What Is The Role Of Connotation In The Scarlet Letter

In The Scarlet Letter Hypocrisy is evident everywhere. The characters of Hester, Dimmesdale, Chillingworth, and the very society that the characters lived in, were steeped in hypocrisy. Hawthorne was not subtle in his portrayal of the terrible sin of hypocrisy; he made sure it was easy to see the sin at work , at the same time however, parallels can be drawn between the characters of The Scarlet Letter and of today’s society.

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.

Born in Salem, Massachusetts in 1804, Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote many novels and short stories. Hawthorne’s best novel, The Scarlet Letter, overtook the role of the first truly, American novel. His use of rhetorical devices, especially symbolism, established him as one of the most studied authors of all time. In order to convey meaning or to persuade, Hawthorne utilized numerous rhetorical devices. Rhetorical devices in The Scarlet Letter evoked emotions of the audience. In Hawthorne’s work, the devices helped the audience elaborate on the novel. Hawthorne used rhetorical devices to show his character's turmoil. He did this through the character of Hester Prynne, a social outcast bound to isolation by her sins. In novel, The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hawthorne depicts Hester’s inner turmoil through the portrayal of the sinful nature of human beings utilizing rhetorical devices.

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.

The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, was first published in 1850. It was set in a harsh Puritan community in Massachusetts during the seventeenth century. Hawthorne was of Puritan descent and researched the community. The focus of his novel is based on the adulteress act of Hester Prynne and how she was treated by her community. The novel is known for it’s abundance of rhetorical and literary devices, and was one of the first novels to effectively use them. Hawthorne uses rhetorical devices to portray his views and thoughts about the community. One device Hawthorne uses is irony. Specifically, dramatic, situational, and verbal irony. Hawthorne's use of irony is employed to show the true characteristics and emotions of the characters,

In his work “On the Scarlet Letter,” D.H. Lawrence addresses the controversial character of Hester Prynne. He is just one of many critics who have analyzed Nathaniel Hawthorne’s fictional character, where some look to her as a hero and others blatantly shame her for her sin. Lawrence makes up the latter of this crowd, and is able to prove his case in a very meaningful manner. The critic believes that Hawthorne sugarcoats Hester’s image, and tries to make it look as if she is the victim of the tale. Disregarding this sympathy, he addresses the root cause of her sin rather than its consequences. As he writes, he uses a multitude of literary techniques to help convince readers of Hester’s seemingly evil character, using descriptive diction, a

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel, The Scarlet Letter, is a compassionate yet riveting piece of English literature that supports the movement for equality of suppressed women during a most tumultuous time during the 1800’s. Hawthorne’s use of emotional diction and imagery throughout his novel employs a deplorable tone upon the story. It serves as a stark representation of an imaginative yet realistic example of the indifference of men and women during these changing times. Deeply held Puritanical beliefs led countless of people to believe that individuals, especially women, who committed sins of any type would never reach heaven upon their passing. Men, on the other hand, were judged less severely if accused of a crime. Hester Prynne, the

Nathaniel Hawthorne, a well-know Dark Romantic, employs the issues prevalent in Dark Romanticism in his novel The Scarlet Letter. These include the concepts of: guilt and sin, good and evil, and madness in the human psyche. Guilt and sin are heavily addressed in the novel, focusing on Hester’s outward versus Dimmesdale’s hidden guilt, and the sins committed by the adulterous couple and the revenge-driven Roger Chillingworth. The idea of what good and evil are is questioned in the novel. For example, the reader is led to question if Hester was right in not revealing Dimmesdale, and in turn if both Dimmesdale and Chillingworth were

"Those who before had known her, and had expected to behold her dimmed and obscured by a disastrous cloud, were astonished, and even startled, to perceive how her beauty shone out, and made a halo of the misfortune and ignominy in which she was enveloped" (39).  Hester, who is being openly condemned for her sins, Hawthorne describes ironically.  To the Puritans, Hester should be dim and obscure, surrounded by darkness and evil.  However, Hawthorne instead describes her shining beauty and the godliness she makes out of her sin and shame by exposing it to the public.  The Puritans condemn Hester for her sin and look towards her as evil, yet she is exposing her sin to the sunshine, to the public, something that Hawthorne praises in the novel.  "A blessing on the righteous Colony of the Massachusetts, where iniquity is dragged out into the sunshine!  Come along, Madame Hester, and show your scarlet letter in the market-place!" (40).  The Puritans feel that they are hurting Hester Prynne by exposing her sin, yet it is only making her stronger and making her grow.

