ipl-logo

Theme Of Punishment In The Scarlet Letter

617 Words3 Pages

In todays time, when an individual commits a crime or sin, the punishment varies depending on the act committed. In the puritan time, when a crime was committed, the individual(s) would be punished publicly by wearing a letter which symbolizes the crime committed. Like Hester, many people wear their scarlet letter on the outside and are publicly embarrassed or punished for what they did. Others may be like Dimmesdale, wearing their scarlet letter on the inside and be punished in the private or by suffering more. In The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the letter A symbolizes and changes different meanings throughout the novel. Early on in the novel, Hester is punished for her crime, adultery. "She clutched the child so fiercely to her breast that it sent forth a cry; she turned her eyes downward at the scarlet letter, and even touched it with her finger, to assure herself that the infant and the shame were real" (Hawthorne 124). The townspeople wanted Hester to suffer, sure, but they also wanted Pearl to suffer as well because she was the living scarlet letter. Hester and Pearl could not go anywhere without receiving dirty looks. The townspeople did not like Hester, not only for what she did, …show more content…

One night, while Dimmesdale is on the scaffold, Hester and Pearl join him and a comet flashes across the sign forming the letter A, coincidence? None of the townspeople saw the family standing on the scaffold: 1. because it was late at night and 2. Dimmesdale would suffer a greater punishment than he has now if they were to be seen. "... a great red letter in the sky—the letter A, which we interpret to stand for Angel. For, as our good Governor Winthrop was made an angel this past night, it was doubtless held fit that there should be some notice thereof" (Hawthorne 334). The scarlet letter gaining another meaning, angel, for the

Show More
Related
982 Words | 4 Pages

The Scarlet letter is a book written in the time period of the mid 17th century in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. During this time, the puritans were a very strict and religious group of people who were oblivious to their hypocrisy. Notably, whenever someone had committed a sin, they publicly shamed the sinner as punishment such as putting Hester on the Scaffold with her child in the middle of town and questioning her about the baby in her arms. Committing a sin is the equivalent of interaction with or being possessed by the Devil. Due to the Puritan religion and the time period the people were in, they treated Hester and Pearl as a follower of the devil and the child of Satan.

Read More
1270 Words | 6 Pages

She receives three punishments from the townspeople, who claim they will free her from her sin. The community orders Hester to go to jail, wear a scarlet letter on her chest, and stand on the town scaffold for hours. Hester wears her scarlet letter proudly on her chest, and endures much suffering because of her public ridicule. Hester is “kept by no restrictive clause of her condemnation within the limits of the Puritan settlement” after she was released from prison, but she chooses to stay (Hawthorne 71). Later, Hester’s child, Pearl, symbolizes the Puritan view of Hester.

Read More
470 Words | 2 Pages

In The Scarlet Letter, Hester is exiled from her community because of her sins. Although everyone in the town sins, it is the way Hester’s were presented to them that makes her seem so wrong. They could not accept their faults, so instead, oppressed Hester and Pearl. “Thus the young and pure Would be taught to look At her, with the scarlet letter flaming on her breast,... -as the figure I the body.

Read More
477 Words | 2 Pages

The “A” was also used to represent the product of her sin which was her daughter Pearl. The “A” had a scarlet red color to represent the fiery flames of hell. The scarlet colored “A” was also used as a reminder for Hester and those around her that even though she was not executed she must live with the sin even after death. The scarlet letter must be engraved on the tombstone of Hester and Dimmesdale to show the act of adultery lasts in the afterlife and only God can judge those involved.

Read More
594 Words | 3 Pages

To begin, Nathaniel Hawthorne introduced the symbol the scarlet letter to add to the overall theme of sin. The scarlet letter was a form of punishment that would last a lifetime. Hester Prynne, the protagonist, was forced to wear the letter “A” because she committed adultery. She had an affair with Dimmesdale, the town reverend, while she was married to Chilingsworth, and produced a baby named Pearl. Hawthorne explains, “There glimmered the embroidered letter, with discomfort in its unearthly ways.

Read More
529 Words | 3 Pages

Hester’s tale is legendary by the end of the book because of all that she has endured due to the scarlet letter, and the person that she is in spite of it. Additionally, another positive impact the scarlet letter has on Hester is that because of it, she is all the more sympathetic and selfless. Even though the letter causes her and her daughter Pearl to be ostracized from society, Hester does not become bitter and angry in her seclusion. Instead, she becomes a “self-ordained Sister of Mercy” and comforts those who are distraught, being “the softer pillow for the head that needed one” (149). The meaning of the scarlet letter even changes because of her generosity and altruism: “such helpfulness was found in her, --so much power to do, and power to sympathize, --that many people refused to interpret the scarlet A by its original signification.

