The Symbolism Of Alienation In The Scarlet Letter

In the 1850’s, America was undergoing a massive internal changes via the industrial revolution. With this new era, American culture was drastically changed as women started to take a more prominent role in American society. In his novel The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne attempts to stimulate this change by illustrating the positive influence of a strong female character in a Puritanical society through his heroine, Hester Prynne, by putting her in a scandalous situation capable of drawing out the worst in people.

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.

In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author presents three symbols that all reinforce the main idea of the novel. The main idea that reoccurred throughout the novel is that people don’t have to let their mistakes or circumstances determine who they are or what they become; it’s all in how one interprets life. Many symbols may seem as just an ordinary character or coincidental object to some readers, but the symbols have a deeper, underlying meaning. Although there are many symbols in this book, there are three that really help support the main idea: Hester Prynne’s scarlet letter, the meteor, and Hester’s daughter Pearl.

Society has unintentionally been guided by the same themes since the beginning of time. The recurring themes that are present in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic The Scarlet Letter are still relevant in today’s society. When high school students and teachers claim that Hawthorne’s novel is archaic and should be removed from the curriculum, they are absolutely wrong. Hester Prynne, the main character of the novel, commits adultery and as punishment, has to wear a scarlet letter “A” on her chest for everyone to see. Throughout the novel, Hester is faced with obstacles such as the struggle between self and society and the burden of publicly suffering for her sins. Despite a substantial amount of time having passed since Puritan times, the themes that Hester Prynne had to experience are still pertinent. Roger Chillingworth, Hester’s husband, is driven mad by his incessant need for revenge and in society today there are many occasions where people are plagued with the desire to seek vengeance. There are some instances in life where human nature takes over without people even realizing and revenge is one of them. Also, people are right when they say “history repeats itself” because some of these themes never go away. The Scarlet Letter takes place in the strict religious time of the 1600’s and although the book seems outdated and obsolete, the ideas inside are still relevant and therefore high school students should continue to read this work

Romanticism is the movement in literature that emphasizes inspiration, selfhood, and the authority of the individual. The purpose of “The Custom House” is that it provides the framework for the main idea of The Scarlet Letter and it also describes Hawthorne’s life. The narrator, who shares similar traits with Nathaniel Hawthorne, takes a post as the “chief executive officer,” or surveyor, of the Salem Custom House. The author’s attitude toward his former job is that the building extremely run down and the Custom House serves the small ship traffic going through the port, but it is usually a quiet place requiring only minimal work. Hawthorne describes his fellow workers as elderly and have been working at the Custom House their how lives. The only reason why they are there is through family connections and they repeatedly tell the stories. So, what I take from this is that he did not like his old job, the reason being is that he only speaks negative about everything relating to his former job. Hawthorne addresses the reader directly and it causes an effect by showing that he 's trying to connect with all sorts of people. He describes the letter as “ scarlet, gold-embroidered piece of cloth in the shape of the letter ‘A’.” Which makes me feel that if they put all that time into making it look nice, that there is some type of importance related to it.

When two authors from distinctly different societies and historical periods build stories around the same theme, there is an undeniable importance in the message being delivered. One of the authors bringing this message about is author of The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne. Hawthorne tells the story of Hester Prynne, a Puritan women in seventeenth century Boston, Hester, having committed adultery, is branded with a scarlet ‘A’ on her chest. The story describes the animosity that society feels towards her and her daughter Pearl, through the story Hester redefines the meaning of the ‘A’ and Pearl’s life is formed in a new light. While the setting of twentieth century Baltimore is unlike that of early Puritan society, The Other Wes Moore

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

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne presents the reader with the harsh, life changing conflicts of three Puritan characters during the 17th century. Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, and Robert Chillingworth must endure their different, yet surprisingly similar struggles as the novel progresses. Despite their similarities, Hawthorne shows these individuals deal with their conflicts differently, and in the end, only one prevails. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s intricately critical diction helps determine his didactic tone; during the course of The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne reveals that happiness can be harnessed through one’s perseverance.

The rose bush is directly stated by Hawthorne that it might represent a sweet moral blossom. It can also be shown as “To

Also, the letter directly creates isolation of its bearer. The narrator speaks of the letter saying that it has "the effect of a spell, taking [Hester] out of the ordinary relations with humanity, and enclosing her in a sphere by herself." (Hawthorne) Here, Hester first appears with the letter upon her, and the letter is describes as creating an encompassing zone of isolation around her. Fear is a stimulus of isolation, and the scarlet letter radiates both fear and isolation - therefore making it a powerful symbol of isolation.

Nathaniel Hawthorne was the author of the fictional book, “The Scarlet Letter”. The Scarlet Letter is about a young woman named Hester Pryne who commits adultery, and is forced to wear the letter “A” on her chest. Hawthorne shows the effects of sin in the Scarlet letter through the characters of Hester Pryne, Arthur Dimmesdale, and Roger Chillingworth. Dimmesdale was Hester’s lover, the father of her child and the minister. Dimmesdale lives with guilt, because he also has” [his own] scarlet letter,” (Hawthorne 130).

In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne uses Hester Prynne to provide an audience with ethical lessons. Caught for committing adultery, the protagonist of the novel transforms her life through dealing with her punishment.  Using symbolism and evident themes, the author clarifies the meaning of his work, which is to teach a moral lesson, making him a “contemporary” author.

Although disabled by their mutual feelings of guilt and isolation, the troubled characters of Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale, in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s positively renowned novel The Scarlet Letter, share an intimate connection. Hawthorne skillfully presents this idea in the beginning of his novel’s 17th chapter, using elements such as figurative language and rhetorical devices.

Hawthorne uses dysphemism, where instead of calling someone a burden to him or his society, he calls them torpid creatures and imbeciles implying that they are far worse than those merely being a burden. There is by all accounts a contention seething inside, keeping Hawthorne from beginning his story. It goes past not having room schedule-wise to compose. Rather, the question is whether the story merits telling in the writing society or general public. This reflection gives an artistic reply about the hugeness of "The Custom-House": it adds import and weight to the story to come. Hawthorne recommends that the story conflicts with the social mores that preserve order among the people.

The theme of isolation is highly present in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter.” Isolation Plays a very important role in the novel. Every main character finds themselves isolated in one way or another, but while some are absolutely and thoroughly destroyed by it, others gain loads of power. Characters Hester Prynne, Chillingworth, and Arthur Dimmesdale are all victims of isolation in the Puritan town of Boston, due to a different reasons such as Adultery, upbringing, and their past.