Literary Analysis: Three Important Scenes In The Scarlet Letter

Literary Analysis Three important scenes in the novel The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne are within chapters four, seventeen, and twenty three. Each chapter contains a scene where it develops the story through its rising action, climax, falling action and resolution. In chapter four, “The Interview”, Hester is currently behind bars and is then greeted by a physician, Roger Chillingworth, who is also her former husband as quoted, “Master Brackett, the jailer, thought fit to introduce a physician…His name was announced as Roger Chillingworth.” (Hawthorne 67-68). The scene further develops into the rising action of the novel as Hester denies Chillingworth’s offer of her a choice of saying that she sinned with Chillingworth and then they could just leave from there. She believes that the cup of medicine will poison her as vengeance from Chillingworth for sinning

Dimmesdale calls for Hester and Pearl to go up to the scaffold with him and they do, symbolic as this is the same scaffold where he shamed Hester seven years ago and now he is standing next to her. Chillingworth saw this and asked Dimmesdale to go away from Hester and Pearl and further saying, “Do not blacken your fame and perish in dishonor! I can yet save you! Would you bring infamy on your sacred profession?” (Hawthorne 248). In reality, this shows that Chillingworth is only trying to further his time for revenge upon Dimmesdale as Chillingworth believed Dimmesdale was going to confess that he sinned with Hester and that would completely destroy Chillingworth’s ability to continue his vengeance upon Dimmesdale. This creates the falling action within this chapter, adding plot development to the novel and showing how important this chapter