Hester's divine beauty outshines others corrupt beliefs of her. While Hester walks stumbles out the prison doors and onto the dreaded scaffold, Hawthorne describes Hester as "the young woman [who] was tall, with a figure of perfect elegance, on a large scale" (40). Hester Prynne is being publicly shamed for the act of adultery she committed along with the minister who condemns her. She is forced to stand on the scaffold and beat the sorrow of he sins with the scarlet letter "A" on her bosom to represent her shameful acts. This mark of embarrassment serves a purpose to make her appear unrighteous, but the author chooses to focus on her beauty, which outshines this emblem.
Sin in puritan times was not taken lightly. Ignominy was how sinners were punished, and in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, the protagonist Hester Prynne was no exception. She was publicly shamed, and forced to wear the letter “A” on her chest. Everything that was meant to be ugly in Hester’s life, turned into something beautiful.
In the beginning of the Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne introduces the main character Hester Prynne, a young, beautiful member of a Puritan society being punished for her sin of love, not lust. The opening chapters introduce the reader to gossips who deem her original punishment, death, too harsh and contrary to Puritan beliefs that unborn babies should be given a chance at life. Instead, Hester and her child are to be alienated and shunned. In addition she is to wear the letter ‘A’ (which stands for ‘adultery’) on her chest which will forever display her as a symbol of shame for her sin. Though a very resilient figure who soon overcomes this pain, Hester’s isolation takes a negative toll on her life.
While her punishment changes her physical appearance, it has a far more profound effect on her character. Hester seems much older and worn down with the scarlet letter on her bosom. To Hester, the scarlet letter is a
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
As a development in Deontological Pluralism, the Belmont Report offers a series of moral duties to consider in medical research and procedure. The Belmont Report considers Respect for Persons, Beneficence, and Justice to be the morals to uphold in medical research. These three moral obligations determine the morality of decisions and allow a deliberation on actions. In the scenario of Troy and Kim, I will consider each moral obligation in terms of applicability and importance in order to determine the most moral action for the couple. As a member of the medical ethics committee deciding whether it is morally permissible to refuse to remove Kim’s birth control implant, I argue it is not morally permissible primarily on the grounds of Respect
“such helpfulness was found in her-so much power to do, and power to sympathize-that many people refused to interpret the scarlet letter A by its original signification. They said that it meant Able; so strong was Hester Prynne, with a women’s strength” (Renner 152). Hester is not the only one that as changed because of the letter. The community looks at her as a new woman who is able and she raised her child and stayed pure, the community looks at her a role model. Hester has to wear the scarlet letter A and be put up on the scaffold for public ridicule.
Hester, who is punished for adultery by constantly wearing a scarlet letter “A” on her chest, is
Hester Prynn, a character from The Scarlet Letter by Nathanial Hawthorne, is a trouble women who committed adultery in a strict Puritan society. She committed an unspeakable crime and many thought she was an awful women. However, I believe she was one of the greatest in Boston. She suffered a huge roadblock and managed to turn her life around, helping many people. Hester and her baby, Pearl, barely had any money.
Hester is viewed by the community as inferior because of her scarlet letter A which she must wear as a constant reminder of her horrid deed. The letter A which she wears stands for her sin of adultery and the color scarlet stands for the sexiness and evil which the sin is. Hawthorne narrates, “On the breast of her gown in fine red cloth, surrounded with an elaborate embroidery and fantastic flourishes of gold thread, appeared the letter A” (Hawthorne 59). This quote is used in the story to show that the letter is meant to stand out and be a reminder of this terrible sin. As the story continues, the views on Hester by the Puritan society change drastically.
In the beginning of the novel, Hester is forced to wear a scarlet letter on her breast and stand on the scaffold for all to see, yet, "In a moment, however, wisely judging that one token of
The townspeople “[began] to look upon the scarlet letter as a token, not of that one sin, for which she had borne so long and dreary a penance, but of her many good deeds since.” This quote exemplifies how sin is not a death sentence for Hester. Through hard work and charity it allowed the rigid Puritan society to see her as something different, and as someone who would not let society define who she was. Hester, thus, was not only able to change herself, but also the image in which society viewed her by working hard to benefit the public. Likewise, the scarlet letter which was supposed to represent sin was instead “fantastically embroidered with gold thread, upon her bosom.”
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, the protagonist Hester Prynne is used by Hawthorne to break away from the feminine norms of women during the Puritan period. Although Hester Prynne embodies stereotypical feminine traits, she also embodies masculine traits that were unseen in women of the period. Women of the time were typically considered the “domestic workers,” doing things such as cleaning, cooking, sewing, and much more. An article by NPR accurately puts Hester’s controversial personality into perspective, citing that Hester is “the embodiment of deep contradictions: bad and beautiful, holy and sinful, conventional and radical” (Seabrook).
In his novel The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne bestows upon Hester Prynne a character of unparalleled strength with a high capacity for moral reflection. Hester’s strong actions and reflectively eye opening thoughts foreshadow a brilliant light at the end of this dark tunnel of a tale where she will pick a “sweet moral blossom” (Hawthorne 42) that has been nurtured by her excruciating struggle and has finally bloomed. When Hester is officially convicted of her act of adultery, she is forced to wear a scarlet “A” upon her chest as punishment and a symbol of shame that she must live with for the rest of her life; she was then forced to stand on display for her fellow Puritan townspeople and let everyone view her “sin”. However, to the spectators’ amazement, Hester stood before them “with a burning blush, and yet a haughty smile, and a glance that would not be abashed” (46).
Sal Hughes English III H Salvation Through Suffering In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel The Scarlet Letter, the Puritan community exiles Hester Prynne for her adulterous actions, which, although they are sinful, ultimately lead to the betterment of Hester’s spirit and character through her time as an outcast. When Hester is sent to live in isolation away from the rest of the community, she is able to reflect upon her sinful actions, the consequences of which the scarlet letter on her breast constantly reminds her. Pearl is also a constant reminder to Hester of her evildoings, because Pearl is the direct result of Hester’s sinful relationship.
