Kyle Kesler
Ms. McMillan
APEL: 6
25 September 2015
Shame Essay Shame is like a scar, eventually the pain from the initial injury will subside, but once the damage is inflicted it can’t be undone and will remain there for the rest of life for the public to see. While shame is an effective tool used to demonstrate societal values and rules, shame in today’s society is no longer effective because it has a destructive effect on human lives and it targets women. While shame is an effective tool to demonstrate societal values and rules, shame, when used incorrectly and excessively, is no longer effective because it has a destructive effect on human lives. In the novel The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester Prynne, a young woman, is found
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Hawthorne describes as Hester struggles through life and is overall changed by her lifelong sentence of shame and her “child of sin”, Pearl. Hester’s life was destroyed by shame and she spent the rest of her time striving for repentance and redemption for a “crime” she committed out of passion and love. So was Hester’s punishment fair? Although the scarlet “A” can be argued to have gotten its point across that adultery is wrong, no it was not fair because the punishment did not fit the crime. The punishment was excessive since it was a lifelong severe punishment and it was used incorrectly because it did more than just show adultery is not acceptable. Especially in our society today the punishment most definitely was not fair. It violated her rights as an individual and forced other’s views upon her. This demonstrates the destructive effect shame can have on human lives. A real life example of shame being used incorrectly and excessively is shown in David Perry’s article, Jeb’s Medieval Politics of Shame: Upholding a Long Tradition of Keeping Women and Girls in Line, 13-year-old Izabel Laxamana was a victim of shame. After Izabel’s father found out she had sent a picture
“Woman, it is thy badge of shame!" (107). Governor Bellingham was describing the scarlet letter to Hester while they were discussing if the punishments that Hester had to go through were adequate enough for the crime. Hester was living in the outskirts of the city in a small abandoned cottage for several years with the only thing that had any monetary value in her life, her child and the product of committing adultery, Pearl. She and her little Pearl were shunned from the community for her acts. In the Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester is punished in more than one way, and she is able to deal with it openly so the community will, over time, forgive her.
When something shaming happens, and we keep it locked up, it festers and grows. It consumes us” (40). Brown believes that we should share our experiences with others, but not just anyone she believes that we should share with someone that we trust and that will not judge us because of what we did. She also considers that not everyone we communicate with is worthy of sharing our shame stories with. Shame is a part of all of our lives we have shame within us it helps us stay humble because it reminds us that we are human and make
Hester Prynne, an adulteress, is imprisoned by the laws of Puritan society and instead of running away, struggles to accept her badge of shame as a very real part of who she is. When she is first commanded to wear a scarlet letter A, she sees it as a curse. For the first few years she tries to ignore the ignominy under a mask of indifference. “Hester Prynne, meanwhile, kept her place upon the pedestal of shame, with glazed eyes, and an air or weary indifference,” Hawthorne writes. (page 48) Even so, she cannot hide from what her sin has produced. Every day her daughter Pearl reminds her of her sin. The only way to freedom is to avoid being defined by the society in which she finds herself. It is a gradual process but slowly, due to her compassion for the poor and sick, people start to view Hester's badge as meaning “Able” rather than “Adulteress”. Eventually her badge becomes a blessing as other women come to her for advice and counseling in that,
Hester's sin is that her passion and love were of more importance to her than the Puritan moral code, but she learns the error of her ways and slowly regains the adoration of the community. For instance, 'What we did had a consecration of its own. We felt it so! We said so to each other! Hast thou forgotten it?';(Ch.17: 179). Hester fully acknowledges her guilt and displays it with pride to the world. This was obvious by the way she displays the scarlet letter with elaborate designs showing that she is proud. Furthermore, she does not want to live a life of lies anymore when she states 'forgive me! In all things else, I have striven to be true! Truth was the one virtue which I might have held fast, and did hold fast, through all extremity save when thy good--the life--they fame--were put in question! Then I consented a deception. But a lie is never good, even though death threaten the other side!';(Ch.17: 177). Hester learns from her sin, and grows strong, a direct result from her punishment. The scarlet letter 'A' was as if a blessing to Hester changing her into an honest person with good virtues. Fittingly, she chooses to stay in Boston with Pearl although Hawthorne admits, ';…that this woman should still call that place her home, where, and where only, she must needs be the type of shame';(Ch.5: 73). She is trying to stay and face her consequences instead of running in the other direction. Most people would leave a town where they are looked upon as trash the scum of society. Finally, the colonists come to think of the scarlet letter as '…the cross on a nun's bosom';(Ch.
