Point of View in Young Goodman Brown Essay

"Young Goodman Brown," a story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, should be interpreted on a psychoanalytical level rather than a religious one. It is my observation that "Young Goodman Brown" may very well be the first published work alluding to divisions of the mind and personality theory. Although religion is a direct theme throughout the story, "Young Goodman Brown" appears to be an allegory with deeper meanings.

Hawthorne in essence, portrayed Goodman as proof of the nature of evil in man by showing how easily even a young dedicated Puritan can easily be influenced by a complete stranger. This stranger was symbolically the Devil among men in this text. Hawthorne begins introducing the Devil immediately as trying to sway Goodman to follow him on a long journey. By leaving his wife, Faith to begin the journey, Goodman Brown was symbolically leaving his faith in God and entering a forsaken ground by following the Devil. The fact that Goodman Brown left with no regard for his wife Faith’s warning, symbolized the lack of regard for his own faith in God and his fellow human race. This simple disregard that Goodman Brown showed was evidence of the easily persuaded ability of man to choose sin over good.

Young Goodman Brown is a short story where the main purpose is to show the social issue of religion during the Puritan time. Although the author Nathaniel Hawthorne had not being living in that time, he came from a long line of Puritans. He wrote Young Goodman Brown to show the flaws of the Puritans’ view of religion. They made God seem heartless and mean spirited, someone who just used humans for entertainment. The short story Young Goodman Brown demonstrates that people should test their faith of their religious beliefs and even people considered upright can fall short of their own religious faiths from temptations and imperfections. In addition, the story shows that there is some degree of evil nature in everyone because of the freewill

    In "Young Goodman Brown," Nathaniel Hawthorne, through the use of deceptive imagery, creates a sense of uncertainty that illuminates the theme of man's inability to operate within a framework of moral absolutism.  Within every man there is an innate difference between good and evil and Hawthorne's deliberate use of ambiguity mirrors this complexity of human nature. Hawthorne's Young Goodman Brown, is misled by believing in the perfectibility of humanity and in the existence of moral absolutes. According to Nancy Bunge, Hawthorne naturally centers his story upon a Puritan protagonist to convey the "self-righteous" that he regards as the "antithesis of wisdom"(4). Consequently, Young

The dialogue, action and motivation revolve about the characters in the story (Abrams 32-33). It is the purpose of this essay to demonstrate the types of characters present in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown,” whether static or dynamic, whether flat or round, and whether protrayed through showing or telling.

Nathaniel Hawthorne constructs uncertainty throughout Young Goodman Brown by employing plot, point of view, and symbolism. For instance, the deception in plot occur as Young Goodman Brown traverses the threshold. Brown considers Faith to be pure and virtuous; a wicked act to leave such behind. Moreover, while conversing alongside the traveler Brown presumes the ethics of his ancestry and townspeople to be good due to high Faith in people. Brown’s perception shatters as the traveler discloses the sinful acts of the masses.

Young Goodman Brown is a short narrative written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Just like many of his other works, the story is set in the 17th century Puritan New England, and the author primarily addresses the puritan beliefs at the time which state that humanity exists in a state of degradation and God holds some unconditional love to humans by giving them unmerited grace. “The author mainly focuses on underlying tensions within the puritan way of life” (Jaynes, 2006). He thus uses symbolism to showcase the story of Young Goodman Brown’s journey. The main character delves deep into self-scrutiny and ends up losing his beliefs and virtue.

Mary Rowlandson (1636-1711) a puritan women, held as a prisoner by the Native Americans and forced to travel, “some 150 miles, from Lancaster to Menamaset then north to Northfield and across the Connecticut river.”(10) was not a writer however had her book, A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson published. The book was released for the, “public at the earnest desire of some friends, and for the benefit of the afflicted”(5-6) and Young Goodman Brown, a fictional character created by Nathaniel Hawthorne, was written because a few male puritans wanted to publish a story to open up societies eyes and live in a more patriarchal society. Regardless of being a fictional character or a

When it comes to the topic of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Young Goodman Brown, most of us will readily agree that duplicity is a major theme in the piece, or the idea of different versions of reality. Where this agreement usually ends, however, is on the question of whether Hawthorne is implying that man is inherently evil. Whereas some are convinced that Young Goodman Brown was good until tainted by the Devil, others maintain that he was evil from the beginning and was completely aware of the evil he was indulging in. My personal view, however, is that Young Goodman Brown was inherently evil, but it did not come to light until the Devil began to influence Brown. This can be seen through the use of symbolism, biblical allusions, and the development of the main characters. While the Devil may have revealed that Young Goodman Brown was not as innocent and pious as he appeared, Brown was willingly indulging in sin and was inherently evil.

The story begins with Goodman Brown starting out on a journey. Hawthorne does not state what kind of journey or the purpose behind it. By the end of the story I saw it as a journey into Goodman Browns own mind, heart and soul rather than a literal journey. I feel this is the most significant

When analyzing an allegory like "Young Goodman Brown", the reader must realize that the story is in its entirety, a symbol. Hawthorne, through his writing is trying to convey the contradicting aspects of the Puritan ideology. This is made evident after discovering that Goodman's father burned an Indian Village and his grandfather lashed a Quaker woman. By Hawthorne including these acts of violence, he is revealing that the

   Nathaniel Hawthorne's works are notable for their treatment of guilt and the complexities of moral choices. "Moral and religious concerns, in short, are almost always present in Hawthorne's work"(Foster, 56). Given Hawthorne's background, it is not a stretch of the imagination to say that his novels are critiques of Puritanism. Hawthorne lived in the deeply scarred New England area, separated from Puritanism by only one generation. His grandfather had been one of the judges in the Salem Witch Trials. Personal issues include the various ways Hawthorne's family and specific events in his life influenced his writing. Readers can easily recognize how "Young Goodman Brown" incorporates

"Had Goodman Brown fallen asleep in the forest and only dreamed a wild dream of a witch-meeting? (387)" The story "Young Goodman Brown" is portrayed as a straight forward tale of a man on a venture. It is not overly difficult to comprehend or interpret, however it does have several great ambiguities. As Hawthorne's tale has a great deal of symbolism, it is all in retrospect to the ambiguous entities within the tale. The formalistic approach will be used to analyze the ambiguities in the story, mainly focusing upon the use of dark and light contrasts. The questions of why did Goodman Brown leave his wife Faith and venture into the forest and was his journey into the forest a reality or a dream bring a grand weight of ambiguity upon the

The way Hawthorne portrays Brown’s wife, Faith, is one of the most unique and powerful pieces of the story. It shows how a man can think completely differently and lose his faith due to traumatizing events. The way Young Goodman Brown represents the everyman is something very unique and enjoyable, as it takes the reader and puts them right into the main character’s shoes. Brown faces a lot of adversity that most people will go through one way or another, and Brown in this story can represent any given person during at least one point in their life. True, it may be hard to understand how one man could represent all of humanity, but Hawthorne did an excellent job at getting as close as possible. Young Goodman Brown may not be who someone identifies with when a crisis occurs, but his character truly shows how big of an impact an extreme incident can be on any given person, and completely changing their way of going about

     Nathaniel Hawthorne utilizes symbolism throughout his short story Young Goodman Brown to impact and clarify the theme of good people sometimes doing bad things. Hawthorne uses a variety of light and dark imagery, names, and people to illustrate irony and different translations. Young Goodman Brown is a story about a man who comes to terms with the reality that people are imperfect and flawed and then dies a bitter death from the enlightenment of his journey through the woods. Images of darkness, symbolic representations of names and people and the journey through the woods all attribute to Hawthorne's theme of good people sometimes doing bad things.