n The Scarlet Letter, there are many elements of the supernatural that are scattered throughout the story. One example would be the scarlet letter itself. Although the scarlet letter is just a piece of cloth, to the villagers and to Hester, it becomes something else entirely. The symbol is not mere scarlet cloth, tinged in an earthly dye-pot, but was “red-hot with infernal fire, and could be seen glowing all alight, whenever Hester Prynne walked abroad in the night-time” (Hawthorne 21). It seared Hester’s bosom so deeply, that perhaps there was more truth in the rumor than our modern incredulity may be inclined to admit. The scarlet letter is connected to Hester and becomes such a part of her that Hester’s own daughter Pearl cannot recognize her mother without the letter. …show more content…
She is the result of Hester’s adultery and is, in her own way, a living embodiment of the letter. When Hester and Pearl are with Dimmsdale on the scaffold and for the three formed an electric chain, “there was witchcraft in little Pearl’s eyes, and her face, as she glanced upward at the minister, wore that naughty smile which made its expression frequently so elvish. She withdrew her hand from Mr. Dimmesdale’s and pointed across the street” (97). Since Pearl was conceived in sin, Hester worries that this may affect the type of child Pearl is. Hester’s neighbors can see only supernatural reasons for Pearl’s odd behavior: she’s an elf-child, a witch-child, or her father is the Black Man