Conflict in Nathaniel Hawthorne's the Scarlet Letter Essay

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.

Hester Prynne starts her life as an average respected young woman until she commits the loathsome crime of adultery, which forever condemns her to wear a

“The magistrate are God-fearing gentlemen, but merciful overmuch, - that is a truth," added a third autumnal matron. "At the very least, they should have put the brand of a hot iron on Hester Prynne's forehead. Madame Hester would have winced at that, I warrant me. But she, - the naughty baggage, - little will she care what they put upon the bodice of her gown! Why, look you, she may cover it with a brooch, or such like heathenish adornment, and so walk the streets as brave as ever!”

The citizens of Boston know that Hester is married and her husband isn 't living with her. Therefore, when she becomes pregnant, she is arrested for adultery, a grave sin in their Puritan society. Consequently Hester is punished with jail time and made to wear a scarlet letter A for the rest of her life, meaning adulterer. These punishments make her life as a single mother even more difficult. Suddenly, Hester is disliked and ridiculed by everyone in the town. People look down on Hester to make themselves seem better than her. In chapter two, several women gossip about Hester. "This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die; Is there not law for it? Truly there is, both in the Scripture and the statute- book" (Hawthorne 78).  The women are calling for an even harsher punishment than the scarlet letter. They want Hester to be executed. As well as being ostracized by the entire community, Hester must endure living in a patriarchal society. Hester has no choice but to adapt to the adversity she faces. To avoid some of the daily persecution she faces, Hester moves to the outskirts of town, where she learns to tend a garden to grow food for her daughter Pearl and herself. This is a clear example of acquiring a skill, because talent and hard work are needed to grow a garden. She also learns to sew, and earns money by crafting beautiful articles of fabric for people in Boston. Hester also applies her free time to crafting clothes for the

This article is going to cover an internal conflict within, The Scarlet Letter. The internal conflict shall be about Hester, and Dimmesdale. Hester is shamed by the Puritan village for having an affair, and concieving a child. For this Hester is forced to wear a scarlet 'A' on her breast till the day she dies. The Puritans force Hester away from the village making her live almost in solitude.

According to the Urban Online Dictionary, Moral Ambiguity can be defined as “Lack of clarity in ethical decision-making. That is, when an issue, situation, or question has moral dimensions or implications, but the decidedly “moral” action to take are unclear, either due to conflicting principles, ethical systems, or situational perspectives.

Hester’s appearance and role in both society and nature help to portray her as pure in contrast with the corrupt puritans. Nature is a symbol for all things beautiful and positive about the world, this is then added to by Hawthorne’s claim that society is corrupt and thus cannot be trusted. Due to Hester inhabiting a home outside of civilization and within nature, it allows for her character to be “lady-like” and “characterized by a

The plot of the Scarlet letter circles around the act of one woman, Hester Prynne. Multiple conflicts arise as a result of her adultery with an unknown man in her community. Therefore, Hester has to face her community - along with her newborn child - as an outcast of her society. After spending about a year in prison awaiting the birth of her child, Hester has to face her true punishment of wearing the scarlet letter. Along with the punishment of the scarlet letter, Hester walks across town and stands at the scaffold only to be stared down by her society. When Hester is alone with her thoughts she becomes conflicted with herself as she reflects on what she believes in and the consequences of her actions. Furthermore, Hester is able to slowly

During the punishment of Hester, the countrywomen with “...stone on broad shoulders and well-developed busts... “(48), and “...a boldness and rotundity of speech…”(Hawthorne 48) stand under the platform and gossip about Hester, such as the woman like  “... a hard-featured dame of fifty…”(49), “...a third autumnal matron…”(49), “...the ugliest as well as the most pitiless of these self-constituted judges.”(49). Those old countrywomen observe how Hester harms public behoof, how to put a hot iron on Hester’s forehead, or Hester brings shame and ought to die. Most of the readers of the twenty-first century think how ironing it is that the countrywomen laugh at Hester who contains unique temperament. Nevertheless, the Puritan culture natures those countrywomen who are in the crowd since their births and Bible is the only source of truth in their lives. Environment and culture cause illiteracy of the women in the town. The development of stereotypes leads the ladies to have stubborn but reasonable boundaries of good or sin in their minds which are unusual than people in today’s world. Other than the town people, Pearl also has interesting reactions towards

The harsh townspeople force her up on the scaffold to be humiliated in front of the whole town. Not only is she sent up on the scaffold with her sin revealed by the “A” for everyone to see, Hester becomes an example of what a woman should not come to be. The author is talking about Hesters experience on the scaffold and her pregnancy, “Throughout them all, giving up her individuality, she would become the general symbol at which the preacher and moralist might point, and in which they might vivify and embody their images of woman's frailty and sinful passion”(32). Hester looses her individuality and is labeled by the townspeople and known for the Scarlet Letter. Further, the townspeople singled her out as an alien or outcast of the town forcing her to live an abnormal live. She was ridiculed and known for her one sin, unable to have acceptance back into society. Although the townspeople feel as if Hester has brought sin upon there lives, she clearly have not harmed any of the townspeople physically, and they have no grounds to punish Hester. The cause of the townspeople's harsh disciplinary acts on Hester originates from a strict, unrealistic standards of puritan society and the zero tolerance of any ungodly behavior observed in the town. Due to the absence of proper justice, Hester's sentencing is left up to the harsh townspeople in which they show no mercy or

With society mocking and roaring at Hester Prynne, it is evident that they are against her, and that the Puritan society has, at a whole, condemned her act of adultery and abandoned her and her child. In the narrator's description, “...the heavy weight of a thousand unrelenting eyes...” it is clear that society holds a rather disapproving view of Hester.

   "...pain is in itself an evil; and indeed, without exception, the only evil; or else the words good and evil have no meaning." (Chase 127) In the novel The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne presents a very clear view of his stand on morality, which he carefully cultivates through the course of the story. The moral, which is "Be true!" applies equally well to all of the characters in the novel. Though his view does seem to stand as true through the length of the story, it does not, unfortunately, transfer as smoothly to our lives today. In essence it is a hedonistic view to take, which requires a slight stretch as to his interpretation as to how evil, and important, an individual's pain is unto

Hester’s battle with herself can only be understood by taking a glimpse into her daily life with her beloved daughter, Pearl. Pearl is the physical manifestation of her sin, of the adultery that Hester committed with her secret lover; with every waking hour, Pearl is always alongside Hester, constantly reminding Hester of her transgression. Whenever Hester sees Pearl, she sees a young and energetic girl, who also possesses the same attributes that she loathes about herself, the difficult and wild side of herself that would never give up. Hawthorne writes that Pearl, “lacked reference and adaptation to the world into which she was born. [Pearl] could not be made amenable to rules” (Hawthorne

The town women rebuke Hester openly and suggest various alternate punishments for her, all of them excessive and exaggerated. By emphasizing her crime, they derive a satisfaction and use her public condemnation to highlight their own “purity.” Additionally, the addition of a scarlet letter at all to Hester’s wardrobe is redundant; it is evident that the infant daughter that Hester has borne is the real consequence to her actions. This public exposure of sin is used less as an actual punishment for Hester than it is to reinforce a sort of spiritual superiority complex that the community holds. For people in general this existence of a superiority complex is a frequent issue; Hawthorne brings to the light the hypocrisy of this personality trait and shows a community affected by it to highlight the negative consequences of having such an attitude towards life and one’s

moral principles that govern a person's or group's behavior. This is how the dictionary defines ethics. Different people have different sets of ethics and sometimes they do not coincide with