Hester and the World Around Her Hester is swayed by many forces that she cannot control, the most important being the natural settings that are direct and indirect to her. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter uses lots of instances of nature to affect Hester Prynne and the other characters around her. Nature and the wilderness are very prevalent topics in the book. The book takes place in seventeenth century Salem, so the town is very small with a vast wilderness around Salem. Hester Prynne is controlled in her emotions and actions of nature that take place within the book which makes nature very important. Nature adds a deeper layer to the book, instead of just reading the words on the page one is able to look further inside the story …show more content…
Some aspects of nature give messages to the reader to feel a certain way about an element in nature. While Hester was walking through to forest with Dimmesdale Pearl had told her “Mother, the sunshine does not love you. It runs away and hides itself because it is afraid of something on you bosom.” (174). One can infer that the sunlight is freedom and forgiveness, while the shade is sin. So there is a message to the reader that as long as she is wearing the Scarlet Letter, she will always be a sinner in her ways. Without nature a reader could not infer that which is why Nathaniel Hawthorne needed it to be able to send a message to the reader about Hester’s sin. Another important reason why Nathaniel Hawthorne needed nature is to be able to add feeling to material objects. Along with character emotions nature is also used to represent how a reader should feel about objects. It gives different connotations to objects intentionally placed in the book. In chapter one Hawthorne represents prisons as the “black flower of civilized society” (46). Hawthorne is able to give a negative connotation to the word black by relating it to sin and that the Black Flower would not grow without the sin of others which it is its nutrients. Being able to have connotations make the reader much more connected to the book which in …show more content…
Nature gives The Scarlet Letter a second underlying layer to the book that would not be there otherwise. This layer is important because without it there would be less to read into in the book. Throughout the book there is motif of night and day. Night is where people are able to speak about their sins freely, but during this time no one can see them. While in the daytime people do not confess anything but people are able to see their sins. In the end of the book this is opposed and Dimmesdale was able to confess his sin during the day for everyone to see, eventually dying upon the scaffold, “That final word came forth with the ministers expiring breath. The multitude silent till then, broke out in a strange deep voice of awe and wonder, which could not as yet find an utterance, save in this murmur rolled so heavily after the departed spirit.” (243). Without these underlying themes Dimmesdale’s confession would have been much less important because it wouldn’t have broken the motif. It would have just been another scene in the story to finish up the plot without a deeper
In the book The Scarlet Letter, the character Reverend Dimmesdale, a very religious man, committed adultery, which was a sin in the Puritan community. Of course, this sin could not be committed alone. His partner was Hester Prynne. Hester was caught with the sinning only because she had a child named Pearl. Dimmesdale was broken down by Roger Chillinsworth, Hester Prynne’s real husband, and by his own self-guilt. Dimmesdale would later confess his sin and die on the scaffold. Dimmesdale was well known by the community and was looked up to by many religious people. But underneath his religious mask he is actually the worst sinner of them all. His sin was one of the greatest sins in a Puritan community. The sin would eat him alive from the inside out causing him to become weaker and weaker, until he could not stand it anymore. In a last show of strength he announces his sin to the world, but dies soon afterwards. In the beginning Dimmesdale is a weak, reserved man. Because of his sin his health regresses more and more as the book goes on, yet he tries to hide his sin beneath a religious mask. By the end of the book he comes forth and tells the truth, but because he had hidden the sin for so long he is unable to survive. Dimmesdale also adds suspense to the novel to keep the reader more interested in what Reverend Dimmesdale is hiding and his hidden secrets. Therefore Dimmesdale’s sin is the key focus of the book to keep the reader interested. Dimmesdale tries to cover up his sin by preaching to the town and becoming more committed to his preachings, but this only makes him feel guiltier. In the beginning of the story, Dimmesdale is described by these words; “His eloquence and religious fervor had already given earnest of high eminence in his profession.”(Hawthorne,44). This proves that the people of the town looked up to him because he acted very religious and he was the last person that anyone expected to sin. This is the reason that it was so hard for him to come out and tell the people the truth. Dimmesdale often tried to tell the people in a roundabout way when he said “…though he (Dimmesdale) were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so, than to hide a guilty heart through life.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne's work, The Scarlet Letter, nature plays a very symbolic role. Throughout the book, nature is incorporated into the story line. One example of this is with the character of Pearl. Pearl is very different than all the other characters due to her special relationship with Nature. Hawthorne personifies Nature as sympathetic towards sins against the puritan way of life. Hester's sin causes Nature to accept Pearl.
Of all the symbols in The Scarlet Letter, the forest is one of the most important. By providing an escape from the overbearing nature of puritan life, the forest allows characters to be presented in a different backdrop, it can serve as a place of both light and darkness, but above all, liberty. For every character that visits it, the forest is freedom, protection, and peace. Without it, there would be no contrast with the village as well as puritan society, and Hawthorne?s message would not be as convincing.
Nathaniel Hawthorne's work, The Scarlet Letter, focuses on the small Puritan community of Boston during the seventeenth century. In the center of the town is a " . . .weather darkened scaffold. . . (234)" where sinners are made to face the condemning public. The accused experience strange phenomena while on the scaffold - some become braver, some meeker. And whether the public is looking at them or not, they become their true selves on the scaffold. In essence, everything that is real and true occurs on the scaffold, and everything that is illusion or hypocrisy occurs everywhere else.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne's classic The Scarlet Letter, nature plays a very important and symbolic role. Hawthorne uses nature to convey the mood of a scene, to describe characters, and to link the natural elements with human nature. Many of the passages that have to do with nature accomplish more than one of these ideas. All throughout the book, nature is incorporated into the story line. The deep symbolism conveyed by certain aspects of nature helps the reader gain a deeper understanding of the plight and inner emotions of the characters in the novel.
