Good And Evil In Hawthorne's Young Goodman Brown

In Small towns everyone knows everyone, or at least they think they do. That is the case in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown.” Young Goodman Brown thinks he knows everyone in his hometown, Salem, Massachusetts, but does he really? In Hawthorne’s story, Young Goodman Brown goes on a journey and comes back a changed man. He discovers horrible truths about the people he thinks he knows the best. Amidst the very simple plot of his story, Hawthorne delves into complex themes and uses literary devices such as foreshadowing, dramatic irony, and symbolism to captivate the reader. Evil is not always easily distinguishable from good. That is one of the themes Hawthorne illustrates in “Young Goodman Brown.” Right from the beginning, where he first leaves Faith he struggles with good and evil. Hawthorne writes “What a wretch am I, to leave her on such an errand!”(2621) this is the first instance of foreshadowing we see. Hawthorne has made it known to his readers Young Goodman Brown is leaving Faith to go on a journey, despite her protests, but a journey to what? Hawthorne later writes, “Goodman Brown felt himself justified in making more haste on his present evil purpose” (2622). Hawthorne adds suspense and also peaks the interest of readers by foreshadowing something “evil”

During the night while Young Goodman Brown experiences the evil in the woods, he loses his focus on reality and believes he can resist the evil forces around him. Hawthorne uses dramatic irony to emphasize this idea. As Goodman Brown continues on his way with his “fellow-traveler,” they run into Goody Cloyse. The Traveler and Goody Cloyse begin to have a conversation when she says, “they tell me, there is a nice young man to be taken into communion to-night” (2624-25). While that clue goes over Goodman Brown’s head, the reader can infer that the “young man” most likely refers to Young Goodman