Individuality In The Scarlet Letter

Society today allows people to have different interest, but it was different a few centuries ago. People in the 17th century people had hobbies, but it had to be accepted in the Puritan religion. Pearl is raised by her mother on the outskirts of town and it makes her feel different from the other children in the town. Her mother is an outcast because she wears a scarlet letter on her chest from the sin she committed. Pearl is known as a devil child in her younger years with wild characteristics. She is not completely brought up as a Puritan child, but she does have something very special about her. She is able to thrive in nature and find tranquility in the crazy world of her life. In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne conveys that natural settings inspire individuality and creativity through Pearl’s development. In the woods, Pearl thrives with the animals and finds peace, unlike other children. She treats the forest like her home and Hawthorne even says

The narrator exclaims “As the last touch to her mermaid’s garb, Pearl took some eel-grass, and imitated, as best she could, on her own bosom, the decoration with which she was so familiar on her mother’s. A letter,-the letter A,-but freshly green, instead of scarlet!”(Hawthorne 161). Pearl has an extremely different view of the scarlet letter than anyone else in the town. She views it as something that everyone will earn eventually in their lifetime. Pearl’s A was described as fresh which symbolized innocence. The green showed her connection to nature. It is important it was not scarlet like her mothers. The scarlet color resembles the devil and the sin that Hester committed. Pearl doesn’t completely understand what the A means, but she knows that it has something to do with her. She doesn’t understand that it has to anything with sin. Pearl’s creativity and individuality makes her like no one else in the Puritan