The Symbolism Of Guilt In The Scarlet Letter By Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Scarlet Letter is a fictional tale of sin, crime, and guilt, mixed with the beauty of love and family. Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author of the tale, uses a rose to symbolize the beauty and pain of the story. This story of sin takes place in the 1600s in a Puritan town in the early New England colonies of North America. Hawthorne is a master of symbolism, using several symbols to represent good and evil, secret sin, his anti-transcendentalist beliefs, and how poisonous guilt can be. The most influential of these is how guilt can lead to the death of a man. In his novel, The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne uses the scarlet letter, the burr, and the town minister, Mr. Dimmesdale, to prove that guilt can lead to someone’s death. Our story begins

Dimmesdale is the town minister, a very respected and intelligent man. However, he is also the father of Hester’s daughter, Pearl, because he committed the crime of adultery with Hester. Hester was punished, but Dimmesdale was not because Hester refused to admit who the father of her child was, and he didn’t admit to his crime and join Hester in punishment. Throughout the book, Dimmesdale suffers both mentally and physically because of his guilt. His name, Dimmesdale, means that his life is slowly dimming and that he is dying. Hawthorne describes, “In Mr. Dimmesdale’s secret closet, under lock and key, there was a bloody scourge. Oftentimes, this Protestant and Puritan divine had plied it on his own shoulders, laughing bitterly at himself the while, and smiting so much the more pitilessly because of that bitter laugh.” (Hawthorne 141). Dimmesdale feels so guilty for his crimes that he uses a scourge, or whip, already covered in his own blood, to punish himself at night. He laughs as he whips himself and whips himself harder for laughing. Another form of punishment he uses, as revealed later in the story, is starving himself and staring into the mirror until his face is no longer his own. As time moves on, Dimmesdale’s health declines. His guilt begins eating away at him, until he meets up with Hester and makes plans to run away together. The day Dimmesdale gave the election sermon, he and Hester discovered that Chillingworth, who had been using his guilt to torture Dimmesdale for years, would be joining them on the boat they were using to escape to Europe. Dimmesdale realized that he would die very soon, and realized that the only way to escape from Chillingworth was to admit to their sins in front of the town. Dimmesdale reveals the secret and tells them everything while standing on the same stage Hester stood upon as punishment seven years prior. With his last breath,