Guilt In The Scarlet Letter

Did you know, that in Puritan Massachusetts adultery was likely punished by death of both committees instead of humiliation? Arthur Dimmesdale, in the book The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is the town reverend and is also the father of Hester’s baby, but his guilt is overwhelming himself because he is unable to confess. Currently, Arthur Dimmesdale is torturing himself so juristically that he has developed a illness so bad that he has to constantly clutch his chest in pain. Roger Chillingworth, Hester’s husband, returns to Boston and sees Hester at the scaffold. Roger Chillingworth, seeing Hester on the scaffold with Pearl and the scarlet letter on her chest, starts a man hunt for the father of Hester’s baby. Chillingworth is also a physician and is living with Arthur Dimmesdale to help out his heart conditions. Chillingworth continues to grow suspicious of Dimmesdale in his man hunt for Pearl’s father, so he is secretly spying on him and giving him potions to help out his illness, which are really for humiliation. Dimmesdale’s insecurities and hopes that he will go to heaven hold him back from confessing to the townspeople. Arthur Dimmesdale’s guilt has changed his character physically and physiologically throughout the book because he has developed an intense heart condition, and his guilt is so intense he is starving himself to try to manage it, although, his physical condition is partly due to the treatment and torture he is undergoing from Roger Chillingworth. In the novel, Nathaniel Hawthorne presents Dimmesdale as the town reverend who is heavily respected to someone who is mentally ill and afraid to confess his sin to the townspeople.

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.

In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne exhibits how three very unique characters are evidently brought together by the sins that they have perpetrated and how they manage to perform acts of atonement in the puritanical Boston society. Hester Prynne sins by committing the shocking transgression of adultery. Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, who as well engages in adultery with Hester, abandons her and their daugher because of his own cowardice and hypocrisy. Roger Chillingworth grows to become a maleficent being who tries to corrupt the very soul of Reverend Dimmesdale. Although Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale do sin greatly, it is Roger Chillingworth who sins to the most ferocious degree.

Judgment can be the the greatest plague of society. Judgment kripples acceptance, forward growth and blinds entire communities. Though in retrospect plagues are necessary, as is judgment. Without judgment humanity would be blind to people's character exposing them dangerous risks unstable people present. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne , Hester dealt with the judgment repercussions of adultery. Her sin caused society's judgment of her to rise and fall, in tandem producing negative and positive effects for Hester. Throughout the novel the Puritan community shifts their views of Hester. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, judgment that plagued Hester as a result of her sin evolved and shifted the communities views of her.

Guilt and shame haunt all three of the main characters in The Scarlet Letter, but how they each handle their sin will change their lives forever. Hester Prynne’s guilt is publicly exploited. She has to live with her shame for the rest of her life by wearing a scarlet letter on the breast of her gown. Arthur Dimmesdale, on the other hand, is just as guilty of adultery as Hester, but he allows his guilt to remain a secret. Instead of telling the people of his vile sin, the Reverend allows it to eat away at his rotting soul. The shame of what he has done slowly kills him. The last sinner in this guilty trio is Rodger Chillingworth. This evil man not only hides his true identity as Hester’s husband, but also mentally torments

The Scarlet Letter is a novel about a Puritan woman who has committed adultery and must pay for her sin by wearing a scarlet “A'; on her bosom. The woman, Hester Prynne, must struggle through everyday life with the guilt of her sin. The novel is also about the suffering that is endured by not admitting to one’s wrongs. Reverend Mister Dimmesdale learns that secrecy only makes the guilt increase. Nathaniel Hawthorne is trying to display how guilt is the everlasting payment for sinful actions. The theme of guilt as reparation for sin in The Scarlet Letter is revealed through Nathaniel Hawthorne’s use of northeastern, colonial settings, various conflicts, and

The author, Nathaniel Hawthorne, is the nephew of John Hathorne. During the Salem Witch Trials, the only judge that did not apologize for the remorseless and cruel acts that were put upon many men and women was in fact John Hathorne. Nathaniel changed his last name from Hathorne to Hawthorne in an attempt to disassociate himself from his uncle. John Hathorne is the reason why Nathaniel Hawthorne is obsessed with the puritan times. Hawthorne lived in the 1800s, but the setting of the novel is based before the Salem Witch Trials were held in the 1600s. In his novel, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the symbolism of the scarlet letter, Dimmesdale, and burrs to contribute to the overall theme of guilt.

The presence of guilt has been felt by all human beings. As guilt grows in a

The presence of guilt has been felt by all human beings. As guilt grows in a

In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne expresses how sin causes guilt through Hester’s, Chillingworth’s, and Dimmesdale’s actions and emotions. Hester Prynne was the main sinner in the story, and she felt

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne paints a picture of two equally guilty sinners, Hester Prynne and Reverend Dimmesdale, and shows how both characters deal with their different forms of punishment and feelings of remorse for what they have done. Hester Prynne and Reverend Dimmesdale are both guilty of adultery, but have altered ways of performing penance for their actions. While Hester must pay for her sins under the watchful eye of the world around her, Reverend Dimmesdale must endure the heavy weight of his guilt in secret. It may seem easier for Reverend Dimmesdale to live his daily life since he is not surrounded by people who shun

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

Puritans actually made people wear the letter A for committing adultery, and if they ever took them off they would be whipped. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, he demonstrates the suffering and impact one individual can have on a society in this novel, by showing the consequences and results of their sins and actions in the story. In the novel, there are many characters who make terrible decisions like sins and end up regretting it later. The novel is about a woman who commits adultery with a man who is a minister because she thought her husband had died but he was alive and later finds out about her sin. She also ends up getting pregnant by the Reverend and is punished in front of the townspeople, but no one knew about the father.

Nathaniel Hawthorne, an Antitranscendentalist describes a life in New England- 1600’s, in a Puritan town, which at this time was known as The Massachusetts Bay Colony stood a woman with the name of Hester Prynne who has to face living a sinful life. The Puritan society will face a new time in this town where the society will watch Hester finish her days in shame. In this novel, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the symbolism of Pearl, Dimmesdale, and the black blossom to contribute to the overall theme of guilt. To begin, Hawthorne uses Pearl, the daughter of adultery, to contribute to the theme of guilt. Pearl, the devil’s daughter of the Puritan society conquers life of being a sin; Creating guilt for the absolute value,

In “The Scarlet Letter,” Hawthorne presents the consequences of sin as an important aspect in the lives of Hester Prynne, Roger Chillingsworth, and Arthur Dimmesdale. The sin committed, adultery, between Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale had resulted in the birth of their innocent little girl, Pearl. This sin ruined the three main characters’ lives completely in different ways. With the sin committed, there were different ways the characters reacted to it: embracing the sin, concealing the sin, and becoming obsessed and consumed with it. With each reaction to the sin there were also different actions of redemption.