How would it feel to carry a secret sin without anyone knowing? The Scarlet Letter answers this question with the character Dimmesdale and how he deals with the secret sin that he committed. It tells the story of Dimmesdale, a timid pastor that suffers with his sin throughout the story and Hester a independent woman that is placed in prison for the adultery sin that both of them committed. The story goes on how Dimmesdale lives with the sin as a secret and Hester living with the sin in public. Dimmesdale starts to lose his mind mentally by not getting enough sleep and he hurts himself physically by doing self-punishment for his sin. The novel The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne uses characterization of Dimmesdale to illustrate the secrecy of sin and how it …show more content…
Dimmesdale starts to see the ramification of holding in his sin and starts to feel culpable when seeing Hester take the blame for something they both did. In the beginning of the novel, Hester and Dimmesdale both had committed adultery, which is against the Puritans belief of sin. Hester is on the scaffold refusing to reveal the father of her child to the people, in order to save Dimmesdale’s reputation as a preacher. As punishment for the sin, Hester had been sentenced three hours on the scaffold and must always wear the scarlet letter. Since nobody knows that Dimmesdale also committed the sin, he is delegated to reveal Pearl’s father from Hester, but she refuses to reveal it. Dimmesdale stops and does not pressure her because he is the father, which makes him feel guilty blaming Hester for their sin. After words, Hester protects Dimmesdale’s identity, only she is thrown into prison for the sin that they committed together. Furthermore, as the townspeople want Dimmesdale to deal with Hester’s sin, he feels that he should not be “silent from any mistaken pity and tenderness for him; for, believe me, Hester, though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee, on thy pedestal of