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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.
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne opens in a Puritan settlement, where Hester Prynne is being publicly shunned for adultery, in which she has to stand in front of a crowd for overt punishment and wear a scarlet ‘A’ on her chest. She holds her child, Pearl, who symbolizes her inability to hide her own past and her sins from the judgment of her settlement. The novel progresses in a way that further defines her mental strength and ability to endure this judgment. However, Arthur Dimmesdale, the town’s pastor, demonstrates a differing method in which he deals with his own personal judgment and fear of alienation. As The Scarlet Letter advances, his mental strength corrupts with the help of Chillingworth’s methods of trickery and Dimmesdale’s
We are all sinners, no matter how hard we try to hide our faults, they always seem to come back, one way or another. Written in the 19th century, Nathaniel Hawthorne shows us Hester Prynne and how one sin can change her life completely. Hester Prynne changes a great deal throughout The Scarlet Letter. Through the view of the Puritans, Hester is an intense sinner; she has gone against the Puritan way of life committing the highest act of sin, adultery. For committing such a sinful act, Hester must wear the scarlet letter while also having to bear stares from those that gossip about her.
The Scarlet Letter is a popular novel written by Nathaniel Hawthorne which is mainly read during one's high school years. The Scarlet letter is set during the sixteenth century in Boston Massachusetts where a young woman named Hester Prynne is publicly shamed by the Puritans. When Hawthorne was writing this novel he described the puritans as a sad, bland society which had a reliance on the consequence of sin. His description of the Puritan society was not fully opinion-based since the Puritans that came over from England did dress simply. This leads the reader to wonder how much of his personal opinion made its way into the story and how much is historical fact.
In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne goes against the ideals of the Puritan community by using topics, such as: adultery, hypocrisy, and revenge. Hawthorne uses Hester’s life and the people in her life to showcase each of these subjects and how much they can affect someone’s life. First, Hawthorne goes against the community by using the scandal between Hester and Dimmesdale and their adultery in order to challenge their Puritan way of life. “‘I fear! I fear!
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, tells a story of a strong woman who learns from her mistakes and accepts her future in Puritan society. Meanwhile, another character experiences extreme guilt and suffers through his punishment. All through these hard times, their actions express their morbid and sorrow filled lives. In The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne and Dimmesdale show a morbidity of spirit in their emotions and their mannerisms. Hester Prynne, the main character, has a gloomy and unwholesome state of mind.
She is a beautiful, young woman who has sinned, but is forgiven. Hawthorne portrays Hester as "divine maternity" and she can do no wrong. Not only Hester, but also the physical scarlet letter, a sign of shame, is shown as a beautiful, gold and colorful piece which
The novel, The Scarlet Letter written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, uses the degradation of Hester Prynne in the Puritan society in Boston as a result of adultery to express how the patriarchy might affect a woman's femininity. Minister Arthur Dimmesdale is the symbol of patriarchy as he goes unpunished, just as Hester Prynne is for feminism in this time period, as she struggles with the consequences of adultery. Throughout the novel, Hester is used to express how the men of Puritan society were able to control a woman’s fate and easily strip them of their personhood, more specifically their womanhood. Womanhood can be described as the state of being a woman. However, qualities of womanhood can include motherhood, nurture, marriage, productivity,
In the beginning of the book, Hester Prynne, a civilian from Massachusetts Bay Colony, is being led to the scaffold where she is sentenced to be publicly shamed for committing the act of adultery. Within her sentence, Hester is forced to embroider a large scarlet “A” on all of her dresses. She had stitched the “A” with gold thread, which added a sense of elegance that she is now denied. On the scaffold, Hester carries Pearl, her daughter, in her arms at all times. On the scaffold, Hester is asked to reveal the name of Pearl’s father, but she refuses to release that information.
Is Hester Prynne the best citizen of Boston? I believe she is one of the best citizens of Boston if not the best citizen. In the novel of The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester gives back to the community by donating the extra money that she earns from sewing articles of clothing. She is looked upon for advice when she returns from Europe. She has been given the scarlet letter as a punishment, but this also keeps her from misbehaving.
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne is about the transformation of Puritan woman known as Hester Prynne who changed from being labeled as an adulterer to somewhat of a living legend. Roger Chillingworth, Hester’s original husband was supposed to follow her in the new world, he only shows up gesturing to his wife during public shaming. She wore a scarlet letter as a result of a secret affair with Dimmesdale; this relationship made the public distrust her after they found out she was pregnant. Pearl and Arthur Dimmesdale are the only people Hester associates with because they share common traits and are a bit weird in their ways. Her daughter starts out as a symbol, and it is not until she is kissed by Dimmesdale at the scaffold, that
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.
Hester Prynne is the very embodiment of feminism because of her refusal to adhere to the societal norms, her independence in thought, and how the view of the society around her changes through the novel. One of the main reasons why Hester Prynne is an important and progressive feminist character in The Scarlet Letter is her refusal to follow societal norms or to be put down by her peers. A primary example of her refusal to be put down by her peers is when Hester brandishes her
Many people identify Feminism as an anti-male movement, which helps on making women the dominant gender. In the mid 17th century ( the time period the book starts on), male domination is an ideal explanation of how Nathaniel Hawthorne tires to express how women were oppressed during this time era in the novel. In the novel, The Scarlet Letter Hester Prynne eliminates the idea of how women were portrayed during this era, by overcoming public humiliation and standing up to the predetermined ideas that her town gave her. Hester represents a “pre-feminist” character, due to the choices she refuses to take from society.
Hester Prynne was a beautiful woman who had cheated on her husband by having a secret affair with the minister. This result to her giving birth to an illegitimate daughter named Pearl. Hester was publicly shamed and shunned by her society, however, she was able to pull it together for the sake of her daughter and repentence. Throughout Hester Prynne’s journey in The Scarlet Letter, she proved to be a true heroine who was capable of enduring any insults, disparage, and unfair treatment accredit to her society in Boston, Massachusetts. So based on that short introduction of The Scarlet Letter on the female protagonist, it should be prominent in the eye of many scholars that The Scarlet Letter is indeed, a feminist novel.
