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Dynamic Characters In Scarlet Letter

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As the seasons and the times change, people change with it. Humanity’s essential nature of survival is to constantly adapt and adjust to their environments. In the novel, “The Scarlet Letter”, Nathaniel Hawthorne's characters undergo numerous challenges and tests upon both their physical and mental health. Some major conflicting characters such as Dimmesdale and Chillingworth go through several contrasting yet similar hardships. There are hardly any static characters within “The Scarlet Letter”, with nearly every person experiencing some form of change. Originally, the minister Dimmesdale had been a stable, respectable man of God; but as the story progresses, he is reduced to a life of pain and penance, walking around the world with “a hand over his heart”. The weight of DImmesdale’s sin has taken it’s toll upon his soul, and his guilt is consuming him. As of the? point in the story where Chillingworth opens up and discovers what is beyond Dimmesdale’s robes , we know what lies under Dimmesdale’s hand, on his chest we see a constant reminder of his greatest sin. Along with discovering what, assumed as self-punishment, is on Dimmesdale’s chest the readers also learn that Dimmesdale truly does feel bad for his sins and wants to repent. The protagonists are not the only people that change within …show more content…

the novel, either, the townspeople, surprisingly, are dynamic characters as well, originally believing that the letter on Hester Prynne’s bosom should have been branded to the “flesh of her forehead”

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How Does Chillingworth's Character Change Throughout The Scarlet Letter

558 Words | 3 Pages

A person’s outward appearance often influences the way others perceive their character. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Roger Chillingworth arrives in the colony to find that his wife, Hester, is being punished for extramarital relations. As the storyline continues, Chillingworth acts as the colony’s physician, becoming very close to Dimmesdale and Hester Prynne. Consequently, Chillingworth’s desire for revenge guided his appearance and interactions with Hester Prynne and Dimmesdale, ultimately altering his character.

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Arthur Dimmesdale's Marking Quotes

561 Words | 3 Pages

It is revealed that there is something on Dimmesdale’s chest after the physician, Roger Chillingworth, moves aside Dimmesdale’s shirt revealing his chest; (Hawthorne 78) the reader is then led to believe that there is something important about this interaction. The mark, again, is not directly stated so the reader does not know what the mark is. The mark is finally beginning to show itself, so the guilt is starting to work its way outward. At this point there is no way that Dimmesdale will be able to hide his shame forever. Over time the guilt will continue to build up and eventually will consume

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Scarlet Letter Guilt Quotes

1464 Words | 6 Pages

Dimmesdale’s guilt from the sin he executed, is not known to anyone besides, Roger Chillingworth and Hester. He is in panic and terror at all moments that the Puritans will discover the sin he has done. Being in such an important position in the Puritan lifestyle, as a minister, he knows the consequences for which his sin will make if publicized. He tries multiple methods to try and rid himself of the guilt. Whenever he feels threatened by the guilt he places “His hand upon his heart,” (65).

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Scarlet Letter Arthur Dimmesdale Weak

660 Words | 3 Pages

A man named Chillingworth, who claimed to be a doctor, made Dimmesdale feel worse about his secret, Dimmesdale let him get in his head. Reverend Dimmesdale was very weak for being a priest and putting no faith into his God. Reverend Dimmesdale is afraid of his town and his people finding out about his sin. As a priest he wants to seem holy and sinless like the people think him to be, so he hides the fact he and Hester committed adultery. When Hester is on the scaffold, Dimmesdale is asked to try and get Hester to confess who the father is, “If thou feelest it to be for thy soul’s peace, and that thy earthly punishment will be made more

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Character Foils In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter

612 Words | 3 Pages

The reader is especially made aware of Dimmesdale's mental state in the eleventh chapter, “His inward trouble drove him to practices more in accordance with the old, corrupted faith of Rome, than with the better light of the church in which he had been born and bred” [150]. This suggests that he is racked with immense guilt and shame at the falsehood he is living and suggests that he is physically abusing himself as a result of this guilt. This directly contradicts Chillingworth's mental state of fury and vengeance that he falls deeper into as the story progresses. These two characters also hold striking incongruities as to what drives them onward as the account

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The Scarlet Letter Dimmesdale's Transformation

523 Words | 3 Pages

Many characters from The Scarlet Letter, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, changed throughout the progression of the novel, — including Chillingworth, Hester, and even Pearl herself. No character, however, has changed as much as Dimmesdale has. Towards the beginning of the novel, Dimmesdale tries to ignore his sinful actions. Near the middle of the book, the clergyman, with the ‘help’ of Chillingworth, is able to realize his wrongdoings, and starts obsessively thinking of those wrongdoings. Around the end of the novel, with the help of the forest’s freedom, is able to finally repent correctly for his sin.

