Scarlet Letter Theme Essay

The Scarlet letter has several themes. The main three that Nathaniel Hawthorne focuses on are pride, guilt and isolation. The characters that experience these themes are Roger Chillingworth, Arthur Dimmesdale, and Hester Prynne. Roger Chillingworth experiences the theme of pride. He wrestles with the betrayal of Hester when she if found to have given birth to a child that did not come from him, her husband. He exclaims his surprise and regret at his pride taking a blow when he says “Better he had died at once! Never did mortal suffer what this man has suffered. And all, all, in the sight of his worst enemy! He has been conscious of me. He has felt an influence dwelling always upon him like a curse.” His pride has suffered a blow by Hester’s betrayal. He tells Hester that he tried to find another way to understand and process his emotions, but revenge is all he can find. Roger Chillingworth also believes that Dimmesdale deserves everything

Arthur has completely transformed. His physical and emotional structure is under attack from his guilt, as well as from Roger Chillingworth. Dimmesdale has become physically ragged and tired, he also blames himself and holds himself accountable for the sin that him and Hester committed. He has taken to starving himself of sleep and beating himself with a whip that he keeps in his closet. The physical description of himself is best explained as “With every successive Sabbath, his cheek was paler and thinner, and his voice more tremulous than before- when it has now become a constant habit, rather than a casual gesture, to press his hand over his heart.” This constant deterioration of Arthur Dimmesdale is the effect of the guilt that is slowly eating away at him. The now constant habit of pressing his hand over his heart is to cover the symbol of the “A” that is imprinted on his heart. Guilt is the theme that encompasses the character of