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Hester In Nathaniel Hawthorne's 'The Scarlet Letter'

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Hester represents a romantic future which Owen renounces to fulfill what he considers his destiny. When Owen comes to terms with his death, he is abandoning all hopes of a future with Hester. Furthermore, Hester acts as a sacrificial gift that Owen would have to lose in order to execute his predestined path. “AND THERE’S ALSO HESTER TO CONSIDER,” (340). Owen knew death was foreordained, although he wanted to take pleasure in what time he had left. Being romantically involved with Hester was still an essential part of his life. He was constantly trying to put Hester’s wellbeing first. “If you loved me, you wouldn’t go- not for all the goddamn children in the world” (476). Hester hated the war and didn't want him to go, as she believed he was
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A Bleak World’s Best Citizen: Rewrite #1 Mark Van Doren’s essay “Hester Prynne” expresses Van Doren’s warm admiration for Hester Prynne’s character in The Scarlet Letter. In Van Doren’s essay, the author elevates Hester Prynne, using his analysis to illustrate his belief in her morality, despite her harsh circumstances. He explores the reasons behind Hester’s strength throughout the novel, and in relation to other characters such as Dimmesdale and Chillingsworth. Van Doren effectively builds his argument by employing historical allusion, repetition, and emotional diction in his case for Hester Prynne.

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634 Words | 3 Pages

On the other hand Hester doesn’t want or try getting attention through her actions. Also she becomes an outcast of the Puritan community and she slowly finds her way back through hard work and showing she cares. Secondly the way the two characters

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Hester went through public humiliation, wearing her sin for all to see and she lived till old age killed her. These two characters represent more than the sin they committed. They show us the pain of a hidden sin and the fruits of a public

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235 Words | 1 Pages

Do you think you can escape death? I believe that you cannot escape death. In the story “Masques of the Red Death” there are many symbols. The clock, the rooms, and the stranger are all symbols.

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451 Words | 2 Pages

While he is stating all this Hester is pulling her chair closer because she is interested in what he is saying about him being a little kid and going to the circus. It also says in the passage William chuckles, showing how he went from being serious to laughing about old times. As they are talking Hester thinks about their relationship and how since the children have grew up it has been a business one. It also states that she would sometimes be hostile towards her husband when it came to the boys. Them always fighting had crowded out the memory of a closer relationship.

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972 Words | 4 Pages

and why does the minister keep his hand over his heart? which dishearten Hester that she for the first time was not true to the symbol that she consist. Her daughter Pearl is also the reason her her pain. Even Hester had dreams and visions of Pearl that caused her even more emotion.

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He thus typified the constant introspection wherewith he tortured, but could not purify, himself" to never forget what he has done (141). To him, it is a bad thing that Hester is shown publicly as a sinner, but people forget that. What is far worse than public shame is his own inner shame that he feels constantly and privately. Knowing what only he and Hester know, the secret eats away at him and drives him close to insanity. Eventually leading to his very public death.

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466 Words | 2 Pages

Feminism is the philosophy advocating equal political, economic, and social rights for women. The idea of feminism was not at all prevalent during the 1850s when Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter was published. In spite of this, Hawthorne wrote one of the most influential feminist novels of his time: The Scarlet Letter. This novel was hailed as an important feminist novel because of the main character: Hester Prynne.

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Even before their marriage he surely knew she didn’t love him but he held on to a glimmer of hope to carry on that one day she might love him. But Hester’s affair with Dimmesdale concludes his delusion that she will ever fall in love with him. During Chillingworth’s lifetime, he has depended on obsessing over an achievable entity to survive. Since Hester’s love is no longer a plausible achievement he can only blame the man who created this issue, her new lover, Dimmesdale. He states, “I shall seek this man, as I have sought truth in books; as I have sought gold in alchemy.

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796 Words | 4 Pages

Hester proves that she has a higher understanding for people and life, also a sense of honor based on her own principles not society’s. This perfectly fits the mold for a romantic hero. Towards the end of the novel, we learn that Pearl became a great women and Hester could have lived a great life with her wealthy daughter, yet she chose to return to Boston and live out her punishment. Now the book describes Hester’s final resting place, “It bore a device, a herald's wording of which might serve for a motto and brief description of our now concluded legend; so somber is it, and relieved only by one ever-glowing point of light gloomier than the shadow:—"On a field, sable, the letter A, gules”(Hawthorne 259).

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601 Words | 3 Pages

Because of this, she gets Dimmesdale involved and Chillingworth who we short after find out is Hester's husband. Everything from here begins to get even worse because of Hester and her actions. Hester never

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640 Words | 3 Pages

Hester's punishment was a judicial sentence; however, being forced to stand on the scaffold for three hours, and to wear the scarlet letter "A" for the rest of her life. It was socially humiliating. Hester was sent to prison for committing adultery. Hester was forced to live with the consequences by wearing the scarlet letter "A". Hester is physically and emotionally reminded of her sin, while wearing the scarlet letter "A".

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710 Words | 3 Pages

We can see it in the following passage, “"Thou knowest," said Hester,--for, depressed as she was, she could not endure this last quiet stab at the token of her shame,--"thou knowest that I was frank with thee. I felt no love, nor feigned any."” (Hawthorne, 72) Her husband also says: I ask not wherefore, nor how, thou hast fallen into the pit, or say rather, thou hast ascended to the pedestal of infamy, on which I found thee. The reason is not far to seek.

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743 Words | 3 Pages

Two of the main characters with many similarities as well as differences is Hester Prynne and Rvd. Arthur Dimmesdale. Hester and Dimmesdale are both characters in the book that had their identities set up in the beginning of the story, within the first 4 chapters. Hester and Dimmesdale are the parents of Pearl, who they had in an act of adultery and sin in the eyes of the townspeople. This book goes through the story of Hester and Dimmesdale's punishments, as well as repentance.

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936 Words | 4 Pages

Throughout the novel, Hester is fraught by the Puritan society and her suffering is an effect of how evil society is. Hester continues to believe that the crime she committed was not wrong and she should not be punished for it. Her desire to protect and love Dimmesdale, turn her into a stronger person and become a heroine in the book. Although society still views her as a “naughty baggage” (Hawthorne 73) and is punished for her wrongdoing, Hester never thought to take revenge on them, yet she gives everything she has to the unfortunate and leaves herself with very little. She continues to stay positive no matter what society has for her.

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