The Scarlet Letter - Punishment and Death
Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter deals with many themes, among those
including punishment and death. Utilizing the theme of punishment, the
central character, Hester Prynne, was forced to wear an embroidered scarlet
letter on "her bosom" for the rest of her life as a sign of her sin of
adultery. This object; however, has the opposite affect as a punishment and
as people of the community begin to forget the original significance of the
letter it comes to bear a new meaning, able. In the thirteenth chapter of
this book, Hawthorne comes out and in the third person states "the scarlet
letter had not done its office."
Hester has gone beyond the letter of the law and done everything asked
of her. She becomes quite a popular seamstress, heralded all over the town
of Boston for her work. She herself wears only drab clothing of ordinary
clothing, punishing herself with humility. There is only one piece of
clothing that she is forbidden to make, the wedding vail, it is assumed
that she can not possibly represent the values of a marriage. It would be
most improper to have one who has committed as sin as she had to be
involved in the marital bonds of another couple. Nevertheless, she does her
work dutifully and completely.
She is emotionately worn out by all the work and penance for her sin.
Midway through the novel she no longer appears as a hidden beauty. Hester
now wears her hair in a cap, and the only effort of considerable worth is
that which she expends in her teachings to Pearl. She has earned the towns
people respect. People now regard the letter as representing the word
"able."
As the Reverend Dimmesdale refers to Pearl in his argument for
allowing the child to remain with her mother, "God gave Pearl as a blessing
and as a reminder of her sin." The girl herself is a much more considerable
punishment to Hester then the letter "A" is. Pearl is the living symbol of
her sin. All the evil and hate of this story is embodied in this little
Throughout The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne attempted to expose the varying ways in which different people deal with lingering guilt from sins they have perpetrated. The contrasting characters of Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale ideally exemplified the differences in thought and behavior people have for guilt. Although they were both guilty of committing the same crime, these two individuals differed in that one punished themselves with physical and mental torture and the other chose to continue on with their life, devoting it to those less fortunate than they.
All of these factual on-screen texts compel the viewer to be more interested in the history of Rodriguez and to possibly even research further into the topic.
Huck witnesses the depravity of human nature when experiences the feud between the Grangerfords and the Shepherdsons. After Huck and Jim get split up on the Mississippi River, Huck spends some time living on the Grangerford’s estate. He befriends a Grangerford named Buck, and the two of them spend a lot of time together. Buck explains that the Grangerfords and Shepherdsons have been feuding for years, although no one quite remember why. Huck does not understand the point of a feud. Buck goes on and explains, “A feud is this way: A man has a quarrel with another man, and kills him; then that other man's brother kills him; then the other brothers, on both sides, goes for one another; then the cousins chip in -- and by and by everybody's killed off, and there ain't no more feud. But it's kind of slow, and takes a long time” (Twain 107). Huck cannot comprehend the point of a feud, especially since in this case Buck cannot pinpoint the cause of the feud. Later, Buck died from gunshots from the guns of the Shepherdsons. Huck is devastat...
...wer and fear of losing it is precisely what drives him to extreme lengths with magnified confidence. As the tragic play concludes, his pompous brashness forcefully disintegrates along with his own life.
"Stop and Frisk." Gale Encyclopedia of American Law. Ed. Donna Batten. 3rd ed. Vol. 9. Detroit: Gale, 2010. 391-392. Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 5 Nov. 2013.
Guilt and shame haunt all three of the main characters in The Scarlet Letter, but how they each handle their sin will change their lives forever. Hester Prynne’s guilt is publicly exploited. She has to live with her shame for the rest of her life by wearing a scarlet letter on the breast of her gown. Arthur Dimmesdale, on the other hand, is just as guilty of adultery as Hester, but he allows his guilt to remain a secret. Instead of telling the people of his vile sin, the Reverend allows it to eat away at his rotting soul. The shame of what he has done slowly kills him. The last sinner in this guilty trio is Rodger Chillingworth. This evil man not only hides his true identity as Hester’s husband, but also mentally torments Arthur Dimmesdale. The vile physician offers his ‘help’ to the sickly Reverend, but he gives the exact opposite. Chillingworth inflicts daily, mental tortures upon Arthur Dimmesdale for seven long years, and he enjoys it. Hester, Dimmesdale, and Chillingworth are all connected by their sins and shame, but what they do in regards to those sins is what sets them apart from each other.
