The Scarlet Letter Shame Quotes

The Scarlet Letter Essay Nathaniel Hawthorne, author of The Scarlet Letter, wrote the book in the 1800s while the events in the book take place in the late 1600s Puritan society. The Puritan society in the 1600s functioned like a theocracy where God is recognized as the ruler. Also, the Puritan society functioned like a hypocrisy, where the rich kicked down the poor. Overall, the Puritan society was strict and judgmental. In his novel, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the symbolism of the scarlet letter, the burrs and Dimmesdale to contribute to the overall theme of guilt.

In the beginning, God created a beautiful and perfect world void of darkness and full of light. However, it did not take long for humans to wreck the goodness of the world they lived in. Their decision to sin brought a number of unfortunate consequences, one of which is shame. In his novel, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne presents the concept of shame as a prevalent idea at work in characters throughout the book. The story follows Hester Prynne’s life after committing adultery, as well as the difficulties she faces and the character of her young daughter, Pearl.

Through this specific method, the readers, similar to the characters in the story, were only allowed to view this character in the way that Dimmesdale would have hoped to be seen; innocent and divine. Reverend Dimmesdale’s hidden wrongdoing led him to receive no punishment, however the individual who had committed the crime with him, Hester Prynne and their daughter, Pearl, had been penalized and shunned upon by the town’s community. Initially, the character had held a strong-willed attempt to throw away the past and avoid the mother and daughter together gracefully, yet his guilty conscience that had bitten down, would not let go. Hawthorne gradually unmasks to the readers what lies underneath Dimmesdale’s vibrant demeanor, and the first unusual sign of distress in this reverend comes to life. Readers begin to perceive that as his guilt continues to haunt him in endless cycles, the easier he is weakened by hallucination and sinful thoughts. We first see that Dimmesdale had begun to develop a strong desire to correct his fault by relentlessly having the compelling urge to see Hester and Pearl, hoping that this new method would cleanse him from feeling sinful. Despite switching from heavy avoidance to necessary sights, Hawthorne left Dimmesdale’s unphasable guilt with him, eventually turned his dimming mind inside out, enclosing him with darkness and insanitary occurrences such as hallucination, which continued to destroyed his mindset, and made him significantly

In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel The Scarlet Letter, the young Arthur Dimmesdale is a highly respected reverend in 17th century puritanical Massachusetts. However, he is the most morally ambiguous character in the novel because of the one great sin he commits and fails to readily confess. For this, he suffers an internal affliction that destabilizes his physical and spiritual composure. Dimmesdale’s sin was detrimental, but this action cannot qualify him as a bad person because in all other aspects, he is as righteous as the Puritans came. This moral ambiguity of Dimmesdale plays a pivotal role in the novel because it allows the reader to distinguish between true good and evil.

Dimmesdale is neither likable nor admirable; he is, in fact, the novel’s most cowardly and hypocritical character. At first, he is revered as a saint-like figure by the townspeople, who “deemed the young clergyman a miracle of holiness” (129). These churchgoers, however, are ignorant of his sin until the novel’s

Mr. Dimmesdale commits a sin but does not confess for fear of humiliation and hatred. By not confessing, he pays the price physically and emotionally. By physically hurting himself, he presumes it replaces the conflict of not exposing his true self to the community. He is held accountable for his actions at a personal degree of suffering. On the other hand, the community and townspeople are accountable for a high degree of the reverend’s actions. On the scaffold the night Mr. Dimmesdale stood with Pearl and Hester, he rejected holding his daughter’s hand in public because “...all the dread of public exposure that had so long been the anguish of his life had returned upon him; and he was already trembling at the conjunction...” (Hawthorne 149). He feels like he has to conform to society to be accepted, and it results in the failure of taking Pearl’s hand in public and divulging the truth. The townsfolk are more responsible for Dimmesdale’s actions because they create a life where wrongdoing is the ultimate sin, and forgiveness is omitted.

