Brown By Nathaniel Hawthorne: Utilization Of Symbolism
The hypocrisy of 1600s Puritan society was often disguised behind a facade of moral righteousness. Puritans claimed to use public shaming as a way to better the morals of society and lead people to repent; however, it was highly hypocritical as the Puritans found pure entertainment in the downfall of others and completely neglected sinners rather than educating them. Puritan society thrived off of gossip and rumors, which goes against many biblical morals. Nathaniel Hawthorne, a 19th century transcendentalist, tells the story of how 1600s colonial Puritan society reacts to a woman who commits the sin of adultery in the 1850 The Scarlet Letter. In an excerpt from Chapter 13, the transcendentalist ideals of Nathaniel Hawthorne are reflected through
“Then god bless you faith said with the pink ribbons”.(Hawthorne 398) Faith is kinda of a symbol of goodness herself so it makes the ribbons a symbol of being good and pure. There is another great use of symbolism and its the staff. The staff represents the evil in the traveler who carried it. Also it represents the devil or the darkness of the meeting.
(Maus 2005) In the story of “Young Goodman Brown”, the traveler carries a serpentine staff and towards the climax of the story, he makes a new stick by stripping twigs, wet with dew. However the moment his fingers touch them they withered and dried up. The traveler is as destructive as they come; he is feared by Puritans. The whole point of the Puritan’s journey into that forest, although each individual’s is different, is so they can get a glimpse of this traveler and what he is capable of and in turn realize how much they actually need God. The serpent on his staff is a symbolization that he is like the serpent in the Garden of Eden.
In the novel, “Brown” by Richard Rodriguez, he uses many notions of “Brown” to represent that it is the most typical American color amongst all. At the point when Rodriguez explains that "the future is brown (quote #1)," his theory is perplexing, in light of the fact that he considers brown "not in the sense of pigment, necessarily (quote #2)," but rather as a color that involves the blending of natural experience. In spite of the fact that Rodriguez trusts that "brown may be as refreshing as green (quote #3)" that vision needs to figure with the way that, generally, the prevailing American color has been white. “I think brown marks a reunion of peoples, an end to ancient wanderings. Rival cultures and creeds conspire with Spring to create
Many famous works in literature feature references or allusions to the Bible and Christianity. The wife’s dreams in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Young Goodman Brown allude to Pontius Pilate’s wife’s dreams in the Bible. Pearl’s name in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter alludes to Matthew 13:45-46, the Pearl of Great Price. Lastly, some quotations in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 allude to Jesus walking on water and Jesus’ first miracle of turning water into wine.
The pink ribbons faith puts in her cap are supposed to represent purity. The color pink relates to innocence and youth. Hawthorne speaks on Faith’s ribbons multiple times at the beginning of the story making her seem full of life and happiness. Hawthorne re-introduces the ribbons when Goodman Brown is in the forest. When Faith’s pink ribbon falls down from the sky, Goodman Brown perceives it as a sign that she has fallen into the realm of the devil.
In “Young Goodman Brown,” Nathaniel Hawthorne uses diction and imagery to show how revelation often leads to corruption. Initially, Goodman Brown’s character is portrayed as a kind and innocent Puritan by Hawthorne’s use of diction. For example, by saying “my sweet, pretty wife” (1), Brown demonstrates his adoration towards his wife; he even goes as far to compare her to an angel.
In 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne published his most well renown, fictitious novel, The Scarlett Letter. Hawthorne described the adversity Hester Prynne, his main character, encountered as a result of the child she birthed out of wedlock. He alluded to the Puritan views of the colony through their reaction to her affair, and the way they treated both Hester and her daughter, Pearl. Nathaniel Hawthorne demonstrated that the belief in predestination generated a lack of empathy to those labeled as sinners.
Hawthorne says, “Something fluttered lightly down through the air and caught on the branch of a tree” Faith’s pink ribbons symbolize purity. In the beginning of the story was Faith had her ribbons she was pure but at the end of the story when Young Goodman Brown saw Faith’s pink ribbon come down from the sky it represents how she succumed to evil and Hawthorne lost both his faith and his wife Faith. The third example of how Hawthorne uses symbolism to show the theme good versus evil in the story “Young Goodman Brown” is when the devil is telling Brown and Faith that they will have a new perspective of life, a life where everyone sins. In the beginning of the story Young Goodman Brown saw his family as godly and he saw Faith as pure but the devil shows him that his views are naive and the devil gives him the capability to see the dark side of everything and everyone.
I’m going to choose the motif of a forest. The idea of forest seems to signify an unexplored realm full of the unknown. It stands for the unconscious and its mysteries. The forest is traditionally a place of darkness or evil. This is particularly true in works set in the Puritan time.
Pink ribbons are used to symbolize innocence in the real world, and how they are represented throughout the story. The wife of Goodman Brown wears these pink ribbons, in order to represent purity. Brown loses them when he notices faith joining the “devil.” “Cries out to Faith to resist this evil.” (Gale).
Lastly, “A stick sharpened at both ends,” conveyed to the children the danger of each other and Roger, the wielder of the stick, used this symbol of destruction to lead them on a hunt to kill the protagonist Ralph. The symbols with the greatest influence and power were mostly derived from a negative connotation. William Golding used both power and symbolism to create an Allegory novel that gives insight on how they have a deadly end result. The washed up Conch and Sow’s head had many differences, the most simplistic being that the head was evil, containing fear, while the Conch wielded order and civility. The plot of this novel shifts around power and what the result is of having it fall into the wrong hands.
The pink ribbons worn by Faith represents purity, the pink color is often associated with innocence. Often when Goodman sees
The color pink has been around for centuries. A combination of the colors white and red, it is sometimes alluded to as the only ‘innocent’ color, besides that of white. It is also referred to as a link between innocence and evil, as the two colors represent different ideas on the spectrum of good and evil. The story Young Goodman Brown written by Nathaniel Hawthorne shows a man who enters the woods and must find a way to fight the evil that is trying to persuade him to go against his faith and essentially become part of the ever growing cult that worships the devil. The color pink is prominent in the story and represents a power struggle of good versus evil.
The snake on the end of the staff represents the devil. No other animal makes you think of the devil like a snake does. In Young Goodman Brown, the staff is brought into the story when Goodman Brown meets the man in the woods. “But the only thing about him, that could be fixed upon as remarkable, is his staff, which bore the likeliness of a great black snake, so curiously wrought, that it might almost be seen to twist and wriggle itself, like a living serpent.” (par. 13)
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