Dialectical Journal For Scarlet Letter

The setting of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet letter” is crucial to the understanding of the event that takes place in the story. The setting of the story is in Salem, Massachusetts during the Puritan era. During the Puritan era, adultery was taken as a very serious sin, and this is what Hester and Dimmesdale committ with each other. Because of the sin, their lives change, Hester has to walk around in public with a Scarlet Letter “A” which stands for adultery, and she is constantly being tortured and is thought of as less than a person. Dimmesdale walks around with his sin kept as secret, because he never admits his sin, his mental state is changing, and the sin degrades his well-being. Chillingworth

The purpose of this chapter is to give sort of a background to the novel. It introduces Salem as well as Puritan society and the Custom house. The author's attitude toward his old job and workers is mainly positive, giving descriptions of the groups and people. He puts them in either a mundane or positive light by showing their qualities even if they are strange. An example of this is his description of the General's overwhelming kindness or the President's love of past meals (Hawthorne, 284). Even though they are seen as positive, the author still shows they no longer belong at the Custom house. He states " [they knew] they ought to have given place to younger men" (Hawthorne, 280). He sees them generally as senile and unfit for their jobs, but still as people. Because the author address

The very scarlet letter from which the novel’s name is derived from is a symbol of sinning; the scarlet letter represents how Puritan society views sinning as unforgivable and something for public speculation. Hester is punished by wearing hers out for the world to see. The letter is “so fantastically embroidered” that one townswoman argues that its intricacy and design defeat the entire purpose of wearing it. The scarlet letter serves as an

Children have always a sympathy in the agitations of those connected with them; always, especially, a sense of any trouble or impending revolution, of whatever kind, in domestic circumstances; and therefore Pearl, who was the gem on her mother's unquiet bosom, betrayed, by the very dance of her spirits, the emotions which none could detect in the marble passiveness of Hester's brow (

The Scarlet Letter submerses the reader in the Puritan’s culture. The story involves the Puritans portrayal of the sins of a young woman. Although a difficult read, the book stirs the reader to obtain a high moral compass. Throughout the novel, Hawthorne uses the symbols of light and dark to depict good and evil among the characters, Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, and Roger Chillingworth.

Throughout The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne relays the theme of guilt using symbolism that is portrayed in the scarlet letter itself and in the main character’s daughter. The story follows the protagonist, Hester Prynne, who commits adultery with the town minister, Arthur Dimmesdale, producing the child she raises on her own named Pearl. Guilt is a common theme for the duration of the novel which covers all aspects of the shame each character feels. These particular dimensions of shame come specifically from different objects in the novel and what they represent.

The first chapter of Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne describes a rose-bush in front of an old wooden prison door. Telling the reader that the rose symbolize some sweet moral blossom to the condemned. I can surmise that the author is foreshadowing the events that will take place throughout the story. The second chapter begins with women gossiping about a young lady named Hester Prynne and the consequence the magistrates decided on. The woman calls her a hussy, another women declares that the magistrates should have put a brand on her forehead, believing that having her wear the A on the bodice of her gown wouldn’t be enough. The woman’s crudity towards Hester was suprising, knowing these same women probably talked to her before she perpetrated her crime,

I have became a stronger women over the years. My little Pearl is now seven years old. Time sure does go by fast. Nowadays the townspeople are now respecting me for what I do so I have respected my role in the community. When the disease struck through the town, no one was more dedicated to the sick than me. The scarlet letter became the symbol of my calling. I was so helpful to others with so much power to aid, that many people refused to recognize the letter ‘A’ for its original meaning. They said it stood for “able”. I feel like I should be able to do more things and my reputation shouldn’t stop me from doing things in my life. I told my Pearl to run down

To begin, Hawthorne uses the scarlet letter “A” to reinforce the theme of Guilt. Hester Prynne, the protagonist of The Scarlet Letter, is forced to wear a scarlet letter “A” upon her bosom because she has committed the sin of adultery. This leads Hester to feel guilty for the rest of her life. Hawthorne states, “... that scarlet letter, so fantastically embroidered and illuminated upon her bosom. It had the effect of a spell, taking her out of the ordinary relations with humanity, and enclosing her in a sphere by herself” (Hawthorne 51). The quote shows how feeling guilt has made her much more distant from the rest of the townspeople. Hester experiences this agonizing guilt whenever she glances in a mirror, or down at her chest. Pearl is the result of Hester’s

In his book, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne tells of a story where a young woman has had an adulterous relationship with a respected priest in a Puritan community. Typical of Hawthorne's writings is the use of imagery and symbolism. In Chapter 12, The Minister's Vigil, there are several uses of imagery when Dimmesdale, the priest, is battling with confessing his sin, which has plagued him for seven years. Three evident techniques used to personify symbolism in this chapter are the use of darkness versus light, the use of inner guilt versus confession, and lastly the use of colors (black versus white).

