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Comparing Scarlet Letter And Moby Dick

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The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne is an American Gothic novel that tells the story of a young puritan woman, Hester Prynne, who committed adultery with the town’s younger reverend, Arthur Dimmesdale, and is forced to endure the punishment for it. When Hester Prynne’s husband, Roger Chillingworth, finds out that Prynne has done this, he becomes fascinated with finding out who the father of the illegitimate child is, and how he can get revenge on the man. Another American Gothic novel, Moby Dick by Herman Melville, tells of a group of men that thought they had set out to sea as whalers, but ended up going on a mission to appease Captain Ahab’s wrath towards the white whale that consumed his leg. Since they are both men of poor character, …show more content…

He has spent a great amount of time sailing the sea looking for Moby Dick. He is willing to do whatever it takes to kill the great white whale that took his leg from him. He even recognizes how extreme his revenge is, but wants it so bad that he is willing to ignore any other obstacles that may be in his way. In addition to this, Captain Ahab also has an obsession with his desire to kill Moby Dick. The crew starts out on a planned route for their sea voyage, but as they go along, Captain Ahab continually commands the crew to keep traveling and searching for Moby-Dick. Captain Ahab ends up taking his crew to Antarctica in icy, perilous waters. Captain Ahab also makes some of the members of his crew make a blood oath to kill Moby-Dick. This demonstrates how much Captain Ahab wanted to kill the great white whale and the extents he is willing to go to in order to appease his obsession. Throughout the whole sea voyage, Captain Ahab refuses to listen to anyone’s thoughts about his actions and only focuses on killing Moby-Dick. Lastly, Captain Ahab also exemplifies a very selfish attitude. This attitude is shown when Ahab continues sailing, in spite of the harm that it could possibly bring to his crew. Ahab carries his crew through extreme weather conditions, such as storms and freezing temperatures, and refuses to turn around. Many of the men could have been harmed or killed by such conditions,

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799 Words | 4 Pages

His crew wanted him to turn around and threatened to kill him. So many people died on that ship. People had to even eat sawdust from wood because they were running out of food. The boat started to fall apart on his first voyage, but quickly got fixed up. They faced the lack of wind that helped the boat progress.

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682 Words | 3 Pages

The Captain takes this a different way and wants to physically find the man while the whole time the man could be found by looking inside yourself. The way he acts prevents him from doing this though. His actions are what make him seem discourteous and benighted. Throughout the story he is constantly yelling at people trying to understand what had happened the day before.

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800 Words | 4 Pages

To some this in an unneeded, extraneous line in the story that adds no real substance. To others, this provides insight into the characters of Nurse Ratched and Mr. McMurphy. The white whale refers to Moby Dick by Herman Melville. In Moby Dick, the whale wreaks havoc and is relentlessly pursued by Captain Ahab. In the end it can be argued that Moby, the whale, and the Captain are both defeated, paralleling the story with Nurse Ratched and Mr. McMurphy.

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1140 Words | 5 Pages

Hester's True Side In committing an act of adultery, Hester Prynne, the primary character in The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, finds herself a victim of harsh judgement and ridicule by her Puritan community. She becomes isolated as a result of this scandalous behavior and becomes emotionally involved in a love triangle between her husband and her lover, Arthur Dimmesdale, who is the town minister. As a result of her shameful history, the townspeople attempt to destroy and embarrass her by socially neglecting her and labeling her as an outcast and loner. Though the people of the community pursue several attempts to shame her, Hester Prynne's beauty, selflessness, and strength help her overcome this rejection from the townspeople and

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1117 Words | 5 Pages

Six of his were killed. Finally, they reached the island called Thrinacia. He told his men not to eat the cattle, but he did not mention what can happen if they do. Due to eating the cattle, all men on the ship died except for

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1051 Words | 5 Pages

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter is a novel that focuses on sin in the Puritan society. Hawthorne revolves the theme around the four main characters Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, Roger Chillingworth., and Pearl. Hester Prynne is forced to wear the scarlet letter ‘A’ after committing adultery against her husband Roger Chillingworth, with the minister Arthur Dimmesdale. As a result an odd child is born.

