The Scarlet Letter

The Scarlet Letter

The major characters go through many changes due to all of the events that have taken place, but the torture they have to live and die with is all within themselves. Hester Prynn has always been strong, but being isolated from society and raising a child who constantly punishes her for her love affair makes her grow stronger and tougher. Chillingworth, who once was a caring man who loved Hester, shows his darkest side when he sets out to destroy the soul of an already weak man. Dimmesdale becomes weaker when he finds he can't purify his soul from the sin he has committed. The major character changes come from within and are controlled by the characters.

Once her jail time had been served, the worst of Hester's punishment had only begun. She had confessed and had no guilt to live with, but society had completely shut her out. Also, aside from the embroidered scarlet letter she had to wear, she also had to live with her child who was a daily reminder of her sin. In order to survive her daily pain, Hester grows stronger and blocks out a lot of her emotions. It is noticed that the tougher she got inside, the tougher her appearance becomes and the more plain she dressed. Once she meet with Dimmesdale in the forest, she told him of Chillingworth, which shows she had grown strong enough to not let him hold her down. When she gained that strength, her beauty was expressed by:

Her sex, her youth, and the whole richness of her beauty, came back from what men call the irrevocable past.

Chillingworth had not been able to harm Hester because of her inner strength. At the end of the book, she is the only one who has survived emotionally.

Chillingworth wanted a woman who would love him, but when that failed, he found a new love. His new passion became the destruction of the man who took Hester away from him. He tells Hester of his plans when he says:

I shall seek this man…There is a sympathy that will make me conscious of him. I shall see him tremble. I shall feel myself shudder, suddenly and unawares. Sooner or later, he must needs be mine!

When Chillingworth moved in with Dimmesdale and controlled his every day life, his whole life was based around Dimmesdale's destruction. Since Dimmesdale had not yet confessed his sin to the town, Chillingworth was succeeding in his plan to destroy Dimmesdale's soul easily.