The society in which she lives is legitimized such that people follow a certain moral code. Refraining or overlooking of such codes leads to punishment as revealed by the women “this woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die” (The Ugly Woman, 7). The narrator however, echoes concern against following strict codes of conduct. Hawthorne presents the idea that lack of compassion and forgiveness makes a society dictatorial, he believes the need to observe and practice grace is imperative. Ruling through grace was expressed by Hester when she is forgiven by a society that had once punished her for same mistakes as the young girl retorts “let her cover the mark she will, the pang of it will be always in her heart” (A Young Wife, 6). Reverend Dimmesdale finds adequate grace after seven years of not confessing his sins because of the repercussions that would come thereafter. He begs Hester to reveal his name so that he can as well reveal his sin “be not silent from any mistaken pity, and tenderness for him” (Reverend Dimmesdale, 26) YOur
Hawthorne describes Hester Prynne’s life desolate in The Scarlet Letter due to public shaming. Hester Prynne indeed commit a crime and sinned, however, she should not have to have her life ruined because of it. There are many more options to punish a criminal than by publicly shaming them. For example, the culprit can be put in prison, spend a certain amount of time doing community service, pay a fine, or anything else that fits the wrongdoers actions. Comprehensively, public shaming can cost someone’s happiness in their life all because of one mistake they made in the past.
Hester Prynne, the wearer of the scarlet letter, conveys a couple of different ways in which guilt can affect individual’s lives for worse and for better. Depending on the emotional depth of the sin and how it affects the society, one of the worst results of sin is the feeling of being an outcast. “Much of the marble coldness of Hester’s impression was to be attributed to the circumstance that her life had turned, in a great measure, from passion and feeling, to thought. Standing alone in the world,–alone, as to any dependence on society, and with little Pearl to be guided and protected,–alone, and hopeless of retrieving her position, even has she not scorned to consider it desirable,–she cast away the fragments of a broken chain.” (Hawthorne 112) In this quote, Hawthorne describes Hester’s emotions of desertion and the ignominy of being alone. For Hester, these sentiments reach a point to where they are almost unbearable. After some time passes, she realizes that in order for her life to continue on, she needs to change the way she is living. “She wanted–what some people want throughout life–a grief that should deeply touch her, and thus humanize and mak...
One of themes that Hawthorne conveys in The Scarlet Letter is that society is more willing to forgive people who ask for forgiveness with humility and generosity than those who demanded it as a right. This theme was conveys using Hester Prynne, a young women who committed adultery. This was considered to be one of the worst crime someone could commit in the Puritan society during the eighteen hundreds, where she resides in. As punishment, Hester was required to wear a scarlet letter "A" upon her garment in order for everyone to recognize her crime. Her society had condemn her, they believed that she "has brought shame upon all of us, and ought to die..."(59) Yet, as time went by, because of the way in which Hester carried herself wearing the scarlet letter, the symbol had taken a new meaning. Although, when the scarlet letter was first place on her bosom it was a symbol of Hester's crime, burden, seclusion, and shame. However, as a result of Hester's generosity and humility the scarlet letter had come to symbolize Hester's strength, philanthropy, and gained her very high respectability in her society.
