Scarlet Letter Hester Prynne Character Analysis Essay

Despite the isolation, Hester supports herself and Pearl with nothing but her inner strength. She is able to deal with the negativity from the townspeople and the local government, and is even able to be honest and compassionate in ways such as acknowledging her sin, keeping the identity of her

Hester Prynne’s sin was a very concrete sin, and was simply committing adultery. Her sin changed her throughout the book, mainly her physical appearance. The beginning of the book says, “The young woman was tall, with the figure of perfect elegance on a large scale” (46). Even though she is embarrassed of her sin, she had not been transformed of it yet. Hester doesn’t changed until later on the book. She starts to feel the pressure of the people and the pressure of her sin. She starts wearing bland clothes and putting her hair up in a bonnet. She also decides to move away from everyone by moving into a cabin in the woods. Hester becomes very depressed throughout the book, the reader sees this because she loses her light. Hawthorne says she is not the girl everyone knew she was, no one recognized her anymore. In chapter 16, she goes to the to the forest to talk to Dimmesdale. Hester’s appearance starts to

From the start of the novel, Hester is portrayed in exile. She begins in the jail, and soon after is paraded through the streets to start her public exile with her child, Pearl. This first public shame caused Hester to feel “as if her hear had been flung in the street for them all to spurn and trample upon (Hawthorne 52).” The

Almost immediately, we start to recognize the true pit that has been dug by Hester and her decision to fornicate with Arthur Dimmesdale, the town priest. She is set up for failure and disaster when Hawthorne describes the trials she will have to endure in her everyday life. He depicts a life where “tomorrow would bring its own trial and yet the same that was now so unutterably grievous to be borne.” (54). He seems to put her on display as a case of ultimate failure that not only will last for days and months but “ for the accumulating, and added years, would pile up their misery upon the heap of shame.” (54). Though her life seems miserable at the moment, she stays in her town that she 's always been a part of. The author is trying to show how those who are the closest to you and may have known you the longest can turn on you once you do commit sin. The “A” she has sewn upon her chest will remain even if removed because of her public humiliation by the Puritan townsfolk. She becomes the actual embodiment of a ruined future and a ruined life for those in her family or associate with her. For it isn’t only

In the life of Hester Prynne, she is viewed as an adulterer. During her sentencing on the scaffold, people enjoyed seeing her be humiliated and punished for her reckless actions. The self-righteous society views her as an outcast: “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” (Hawthorne 76). Because she broke the strict Puritan laws,

A woman, Hester Prynne, who does not ignore her mistake, and Arthur Dimmesdale who does. Nathaniel Hawthorne wants the reader to learn that running away from your problems always has repercussions, and often leads to others. At the beginning of the story Hester Prynne gets punished for her sin, adultery. The punishment is to stand for three hours on the scaffold and wear the Scarlet Letter for the rest of her life.

Hester is an outcast from town. “[Hesters] sentence bore that she should stand a certain time upon the platform… under the heavy weight of a thousand eyes, all fastened upon her and concentrated on her bosom” (63-64). This act of standing upon the platform means that she is now officially an outcast from the colony. She has gone from a respectable women living on her own to a women of disgrace that has had sex out of her marriage. The colonists see her as socially unacceptable and leave her as an outcast to their social society. Social isolation is seen again when Hester is dropped to the bottom social class. Before Hester exits the prison gates to stand on the platform, the women of the town begin to gossip. They begin to gossip about how Hester “has brought shame upon us all” (59), and how she really should be punished for embarrassing them. Hester used to be a good role model for the town, but now that she has sinned it makes the other upper class women look bad. Hester is dropped to the bottom because the upper class women could not bear to be seen socializing with a sinner like her. The women don’t socially accept her anymore. Hesters sin socially isolates her when the town only sees her as a symbol. Hester is seen by the colonists as, “the general symbol at which the preacher and moralist might point and in which they might vivify and embody their images of women’s frailty and sinful passion.

Hester’s life has been turned completely upside down with her mistake, and she learns to live with the consequences, doing the best she can under

In the beginning of the book, when Hester exits the jail, she is described as “a woman of perfect elegance”. She is also described as having “dark and abundant hair, so glossy that it threw off the sunshine with a gleam”. She was viewed as a beautiful lady, but after seven years of ridicule, her beauty has turned to something much worse. A cap covers her beautiful hair, and the warmth of her heart has diminished. These changes could not be undone without

     Hester Prynne, through the eyes of the Puritans, is an extreme sinner. She has gone against the Puritan ways by committing Adultery. The Puritans believed that Hester was a lost soul that could only be saved by sincere and thorough repentance. For this

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.

From a young age, it is ingrained into the minds of children that image is everything, and when that is taken away or ruined, it easily shatters a person. Believing the idea that how the world perceives you is a permanent thing once fully formed creates a weight on the shoulders of young people who are trying to discover their identities in their society. Pressure stemming from this burden leads to monumental downfalls of a person’s emotional health. With a specific message of this in mind, Nathaniel Hawthorne sculpted his lead character, Hester Prynne, to become an image of sin in her community. This image was derived solely from her sinful actions that branded her for the remainder of her days: “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” (Hawthorne 66). A young woman born to respected parents, Hester made the grave mistake of committing adultery, and because of this deviation from her Puritan community’s way of life by the bible, she is condemned to eternally embody sin. One action dictates the rest of her life; when the

Her fearlessness at leaving shows a complete separation from her current dwelling and that the resilience she originally had has only grown with time. Hester Prynne does not allow herself to waste away and wallow in self pity because she respects herself and her child much more than that. She holds onto a feminine strength: quiet yet resounding.

Often in society people are criticized, punished and despised for their individual choices and flaws. In the novel, The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author uses Hester Prynne to symbolize that those who challenge social conformities can benefit society as a whole. Though she has been banished for committing adultery, she sees that the community needs her. Through her generous accomplishments the community realizes she is a person who, regardless of her sin, can affect the community in a positive way.

In the beginning of the novel, the reader is presented with a physical appearance of Hester that is pleasing to the visual eye. It is Hawthorne describes his heroine of the book by