Read More
607 Words | 3 Pages

In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne was branded with a scarlet letter A after being founded as an adulteress. She became an outcast and always had the constant reminder, for herself and those around her, of her sin. The letter’s significance transformed as time passed and became more compelling. Throughout the novel there was a tremendous evolution of the scarlet letter A from the views of Hester, the villagers, Pearl (Hester’s daughter), and Hawthorne himself.

Read More
860 Words | 4 Pages

In Nathaniel Hawthorne 's Novel, The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne is punished for committing the crime of adultery. Hester must wear the letter "A" upon her bosom to represent the adultery she has committed with Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale. It is argued whether Hester is the culprit of her crime or if she has fallen victim of it. Early on in Hester 's life she becomes a victim when she is forced into an arranged marriage. Her parents arrange her to marry Roger Chillingworth, a wealthy yet infamous man.

Read More
719 Words | 3 Pages

The townspeople “[began] to look upon the scarlet letter as a token, not of that one sin, for which she had borne so long and dreary a penance, but of her many good deeds since.” This quote exemplifies how sin is not a death sentence for Hester. Through hard work and charity it allowed the rigid Puritan society to see her as something different, and as someone who would not let society define who she was. Hester, thus, was not only able to change herself, but also the image in which society viewed her by working hard to benefit the public. Likewise, the scarlet letter which was supposed to represent sin was instead “fantastically embroidered with gold thread, upon her bosom.”

Read More
1338 Words | 6 Pages

To overcome Social Incrimination The Scarlet Letter encaptured people because of the perception of religion’s and society’s role in justice. As in most literature from the 19th century, religion plays a large part in The Scarlet Letter, because Hester Prynne, Reverend Dimmesdale and Roger Chillingworth are themselves affected by the hand of religion. Society shuns Hester, the scorned woman forced to wear the scarlet letter and placed on a scaffold with her sin-bred child Pearl, publicly humiliated for her act of adultery. The sins committed throughout The Scarlet Letter represent more than acts against God: each of the characters symbolize a sin, their actions and dialogue bringing this symbolism to light. In Nathaniel Hawthorne's,

Read More
541 Words | 3 Pages

Symbols: The Letter A The scarlet letter is a red letter A that Hester is forced to wear as punishment for her crime of adultery. It is of deep scarlet color, so it is very striking and alluring. It represents the sin she has committed, adultery. Hester wears this letter of shame throughout the whole beginning of the novel.

Read More
279 Words | 2 Pages

Throughout The Scarlet Letter a great deal of symbolism is used. Nathaniel Hawthorne does this when assigning the A to Hester, or relating Pearl to the flower or rose-bush. The novel is based during the seventeenth century and beginning with Hester Prynne and her child Pearl leaving prison. This is where the A is brought to our attention. The A represent the adultery that Hester has committed.

Read More
562 Words | 3 Pages

The idea of the scarlet letter is an example of a Puritan society’s just punishment as a result of breaking the standards set by authority figures. Many Puritans viewed these topics of punishment as an everyday repeating ordeal. The few that were fully confessed to crimes were subject to all of these constant streams of torment. These ideas are reasons the average Puritan would take measures to avoid these actions at all costs; in contrast, today’s society would allow choices of a citizen with very slim or no legal

Read More
1625 Words | 7 Pages

Still, the novel of that importance as it is The Scarlet Letter depictures far more than just a destiny of a single woman. Hence, if the writer questioned the power of love, toyed with human emotions and their psyche, and managed to insert a substantial amount of symbolism by creating the novel with historical background, then all the aspects should be included within the analysis. Let us start with the very theme of the novel – the sin; and among all, the sin within the Puritan colony. This precise theme has always been the subject of interest and therefore it has

Read More
959 Words | 4 Pages

With Hester changing her ways and helping the poor, the community changed, “They said that it meant Able; so strong was Hester Prynne, with a woman’s strength” (Hawthorne 168). While the community originally viewed the “A” as a symbol of sin, they began to see it too as a symbol of being “Able” because all that Hester Prynne had overcome. The Scarlet Letter had many examples of symbolism, but none were more significant that the letter “A”

Read More

More about Theme Of Punishment In The Scarlet Letter

Related Topics

Open Document