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747 Words | 3 Pages

While exploring the power of love and, manipulating people 's emotions the Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne was written on the battle of someone who was convicted of being a sinner living in a puritan society. The Scarlet Letter was a very influential novel because it was like a change in time, because it’s so different from what we see today. The story talks about Hester, who committed adultery and instead of giving her the punishment of death, she got the leeway of public humiliation. Throughout the novel the author uses characterization, tone and symbolism to help the readers better understand. First, there were the characters that helped to connect the theme sin, crime, and punishment.

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1004 Words | 5 Pages

The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is a novel about how being a sinner led to a life of misery during the Puritan era. Hester Prynne, the sinner, commits adultery with a man, Arthur Dimmesdale, who is not her husband. She gives birth to a child named Pearl and is branded with a scarlet letter “A”. Her husband, Roger Chillingworth, disguises as a physician in order to unravel the truth behind the crime that his wife committed and to get revenge on the man who slept with his wife. Although Chillingworth appears as a calm man who only craved knowledge, he eventually turns into a malicious devil who is blind with getting revenge.

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1093 Words | 5 Pages

This quote shows the dangers of whaling because it is common for men to be injured at sea. Whales are enormous creatures whos instinct is to fight for their lives if they are in danger, leading them to cause destruction on ships and kill the men who hunt them. Once the whale is dead, the task of bringing the whale towards the ship is even harder. The crew works six hour shifts until the body is processed, taking days to finish depending on weather or size of whale. “Trying out a whale could take as long as three days.

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1458 Words | 6 Pages

Nathaniel Hawthorne, a famous American author from the antebellum period, notices the emphasis on individual freedoms in the works by Ralph Waldo Emerson and other Transcendentalists during his residency in the Brook Farm’s community. In response to these ideas, Hawthorne writes The Scarlet Letter, a historical novel about Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale’s lives as they go through ignominy, penance, and deprecation from their Puritan community to express their strong love for each other. Their love, even though it is true, is not considered as holy nor pure because of Hester past marriage to Roger Chillingworth, and thus Hester gained the Scarlet Letter for being an adulterer. Hawthorne utilizes biblical allusions, such as the stories of

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886 Words | 4 Pages

Melville’s life had a great impact on the story Moby Dick. In the same way, he had a bad leg on one of his journeys, he creates Captain Ahab with a broken leg. Primarily, by reading Shakespeare’s plays he creates the setting and language of the novel. In the same manner, he uses his dramatic technique in creating Ahab as a tragic hero villain.

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497 Words | 2 Pages

As the whaling ship, the Pequod, sets sail. The Crew doesn’t see Captain Ahab for a few days of being aboard the ship. When they finally see him he makes the three harpooners and his three mates take a blood oath to killing Moby Dick. After a few months of being on the journey they see the white whale and go after him. After hours of hunting him it becomes dark and Ahab is still going after him while all the crew is trying to get him to give up.

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1369 Words | 6 Pages

Tobacco in the United States has become a big money maker, as the use of tobacco has blown up so has tobacco related deaths. Tobacco comes in forms ranging from smoking to smokeless. Those who are generally just against tobacco may view smokeless tobacco as a harmful substance due to its ability to cause a variety of oral cancers, leading to a significant portion of oral deaths, and a nicotine dependence development. Those who may agree that tobacco use is not safe but also look at the smoking tobacco vs smokeless tobacco can see just how smokeless is a lifesaver and can benefit public health. Smokeless can reduced risk of oral cancer and other cancers compared to smoking, has a significantly lower death toll than smoking does, and the possibility of slowly quitting tobacco.

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506 Words | 3 Pages

Ahab’s main goal for going on the whaling ship is to kill the whale, Moby Dick. Roger Chillingworth and Captain Ahab are both evil characters with many differences.

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1731 Words | 7 Pages

There are many whales in the sea, but this particular whale called Moby Dick is the desirable catch for the whalers and captain due to its legendary proportions. In the novel, Moby Dick, it offers an allegorical story of humanity’s dangerous search for meaning. The monstrous, white whale represents that “meaning” humans have been hunting for their entire lives, but at the end one will discover that one can do so much but still end up not finding their answer. The entire plot to Moby Dick is directed towards the final confrontation between Ahab, his crewman and the White whale. At the end, the whale wins the fight and the rest of the crew on ship all die, demonstrating the fact that the whale cannot be defeated, hence signaling how the laws

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