To start off, Orwell's sole inclusion of women who base their relationships with men exclusively on sex demonstrates Orwell's negative beliefs about women. Despite Julia's claims to love Winston, their relationship is not about “the love of one person, but the animal instinct”(132). Julia has been in similar relationships to her and Winston's “hundreds of times”(131), relationships that look only at the sexual side and never at the emotional. She refuses all of Winston's attempts to expand their relationship, having “a disconcerting habit of falling asleep”(163) whenever he persists in talking. And although Winston cares for Julia more than he cares for Katharine, Katharine also bases her relationship with Winston completely on sex. When Winston reflects on their time together, he thinks, “he could have borne living with her if it had been agreed that they remain celibate... It ...
Nathaniel Hawthorne created themes in The Scarlet Letter just as significant as the obvious ideas pertaining to sin and Puritan society. Roger Chillingworth is a character through which one of these themes resonates, and a character that is often underplayed in analysis. His weakness and path of destruction of himself and others are summed up in one of Chillingworth's last sentences in the novel, to Arthur Dimmesdale: "Hadst thou sought the whole earth over... there were no place so secret, no high place nor lowly place, where thou couldst have escaped me, save on this very scaffold!" (171).
The Great Depression was not just a little event in history, hence the word “great”, but a major economical setback that would change Canada, and the world, forever. The word “great” may not mean the same thing it does now; an example of this is the ‘Great’ War. These events were not ‘good’ or ‘accomplishing’ in any way, quite the opposite, but in those times it most likely meant ‘big’. What made it big are many factors, both in the 20’s and 30’s, which can be categorized into three main points: economics, politics and society. With all these events, compressed into ten years, this period of economic hardship of the 1930’s truly deserves the title the “Great Depression”.
letter *A* embroidered on her chest. The A served as a symbol of her crime, was
The legislative branches are the U.S. Congress on the federal level, various general assemblies on the state level and on the local level town councils or township trustees. The legislative branch is said to be the most important player in the policy process and is so powerful ...
All of the Final Fantasy installments have strong stories that are easy to understand and are ultimately enjoyable. Final Fantasy 13 doesn’t have this. Enter the floating sphere of Cocoon and the forbidden realm of Pulse that lies beneath. The main story begins with a clash between these two worlds. The story of the game begins with the purge of a city that is believed to have come in contact with something form Pulse. The main character, Lighting, is a soldier that goes against the government during this purge in order to save her sister who was changed into an l'Cie (a servant of Pulse). The story is then about a ragtag group of people who meet up during different events and join forces while running from the governm...
Revenge is the act of retaliating in order to get even with someone for the wrongs they have done. In the novel “The Scarlet Letter,” the author, Nathaniel Hawthorne, uses Roger Chillingworth to reap revenge on Arthur Dimmesdale for his affair with his wife, Hester Prynne. Chillingworth becomes so devoted to revenge that is all his life revolves around. Chillingworth then devotes the rest of his life to taking revenge on Dimmesdale.
"Let her cover the mark as she will, the pang of it will be always in her heart."(59). The scarlet letter was place upon Hester Prynne bosom as a punishment for the crime she committed; the letter A to signified adulteress. The letter A on her bosom was there as a reminder the townspeople, strangers and Hester herself of the crime she committed. Likewise, it was there to ensure that such a crime would not again befell upon their Puritan community.
The presence of crime was a difficult, unwanted aspect of both Puritan society and life in the eighteen hundreds that had to be dealt with in order for society to remain fully functional. Justice systems were used over the course of this particular time period to create laws, maintain order, and to justly convict criminals that threatened the societal peace in an attempt to reduce the impact of crime within communities. Laws created by these systems reflected the standards held by the majority of the population, and they worked for the greater good of all members in a particular community. In Hawthorne’s book “The Scarlet Letter,” he was able to combine both the Puritan Law and common modes of punishment from his lifetime to create Hester Prynne’s sentence.