Scarlet Letter Symbolism Essay

They damned Hester because of the fact her child was not from a marriage. They wanted someone to “stand on the scaffold by her side” (44). Which shows that they didn’t really want to condemn her just because she is a woman, but they still want her to be brought to moral justice because having extramarital affairs is bad. Arthur Dimmesdale, who admits to being Pearl’s father, may not have experienced the same public ridicule as Hester did, but he did put himself through a great amount of grief. The sexual experience between the two of them really had a negative impact on their lives. Hester was publicly embarrassed and is forced to wear the A for the rest of her life and Dimmesdale feels immense guilt because he never faced his sins. He ends up physically destroying himself due to the guilt. He was never put through the same experience as Hester, but he put himself through a large amount of punishment as

A second symbol that supports the main idea is the meteor. As The Scarlet Letter progresses, the readers find out that Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale is the man who committed adultery with Hester. Because he has not admitted to his fault, Dimmesdale has been plagued with a sickness where he is constantly grabbing at

In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, symbolsim is constantly present in the actual scarlet letter “A” as it is viewed as a symbol of sin and the gradally changes its meanign, guilt is also a mejore symbol, and Pearl’s role in this novel is symbolic as well. The Scarlet Letter includes many profound and crucial symbols. these devices of symbolism are best portayed in the novel, most noticably through the letter “A” best exemplifies the changes in the symbolic meaning throughout the novel.

17a) The house symbolizes different aspects for both of the main characters, Ruth and Hester. For Ruth, the house on the farm symbolizes loneliness and seclusion. Since the farm is far away from the town, Ruth is unable to visit the town frequently and therefore, feels eager and willing to sell the farm and move closer to the town. “Ruth: … It’s just that we’re so cut off and lonely here; and this is the best offer we could get.” (Still Stands the House, 24) The lack of freedom and companionship plays a big part in her life as she feels the need to be around people and feels too mentally and physically trapped in the house almost as if it were a jail cell. In order to bring joy into her life, Ruth plants hyacinths and takes care of it as it is the only thing that brings a spark of light to the house.

One of the most adroit talents authors use is symbolism. Writers such as William Shakespeare, Ernest Hemingway, and Ray Bradbury have perfected this craft. One piece of literature’s symbolism I am distinguished with is Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter. Specifically, the how the names of the main characters have an underlying meaning.

Hester Prynne grew up with a Puritan state of mind, but when her and her lover had an affair, she abandoned all of her personal values. Hester was imprisoned, and had to go to trail for her crimes. The Puritan people decided that her punishment should be public shaming. Hester was forced to wear a scarlet letter “A” on her chest at all times. She was shunned to live outside of town.

When the book starts, Hawthorne tells the reader that the letter “A”, on Hester’s chest, is a symbol of adultery. Hester is forced to wear this letter “A” because she has committed the sin of adultery with a fellow townmate. Hester gave birth to a child named Pearl, with somebody besides her husband Roger Chillingworth. Now that the letter has concreated itself on her chest, she is labeled as sinful. Hester is forced on a scaffold where everyone in the town can see what is on her chest, “When the young women - mother of this child - stood fully revealed before the crowd…

It appalled her, nevertheless, to discern here, again, a shadowy reflection of the evil that had existed in herself. All this enmity and passion had Pearl inherited, by inalienable right, out of Hester’s heart…the child seemed to be perpetuated those unquiet elements that had distracted Hester Prynne before Pearl’s birth, but had since begun to be soothed away by the softening influences of maternity

Throughout this novel, Author Nathaniel Hawthorne used Pearl as different symbols. Pearl was a symbol of Hester and Dimmesdale’s sin, the innocent reminder of that sin, and balance. He shows her being these symbols often throughout the book. Though, as the book goes on you can notice Pearl start to grow and evolve into the different symbols. Some of her original symbolism stays with her, however, she goes through stages as she ages. She was put through many things she couldn’t understand and endured pain because of her surroundings. When Hester is being screamed at to tell everyone who Pearl’s father, Hawthorne says Pearl, “pierced the air with its wailings and screams.”(Hawthorne 78). Just like her aging, her symbolism

When Dimmesdale, Hester, and Pearl hold hands and come out as a family (accidentally), an A shaped meteor soars across the sky. The townspeople take it as a sign that Dimmesdale is an angel, but I (and Dimmesdale) see it as a symbol of God’s acceptance. The courage it took to finally step up to the crime after years of pain and suffering was great enough to please God.

Nathaniel Hawthorne uses many forms of symbolism in his book The Scarlet Letter. Symbolism is, according to Merriam-Webster, “the art or practice of using symbols, especially by investing things with a symbolic meaning or by expressing the invisible or intangible by means of visual or sensuous representations.” This means that the author was using objects to represent an action or idea. The symbols used in his book is either all physical or visible objects. Many of the symbols in the book are about characters.Nathaniel’s ideas came from his bonds with the Puritans. According to CliffsNotes, “the Puritans had great difficulty in loving the sinner and hating the sin”. With the Puritans strong hatred for sin,

Symbolism is the use of an object, character, or event to represent something else. Nathaniel Hawthorne, without a doubt, uses symbolism throughout the course of the novel, The Scarlet Letter. The novel takes place in a Puritan community in present-day Boston. Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, Roger Chillingworth, and Pearl are the main characters. They all have major roles and without them, the novel would not be the same. Hester Prynne; married to Roger Chillingworth, had a baby named Pearl out of wedlock with a man named Dimmesdale. Because Hester was married, herself and Dimmesdale have now committed adultery and that is the main cause of a lot of the major events that take place in the novel.

Symbolism has many different meanings, and the Scarlet ‘A’ in “The Scarlet Letter” has many different meanings as well. Hester Prynne is the main character who is forced to wear the scarlet letter as remembrance for the crime and the sin that she has committed. This letter completely ruined her reputation in her community. How could a small piece of fabric do so much harm? This letter was a representation of something much greater than the letter ‘A’. This letter was originally made to stand for adulteress, as physical reminder of her sins. The vibrant scarlet red is meant to shame Hester, to make her feel sorry for her mistakes. Most importantly it was a symbol for change and an emblem of identity. In short, the scarlet letter meant much more than a letter of shame, it was simply a piece of fabric with meaning that could easily change.

The meteor in chapter twelve was interpreted by the townspeople as a sign from the heavens that the governor be came an angle, but Hester and Dimmsdale saw in as a sign of the sin that they commited. Although this also could be counted or viewed as a sign of ableness, but Dimmsdale saw it through the eyes coated by quit. In The Scarlet Letter said,

Symbols unlock the secrets of a story. Hawthorne, in The Scarlet Letter, uses many symbols to represent different things. Some symbols represent the same thing. The letter “A” has many meanings, each character has their own meanings, and even the different parts of nature are symbols. Also, apart from providing structure for the novel, each scaffold scene conveys something different. One could say, arguably, that nearly everything in The Scarlet Letter is a symbol for something else.