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True Identity In Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter

668 Words | 3 Pages

Dimmesdale is the minister of the Puritans which devours him alive because of the shame and guilt of his true identity as Pearl’s father. He is so ruined that his health becomes putrid and he begins to decay in a sense. Hawthorne describes his looks, “...the health of Mr. Dimmesdale had evidently begun to fail…the paleness of the young minister’s cheek was accounted for...his form grew emaciated… his hand over his heart, with first a flush and then a paleness, indicative of pain” (92 Hawthorne). The reverend decays more and more as the guilt of his true identity lingers in his heart. Chillingworth, mostly referred as ‘The Leech’, is in a similar situation where identity tests his well being.

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Secrets Kept In The Scarlet Letter

765 Words | 4 Pages

Some secrets changed characters in many different ways throughout the story. A person reading this book could feel that from the beginning, it was going to be a dark, evil story in many aspects. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, he set out to write a story in the early settlements of Massachusetts, and all of the religious aspects that came with it. Light and dark imagery, alluding to the larger conflict between good and evil, is present throughout the novel in the characters of Hester Prynne, Pearl

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Hypocrisy Of Sin In Scarlet Letter

615 Words | 3 Pages

When Dimmesdale first meets Chillingworth, he immediately declares his distaste for the man. However, as Chillingworth continuously attempts to discover Dimmesdale’s secrets, Dimmesdale continues to deny his initial suspicions. He remains close to Chillingworth, even knowing intuitively that he was a freud. It is his blatant ignorance of sin that proves his denial of the truth: “I might have known it,’ murmured he—‘I did know it! Was not the secret told me, in the natural recoil of my heart at the first sight of him, and as often as I have seen him since?

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Private Suffering In Nathaniel Hawthorne's 'The Scarlet Letter'

1030 Words | 5 Pages

During Dimmesdale’s sermon the narrator insists that "no man for any considerable period can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true” (Hawthorne 203). The narrator calls attention to the idea that after sinning a person can not act in public as if they didn’t sin because they will eventually succumb to the consequences of their actions. Since Chillingworth attempted to act in the open like he was not an adulterer he faced the repercussions, and he was unable to come to terms with it, so he encountered an enormous amount of mental torment. After Dimmesdale died due to his constant individual torment Chillingworth also passes from the same hardship. This is shown when the narrator conveys that “all his strength and energy- all his vital and intellectual force- seemed to at one desert him (Hawthorne 244).

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How Does Nathaniel Hawthorne Use Biblical Allusions In The Scarlet Letter

1458 Words | 6 Pages

However, he also uses these allusions to create a new side to his narrative as evident when he describes Hester’s resilience, and to create a new element in the plot as evident in his description of Dimmesdale’s penance and need for redemption. Therefore, Hawthorne demonstrates an effective use of allusions to craft a religious and detailed narrative for The Scarlet Letter by reviewing on parallels between the Bible and the novel’s main characters. There’s more to The Scarlet Letter than these allusions though, and there are many questions to answer about this book. These questions may never be answered fully, but by reading the novel itself, we might find the right places to start searching for answers and formulate our own opinions on the matter. What’s important from this novel is the realistic warning about what might happens when an individual place themselves too highly among others, a message Hawthorne writes to warn against the fervor of transcendentalism of his time.

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The Sin Of Dimmesdale In The Scarlet Letter

1404 Words | 6 Pages

Because of the effects that Dimmesdale’s sin has on Chillingworth, the town suffers as well. The betrayal of their pastor leads them to refuse to see the truth when he pleads for the public to see his guilt at the end of the novel, and his secrecy from the people that adore him is one of the slyest and vile parts of his sin. The blind faith that the public has in their reverend is mislead by his deceit, which causes his sin to grow to a scale that Hester’s never did. Dimmesdale also harmed Pearl, by not standing with her and Hester on the day they were condemned. When she is grown, she asks, “Doth

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The Hidden Sin In The Scarlet Letter

686 Words | 3 Pages

He was the last person that people would think as a sinner. Dimmesdale was sin when he was committed adultery with Hester. He broke the law of church, but he was afraid to face the punishment and indifferent attitude from he masses. As a faithful follower, Dimmesdale also afraid the punishment of God, so he flog himself with a whip. The physical and spiral torture and the control of Chillingworth stranded him in a world that he cannot contact with others.

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Scarlet Letter Hypocrisy Quotes

890 Words | 4 Pages

In the last few chapters after Dimmesdale and Pearl meet in the forest, we see that The minister's glow and passion were nothing like they were, it was all gone. “Yet Dimmesdale himself was a mere shrunken shell of the person he had once been. The glow of passion and fervor that had reddened his cheek in the meeting house was gone. Now his cheeks were chalk, and his face looked more like a deathmask than a living thing”(p.142) His guilt builds up tremendously throughout the story, causing him to even inflict self harm in the form of “The Scourge” a whip with many threads that had sharp edges, used as corporal punishment, or self inflicted by members of church for spiritual discipline.

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Masquerade In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter

1597 Words | 7 Pages

And he himself, in so far as he shows himself in a false light, becomes a shadow, or, indeed, ceases to exist,” (173). We can see that Dimmesdale begins to cease to exist. He is overwhelmed and unable to gain control of his life. The stress is increased when Chillingworth pokes around the truth and uses it to torture him. He finds the root of the minister’s evil and picks at it like a festering scab.

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