As you yell back and forth, it all falls together in your tempered mind, every little sign you decided to ignore by thinking to yourself “Oh, we can work it out, no big deal!” boy were you ever wrong, from the way he ignored you after coming home from work, to the rolling of his bloodshot eyes after stumbling through the front door at 4am after his “friends birthday celebration” every. Single. Saturday. You knew it would be a disaster from the start, but you trucked on, for the fun times you had, when his apologies seemed sincere, to your friends constantly envying you for being with such a seemingly “perfect guy” but every empty night ends with a lung emptying sigh. If you only had paid more attention to the little things, none of this would ever be happening; you are constantly in the dark with him, when all you want is the light. After a thorough reading of the Scarlet Letter, the reader can conclude that Nathaniel Hawthorne has an immense focus on symbolism, whether it's on a subconscious level like night and day, or in blatantly obvious ways, from the red letter "A", to pearl herself.
Throughout the novel, The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester’s experiences in and out of the Puritan society and the weight of the scarlet letter change her in many ways, including her level of confidence, her appearance and her outlook on the Puritan people, and the way she feels about the letter “A”. Due to the sin committed by Hester she became the outcast of the Puritan community. She was forced to begin a new life on her own with no support from anyone. The sudden vicissitudes in her life cause a great transformation in Hester.
Humans are social creatures‒they form groups, communities, and societies that have varying degrees of requirements for a person to be accepted. For many, the question of whether to conform to society 's unspoken rules and garner acceptance or to reject them and be alienated is to be thoroughly examined and contemplated over. A facet of this question is answered in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s historical novel, The Scarlet Letter, as the characterization of Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale reveals that forcibly molding oneself or another to fit the rigid expectations that society implements rescinds the rights of an individual to an identity and a life.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, there are many moral and social themes develped throughout the novel. Each theme is very important to the overall effect of the novel. In essence, The Scarlet Letter is a story of sin, punishment and the importance of truth. One theme which plays a big role in The Scarlet Letter is that of sin and its effects. Throughout the novel there were many sins committed by various characters. The effects of these sins are different in each character and every character was punished in a unique way. Two characters were perfect examples of this theme in the novel. Hester Prynne and The Reverend Dimmesdale best demonstrated the theme of the effects of sin.
The Scarlet Letter is a well-known novel written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. In this novel Hawthorne wrote in depth about the Puritans’ reception to sin, in particular, adultery. He also includes brilliant visuals of the repercussions that occur when the town of Salem hears of Hester’s adultery. There are many relationships within the book, from a lover to a beautiful yet illegitimate daughter. Symbolism runs throughout, even a simple rose bush outside of a jail holds so much meaning. Hawthorne reveals themes all through the novel one in particular, was sin. Although sin does not occur often in the Puritan lifestyle Hawthorne shows the importance and change this one deceit makes for the town of Salem.
The Scarlet Letter involves many characters that go through several changes during the course of the story. In particular, the young minister Dimmesdale, who commits adultery with Hester, greatly changes. He is the moral blossom of the book, the character that makes the most progress for the better. It is true that Dimmesdale, being a minister, should be the role model of the townspeople. He is the last person who should commit such an awful crime and lie about it, but in the end, he confesses to the town. Besides, everybody, including ministers, sin, and the fact that he confesses illustrates his courage and morality.
Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter silhouettes the human experience as being intricately woven with equal parts loving bliss and guilty anguish. He describes, from different characters’ perspectives, that only through one does the other have meaning. That living is a sensation fully encountered exclusively from naked emotion which is tended toward, the liberty to articulate those truths, and solidarity. Pearl becomes the embodiment of the former, who is described from the very beginning as an unearthly “creature”, the second by Arthur Dimmesdale, slowly killed by his secret sin, and the latter by both as they discover the lawless triumph of pleasure and pain. Over the course of the novel’s
That man who Hester loves so deeply, Mr. Dimmesdale also undergoes major changes due the sin he bears. In the beginning of the book we see this man’s weakness and unwillingness to confess sin even as he begs Hester the person he committed his sin with to come forth with her other parties name (p56). As The Scarlet Letter progresses we see Dimmesdale become weaker physically and his religious speeches become even stronger so that his congregation begins to revere him. For a large part of the novel Dimmesdale has been on a downward spiral in terms of mental and physical health thanks to a so-called friend who was issued to take care of Mr. Dimmesdale, then because of a talk with Hester he is revitalized and given the power to do something, which he could not for seven long years. At the end of the novel Dimmesdale is finally able to recognize his family in public and confess his sin before all releasing the sin he held so long hidden in his heart (p218, 219).
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, nature and Pearl are depicted as innocence and evil. Hester brings her daughter, Pearl, to live in the forest because they are not accepted by society due to the Scarlet letter. The relationship between these two is Pearl creates a bond with nature mentally since society rejects her as a product of sin. Nature is viewed in the eyes of a Puritan as a place where witches live to perform witchcraft and where darkness inhabits. However, the relationship between nature and Pearl gives her freedom and growth.
Hawthorne shows this when he writes about a forest that has intriguing qualities. “ ‘See!’ answered Hester, smiling. ‘Now I can stretch out my hand, and grasp some of it.’ As she attempted to do so, the sunshine vanished” (Hawthorne 176). When Hester and Pearl were in the forest near their home, Pearl claimed that the sunshine would not touch her mother because of her scarlet letter. The sunlight, considered to be a symbol of purity, would not touch something impure. The forest was also where Hester found peace, because she was not judged by her scarlet letter there. Dimmesdale and she could also show their love for each other in the forest without anyone’s knowledge. The sun and forest are examples of how romantics gave nature supernatural and human