Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter And How Do I Love Thee?

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The Scarlet Letter and How Do I Love Thee? (sonnet 43) Comparison
The Scarlet Letter has multiple themes and motifs that differ from “How Do I Love Thee”? However, the discovery of your identity and realizing who you truly are and Loving someone more than you love yourself and the blessing of mortality are the common and repeated themes in Nathaniel Hawthorne's romantic novel The Scarlet Letter and Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s romantic poem “How Do I Love Thee”? The Scarlet Letter presents multiple themes and motifs that differentiate from the ones in “How Do I Love Thee”. The dangers of sin is a theme that is only presented in The Scarlet Letter, for example the crimson “scarlet letter” (Ch.1Pg.23, Hawthorne) is a consequence of Hester …show more content…

Furthermore, a motif only presented in The Scarlet Letter is night versus day. When Pearl says to her mother that the “sunshine does not love you. It runs away and hides itself, because it is afraid” (Ch.16, Pg.178 Hawthorne), this states that day only presents itself to those who are innocent and free of sin and night is for the sinners and the ones who can’t show their true face to society. Thus, stating that the night is for the sinner and rejects of society and the day is for the innocent ones and reject sin. Another motif that is only presented in The Scarlet Letter is civilization versus the wilderness, The “Nature of the forest, never subjugated by human law, nor illumined by higher truth-with the bliss of …show more content…

An example of the shared discovery of identity is the statement “Ah, but let her cover the mark as she will, the pang of it will be always in her heart."( ch.2, pg.3 Hawthorne) These is the beginning of Hester’s connection to the scarlet letter where she will find her identity with it, she will identify herself with the scarlet letter until death. Thus, demonstrating the discovery of one's true identity. Similarity, in “How Do I Love Thee” Browning displays the discovery of one's identity. When she states “I love thee with the passion put to use”/”In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.”( 9-10 Browning), the love she had for her husband allowed her to realize her identity by reminiscing about her childhood. This realization allowed her to discover herself and it illuminated her true identity. The common theme of realizing one's identity relates Hawthorne and Browning to the romanticism era that they were part of which correlates to why they both shared a similar theme. Furthermore, The way that someone can lose someone else more than they love themselves is a theme that both The Scarlet Letter and “How Do I Love Thee? Share. When Hester “named the infant 'Pearl,' as being of great price- purchased with all she had- her mother's only pleasure."(ch.6 Pg.5,

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