She also realizes that her shame, were she worthy to be rid of it, might “speak a different purport.”(471) Hawthorne does feel moral sympathy for Hester, but her place in the story is to exhibit that persons who appoint our moral concern may however value proper censure. The shame and the humiliation appear to have totally flattened Hester’s heart, even though the disgrace and the anguish pain have prepared a “Sister of Mercy” out of Hester. Much of the aloofness of Hester is because of the fact that her life has curved from fervor and feelings to contemplation. This conversion has a psychological

Dimmesdale ultimately lets his fear of a bad reputation get in the way of his true happiness and internal peace. By not confessing his sins, he harbors guilt on his conscience until the very end of his life.

His noble position in the puritans society can’t be tainted and and due to societal pressures the character is left it inwardly question his actions. Dimmesdale’s tension between outward conformity and inward questioning lend to his downfall. In the beginning

As a result, throughout the rising action, Reverend Dimmesdale continues his life with the secret of his sin burning within him. To begin with, Hawthorne carefully makes use of diction to show the weakness of Arthur Dimmesdale. Furthermore, the author uses indirect presentation to emphasize Dimmesdale’s caring nature. However, when Hawthorne describes Dimmesdale confessing, he does not explain his protagonist’s scarlet letter, leaving the climax ambiguous and unsatisfying. Therefore, through the aforementioned characterization techniques, Nathaniel Hawthorne presents Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale as a dynamic character who demonstrates that admitting to one’s wrongdoings can free one from the torment of guilt.

“Man had marked this woman's sin by a scarlet letter, which had such a potent and disastrous efficiency that no human sympathy could reach her,…” (Hawthorne 73). This quote shows the struggle of the letters shame because Hester committed Adultery with Dimmesdale which caused her to have to wear the letter in the Novel The Scarlet Letter By Nathaniel Hawthorne. Although the letter represents Adultery and the sin and shame in the Beginning of the novel she takes the lesson that it gives her and turns it into a example of being able.

One of Hester’s constant reminders of her sin is the scarlet letter, which she is forced to live with for the rest of her life. This is shown when Hawthorne writes “Thus the young and pure would be taught to look at her, with the scarlet letter flaming on her breast,—at her, the child of honorable parents,—at her, the mother of a babe, that would hereafter be a woman, —at her, who had once been innocent, —as the figure, the body, the reality of sin.” (71-72) This shows how Hester has become a living symbol

The Scarlet Letter is set in the mid-1800’s, a time of strong religious values where adultery was considered one of the most horrendous sins one could commit. The novel takes place in the Massachusetts Bay Colony; a community with deeply-rooted religious morals. This setting that Nathaniel Hawthorne chose heightens the severity of the wrongdoing that Hester, the novel’s protagonist, perpetrates. Reverend Dimmesdale, a church figure who is widely respected throughout the community, commits the exact same crime as Hester, however the two handled their situations very differently. By examining the two character’s mental states, it becomes evident that Hawthorne is demonstrating the theme of how taking responsibility for one’s sins enables that

Even though Dimmesdale will not recognize his sin, he still punishes himself harshly “In Mr. Dimmesdale’s secret closet, under lock and key, there was a bloody scourge” (Hawthorne 150). Dimmesdale is trying to relieve his suffering by punishing himself, but only ends up causing more pain to himself. Eventually Dimmesdale can not stand the guilt anymore, and goes to the scaffold to confess his sin, “ in the name of him, so terrible and so merciful, who gives me

To further exemplify this point, the scarlet letter begins to mask Hester’s identity, turning her into a public display of mankind's sins. He is depicted as follows, “Hester looked, by way of humoring the child; and she saw that, owing to the peculiar effect of this convex mirror, the scarlet letter was represented in exaggerated and gigantic proportions, so as to be greatly the most prominent feature of her appearance. In truth, she seemed absolutely hidden behind it” (Hawthorne). With this in mind, as Hester gazes at the reflection of herself in the “mirror”, all she can see is the “exaggerated and gigantic” letter “A” printed across her chest. This moment signifies the puritans’ tendency to view Hester as a “letter” before viewing her as a woman. She is, therefore, “hidden behind it” as it suppresses her identity from society so much so that it has become “the most prominent feature of her appearance”. In light of this, the scarlet letter, symbolizing Hester’s lust, obscures and rewrites her identity, turning her into a sinner amongst the puritans.