hawthorne make the book symbolically what it is. Hawthorne’s characters symbolically transform the scaffold from beginning to the end of the novel. Next, the three scaffold scenes physically deteriorate with an underlying symbolic resonance. Finally the symbolic use of the scaffold throughout The Scarlet Letter leaves a lasting impression on its readers. The scaffold gives the reader a deeper sense of plot development and what the characters’ emotional evolution is. One can see this after finishing the novel and looking back at the three scaffold scenes. Hawthorne’s characters symbolically transform the scaffold from beginning to the end of the novel. The first scaffold scene was all about the shaming of Hester and Pearl. Even though Pearl was very young at this time one starts to feel that her being there made Hester’s shaming more real and painful. At this time in Hester’s life she was ashamed of what she had done and the pain was killing her inside. Dimmesdale, Pearl’s father, on the other hand at this time was feeling no pain at all compared to what he would feel at the end. Dimmesdale wanted Hester to tell the