In the beginning of The Scarlet Letter, the letter is understood as a label of punishment and sin being publicized. Hester Prynne bears the label of “A” signifining adulterer upon her chest. Because of this scorching red color label she becomes the outcast of her society. She wears this symbol of punishment and it become a burden throughout her life. The letter “produces only a reflection of her scarlet letter; likewise, the townspeople's image of Hester revolves around her sin. The evil associated with Hester's actions and the letter on her chest consume all aspects of her life, concealing her true beauty, mind, and soul” (R. Warfel 421-425). Society pushed blame upon Hester Prynne, and these events lead to the change of her life. The Puritans whom Prynne is surround by view the letter as a symbol from the devil, controversially some individuals look upon the letter, sigh and fell sympathy towards her because they have or are involved in this same situation. Nonetheless the haunting torture Hester Prynne battles daily drags on, Nathaniel Hawthorne shows this torture “of an impulse and passionate nature. She had fortified herself to encounter the stings and venomous stabs of public contumely wreaking itself in every variety of insult but...
Through Hester and the symbol of the scarlet letter, Hawthorne reveals how sin can be utilized to change a person for the better, in allowing for responsibility, forgiveness, and a renewed sense of pride. In a Puritan society that strongly condemns adultery one would expect Hester to leave society and never to return again, but that does not happen. Instead, Hester says, “Here…had been the scene of her guilt, and here should be the scene of her earthly punishment; and so, perchance, the torture of her daily shame would at length purge her soul, and work out another purity than that which she had lost; more saint-like, because the result of martyrdom.” Hes...
Public humiliation supposedly enforces people’s behaviors to change but does shame really influence people to change? Most people have their different opinions on public humiliation but either way Hester is a victim of this cruel well-known Puritan punishment. On the other hand, as a result of Reverend Dimmesdale withholding his sin, a hard-hitting sickness secretly hits the reverend. The scarlet letter located on Hester’s chest is a constant reminder of her wrong decision. In the novel The Scarlet Letter, author Nathaniel Hawthorne expresses the effects of sin in many ways, including public humiliation, Hester and the scarlet letter and Dimmesdale’s sickness. Maria Stromberg, who wrote the article “Hawthorne’s Black Man: Image of Social Evil” expresses the danger of breaking laws through her writings about The Scarlet Letter. Olivia Taylor’s article “Cultural Confessions: Penance and Penitence in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter and The Marble Faun” indicates that with every sin one commits there are consequences.
Hester Prynne’s sin was adultery. This sin was regarded very seriously by the Puritans, and was often punished by death. Hester’s punishment was to endure a public shaming on a scaffold for three hours and wear a scarlet letter "A" on her chest for the rest of her life in the town. Although Hawthorne does not pardon Hester’s sin, he considers it less serious than those of Dimmesdale and Chillingworth. Hester’s sin was a sin of passion. This sin was openly acknowledged as she wore the "A" on her chest. Hester did not commit the greatest sin of the novel. She did not deliberately mean to commit her sin or mean to hurt others.
When one analyzes the punishment inflicted upon her, it may seem harsh and cruel, especially for a Puritan society. It seems that Hawthorne agrees with this as well. Throughout the novel, it seems apparent that Hawthorne feels that the punishment Hester received was harsh and self-degrading. When one commits a sin, they should understand their mistake, receive their blame, and receive a "slap on the wrist." However, the punishment Hester received was far worse emotionally. Wearing the letter made Hester the talk-about of the town. When she walked through the marketplace, she received scornful looks, as if society was rejecting her for her wrongdoing. Hester was now living on the outskirts of town, isolated from neighbors and trying to communicate with her daughter Pearl.
Hester Prynne committed a crime so severe that it changed her life into coils of torment and defeat. In The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester is publicly recognized as an adulteress and expelled from society. Alongside the theme of isolation, the scarlet letter, or symbol of sin, is meant to shame Hester but instead transforms her from a woman of ordinary living into a stronger person.
In the Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne commits adultery, a disgraceful sin, and she is severely punished. Yet although her sin was not a good choice, Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author, attempts to justify her actions. His writing indicates that he does not accept of her behavior but that it was not completely her fault. Being a Puritan, Hester was forced into one way of life, the only acceptable way in the eyes of her community. This pressure to adhere to numerous strict rules was metaphorically compared to a difficult journey down a narrow, winding road in the forest with little light. The Puritanical way of life curbed deviant behavior and is a justification for Hester's sin because every so often, everyone strays from the path but it the reaction to the wrongdoings that should be defining and Hester remained strong and took the consequences.