Summary Of ' Young Goodman Brown '

“Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a short story centered around the psychoanalysis of Young Goodman Brown. Hawthorne was an American Novelist who wrote exceptional short stories, many of the Dark Romantic genre. The genre is characterized by dark, gloomy, psychologically crazed, romanticisms that often don’t have that typical happy ending. Throughout “Young Goodman Brown” his mental capacity is put to the test as he is forced to endure a battle between 2 conflicting emotions. Ambivalence is shown throughout the story as well, due to these conflicting emotions. Young Goodman Browns departure on his journey outlines the power struggle of good and evil within himself and the sinful nature his psyche imposes on the members of his community.

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 short story “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathanial Hawthorne is a story in which the main character, Goodman Brown goes into the forest with an evil purpose and later finds out that it appears to be a meeting with the devil. In “The Man in the Black Suit” by Stephen King, the story is an autobiography about a young boy named Gary who has a frightening encounter with the devil while going on a fishing trip. In both short stories the main character are religious, but a significant difference between them is the way they handle their encounter with the devil. In “The Man in the Black Suit” family plays an important role in Gary’s live and is a big part of his motivation, and in “Young Goodman Brown” his family name, the way the people of Salem look at him and his wife Faith play the most important roles in his lives. Both short stories are very interesting to read and immediately grab your attention. In the short story “Young Goodman Brown”, the story takes place in Salem, which is known for it’s which trials. The short story “The Man in the Black Suit” takes place in the year 1914, in the town of Motton, not long before the First World War. In “young Goodman Brown”, the devil appears to be the figure of a normal old man, but in “The Man in the Black Suit” for example the reader can tell right away that this is not a human being. The main characters both have a different way of dealing with their encounter believes, and that may have been a difference in the outcome of the

The story of ?Young Goodman Brown? exemplifies the struggle of one man?s internal conflict of good and evil. The main character, Goodman Brown, leaves Salem village and his wife, Faith, to travel into the depths of the dark forest. The Young Goodman Brown will be aged with the knowledge he faces in this one night. Brown keeps his appointment with the devil in the forest, and he must choose to go back to his ?faith,? or explore the evils that the devil has to offer. Next, Brown is confronted with the virtuous people who live in his community, who will be attending the witch?s meeting with the devil. He has to decide if he will follow them along this

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

Through the dark description of the forest and prison, Hawthorne shows the hypocrisy in the society due to the fact that the Puritans are sinful. The very first descriptions of the town are a prison and a graveyard, the two most essential things the society needs. The society has “a grass-plot, much overgrown with burdock, pigweed, apple-peru, and such unsightly vegetation, which evidently found something congenial in the soil that had so early borne the black flower of civilized society, a prison”(Hawthorne 2). Prisons represent crime and the punishment in society, which grows from sin. Hawthorne compares the prison to a “black flower” which implies the growth of something evil in society. The Puritans know they are all but pure when the first structure they agree to put in the society is a prison. They should not be as judgmental to those who sin because the

Being a faithful person in today’s society can prove to be very difficult. There are a lot of temptations that can negatively impact your religious beliefs whether it be completely internal conflict or an external temptation. By internal conflict I mean just your own desires and inner demons trying to reveal themselves. External temptation comes from the people around you trying to convince you to do things that are not right by your beliefs. They can do this directly or indirectly but its up to you to combat these desires and refuse the temptations but that is far from easy. With the many different people that inhabit our world comes a lot of different religions and faiths. This can easily cause confusion and unintentional misdirection while coexisting with many different diversities. In the short story “Young Goodman Brown” Hawthorn uses symbolism to show the struggle of keeping faith in the face of sin with the character’s names, the path through the woods, and the final ritual.

Young Goodman Brown" tells the tale of a young Puritan man drawn into a covenant with the Devil. Brown's illusions about the goodness of his society are crushed when he discovers that many of his fellow townspeople, including religious leaders and his wife, are attending a Black Mass. At the end of the story, it is not clear whether Brown's experience was nightmare or reality, but the results are nonetheless the same. Brown is unable to forgive the possibility of evil in his loved ones and as a result spends the rest of his life in desperate loneliness and gloom.

In the story of Young Goodman Brown, as a reader we see many circumstances where Hawthorne uses irony in straightforward situations. I have learned from reading several of the author’s works that it is up to the reader to decide the meaning behind his stories. In this paper, I will be discussing the significance of the title, Young Goodman Brown and how I believe there is more to the story than what Hawthorne writes. Young Goodman Browns journey within the forest revealed truths not only within him, but within human nature and society. On page, 1103 Goodman Brown states “there may be a devilish Indian behind every tree.”

" This could be his way of proving himself worthy in some way due to the fact that he say that neither his father nor his grandfather had completed his task at hand. The second idea is in the reasoning that Hawthorne had simply utilized it as the setting and forged the story around the forest and its characterized darkness and evil notions compared to that of the town which is light and absent of evil until Goodman Brown returns. This is a definite formalistic observation in the contrast of forest and the town. The forest is used as a setting which Hawthorne utilizes to expose the faults in all of mankind, including the self professed religious. No matter which way you believe, Hawthorne has successfully left the issue as a mystery and an undeclared element of the narrative.

In the short story of “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the setting is a very important aspect in providing symbolism to certain events. The setting of a dramatic work or story is defined as the overall setting of a narrative detailing the general location, historical time, and social undermining in which its action occurs. The setting of a story is just as important as the characters that are involved within the story. It is a necessary aspect that has influence on every narration. Which is a subject that has not gained much attraction and attention as other parts of the story, but is certainly a very interesting topic to discuss. This essay will give an in-depth analysis of the various techniques that Hawthorne used to convey

Darkness, confusion, and terror are some words that come to mind when thinking of the setting in this writing piece. The story has a way of getting the theme across that seems very extreme, partly with its vast use of symbolism. The tale comes down to a single central theme. The story “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne shows that anyone is susceptible to a change in beliefs, and everyone's lives can be affected from the act of being caught off guard.

Young Goodman Brown was an innocent, corruptly, and doubtful man. At first, he only thought there was goodness inside of his father and grandfather, until the old man tells Goodman Brown that he knew both of them. All the people that he thought were pure, happened to be connected with the devil at one point. Once he found out about everybody that the old man knew, Goodman Brown questioned his beliefs about everything and he was never the same. When Goodman Brown went to the forest, it completely changed his faith and well- being.

“Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a story about a normal man that ventures into the forest to meet an old man who attempts to tempt him into going deeper into the woods to worship the devil. After the old man convinces him that everyone that he loves and respects is going to the devil’s ceremony he gives in. In “Young Goodman Brown”, Hawthorne effectively uses symbolism to portray the theme that putting one 's faith in others leads to weakness and the role his psychological developed plays in his morality.