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Redemption In The Scarlet Letter

1371 Words6 Pages
Imagine living through gruesome physical and mental torment for seven long years of life. This affliction would be due to a sin that was committed out of wedlock and causes a long and harrowing death. Arthur Dimmesdale is one of the characters Nathaniel Hawthorne uses to present this torment in The Scarlet Letter to present how failing to survive the effects of sin can lead to a characters death also known as not receiving redemption. Correspondingly, Roger Chillingworth exemplifies through the transgressor of revenge that not bearing through the effects of sin does not lead to redemption. Uniquely, Hester Prynne is displayed by Hawthorne to expatiate how being driven to live through the effects of sin eventually lead to redemption. Altogether, Nathaniel Hawthorne presents his idea for redemption in colonial America by allowing characters to fail and succeed in pursuit for redemption in order to prove that one must be driven in surviving the effects of sin to break through the barricade of their puritanistic crimes. The puritanistic monster of sin is a barricade between the characters and redemption. The struggling characters face puritan backlash from within their community which rejects some of them from reaching redemption. Hester was forced to endure this ignominy for adultery in which crushes her feelings, making her seem worthless in her mind. Public shaming in puritan society is emotionally draining and makes the victim feel as if the whole community had trampled
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