"On the breast of her gown, in fine red cloth surrounded with an elaborate embroidery and fantastic flourishes of gold thread, appeared the letter 'A'" (51). That one simple letter set into the bodice of a young woman named Hester Prynne, tells a story of heartache, pride, strength and triumph in the book elegantly written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter (1850). Hawthorne's novel provides many types of symbolism. One of such is the symbolism of a red rose bush growing outside the gates of the town prison.

In the first Chapter of The Scarlet Letter, "The Prison-Door", the reader is immediately introduced to the people of Puritan Boston. Hawthorne begins to develop the character of the common people in order to build the mood of the story. The first sentence begins, "A throng of bearded men, in sad-colored garments and gray, steeple-crowned hats, intermixed with women, some wearing hoods, and others bareheaded, was assembled in front of a wooden edifice, the door of which was heavily timbered with oak, and studded with iron spikes" (Hawthorne 45). Hawthorne's use of vivid visual images and his Aaccumulation of emotionally weighted details" (Baym xii) creates sympathy for the not yet introduced character, Hester Prynne, and creates an immediate understanding of the harshness of the Puritanic code in the people. The images created give the freedom to imagine whatever entails sadness and morbidity of character for the reader; Hawthorne does not, however, allow the reader to imagine lenient or cheerful people.

This ridicule has a trickle down effect on Hester as she too is banished from her own community for committing adultery. The comparison between Hester and Hawthorne defines the external struggle for the reader to fully understand the effect of opinions from society on them Although reluctant to allow Hester to leave prison, the members of the town suggest that her punishment be to wear a scarlet red letter A on her bosom, thereby allowing all to know of her crime. The scarlet letter “ was red-hot with infernal fire, ” (Hawthorne 81) and defined the state she was currently in, that being eternal hell. Though she was forced to marry an older man at a young age, her rebellion to have an affair is not seen as an internal struggle that she overcame; rather, it is merely seen as a woman who sinned, a woman who shall therefore endure the punishment for the sin, rather than a woman who was never given a say in what she wanted with her life. Time and again, Hester Prynne is seen defying society by allowing herself to stand out from societal norm just as the roses “with its delicate gems, which might be imagined to offer their fragrance and fragile beauty to the prisoner“ (Hawthorne) did. Instead, she returns to the community and is observed aiding those in need, all with seven year old Pearl by her side.

Nathaniel Hawthorne portrays the ideology of Puritan society in the novel the Scarlet Letter; however reader also get to witness his characters being an illustration of hypocrisy and victims to their own guilt. In the Scarlet Letter, as in many of Hawthorne’s shorter works, he makes profuse use of the Puritan past: its odd exclusionary belief, its harsh code of ruling, its concern with sex and witchcraft. The Scarlet Letter is a story that is embellished but yet simple. Many readers may view this novel as a soap opera due to the way Hawthorne conveys this Puritan society’s sense of strictness and inability to express true emotion along with the secrecy and how deceiving the characters are being. As the story unfolds the main character Hester Prynne is bounded in marriage at an early age. She engages in an adulterous affair with an unknown member of their small village. Hester soon becomes pregnant and with her husband’s absence the chances of this child belonging to her husband are slim. The towns’ people know that she has committed a sin and imprisons her for her crime.

What is most remarkeable about Hester Prynne is her strength of character. Her inner strength and honesty and her compassion to others, even ones that have condemned her is what is brought to the reader’s attention throughout the novel. At the beginning of the novel Hester is described as a radiant beauty, however seven years later her beauty is gone and the beautiful hair that she once had is hidden underneath a cap that she wears. In Chapter 13, she removes the cap and the letter “A” and she becomes the beautiful person that she was before her punishment. I think that this is symbolic in that when she removes her cap and letter she taking off the harsh structure of Puritan society. When Pearl demands that she put back on her cap and letter “ her beauty, the warnth and richness of her womanhood, departed, like fading sunshine; and a gray shadow seemed to fall across her.” While her punishment does change her physical appearance, it has a deeper impact on her character.