In the Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne critiques Puritan ideology by using hypocrisy. Throughout the novel, symbolism gives a deeper meaning to his words and obvious tones of criticism if not mockery of Puritan beliefs. One way to critique Puritan ideology, Hawthorne uses the letter “A” in scarlet color that Hester Prynne, a main character, wears as a symbol of a sin that over time changes the characters in the novel. The scarlet “A” that Hester Prynne bears changes her through the novel many times. The scarlet “A” also leads Dimmesdale, who is a clergyman and minister of the Puritan church, to complete destruction.

A major universal idea that touches upon every part of The Scarlet Letter is the feeling of hypocrisy. Displayed on the board is a black mask, which represents how characters had two sides throughout the story. Not only were characters such as Dimmesdale, Chillingworth, and Hester hiding a secret from others in the novel, but dramatic irony happened various times. The three clothespins in the middle of the board have a baby invitation, a heart, and a cross hanging which represents how everything could quickly be dropped and changed for the worse within the blink of an eye, The baby invitation that says “Welcome to the world baby Pearl” which symbolizes how Pearl being born proves that Dimmesdale is a hypocrite. The heart symbolizes how Hester

The story begins with Hester’s sin of adultery. In fact adultery is just one of the many bases Hawthorne used to build the story. The underlying sin that Hawthorne deals with in The Scarlet Letter is hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is defined as the practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one's own behavior does not conform. Hester Prynne is a strong, independent woman who deals with her sin of adultery very well.

While Puritan women are weak and dependent upon their husbands, Hester Prynne is empowered and self-reliant. A character designed by Hawthorne to show 19th century women that women’s work could be valuable, Hester supports herself and her daughter by needlework. “For, as the novel unfolds, the letter, intended by the Authorities to signify harsh but just condemnation, is made by Hester to signify something entirely different—able, admirable.” (Bell 109) All aspects considered, the ability of Hester, a woman who committed sin and was publicly punished for this crime, to manipulate this punishment into a virtue

Critics generally agree Hawthorne uses the effects of the scarlet letter to reveal the atrocities of the patriarchy and masculine hegemony. The patriarchal forces women to carry the burden of an action despite the entity of the original sinners. In The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne takes the responsibilities and consequences of adultery, even though Dimmesdale should have equal, if not more, punishment. When Hester stands in front of a jury and endures the tremendous hatred from the individuals within the audience who believe Hester “has brought shame” to society, she declares,“Ye cannot take it off, and would that I might endure his agony, as well as mine!” (Hawthorne 39, 49). Hawthorne reveals how society isolates and condemns women for the actions and results of men. If the women do not hold the accountability of all sin, they experience ignominy from society; if they do hold accountability of all sin, they still experience ignominy. The patriarchy enforces the idea that women should hold all responsibilities for all of men’s actions. Advancing Hawthorne's argument, critic Jane Swisshelm reveals the treatment of women as they endure ignominy: “[Hester] was the moral leper whom none might dare to touch - the blazing emblem of the virtuous indignation of an entire community” (Swisshelm 273). So long women exist, the consequences of the world’s

Nathaniel Hawthorne, author of the book The Scarlet Letter, introduces three major characters in his telling of a story, set in a 17th-century puritan colony, of betrayal, struggle and repentance. Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale and Roger Chillingworth lives are explicitly intertwined in the narrative. But the main focus by the author is the actions of Hester Prynne and the impact of these actions on others throughout the novel. As the main character, Hester is first introduced to us by several outraged rotund and ruddy-cheeked matrons expressing how they would have handled the punishment of Hester for adultery. “At the very least they should have put a iron on Hester Pyrnne’s forehead” (Hawthorne ###), they echoed as these matrons righteously attend an execution on the gallows in a market place. “This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die: is there not law for it?” (Hawthorne ###). But despite this scorn, Hester chooses not to cower in her public shaming but faces her situation holding her infant with as much dignity, spirit and ladylike demeanor in a way that allows her natural beauty to show. In fact, the narrator in Hawthorne’s book continuously remarks on Hester’s beauty and states “Here was the taint of deepest sin the most sacred quality of woman’s beauty, and the most lost for the infant she had borne" (1034?). Meaning that her sins are labeled and judged in the minds of others because if they had not previously