Young Goodman Brown Theme Essay

Another symbol that we see in this story “Young Goodman Brown” is the pink ribbons that faith uses in her cap. “He looked back and saw the head of faith still peeping after him with a melancholy air, in spite of her pink ribbons” (Hawthorne 137).This seems to symbolize the ribbons as having a sort of positive emotion in this case towards the presence of Goodman Brown. In this story there were quite a few symbols that symbolized important events or ideas through the entire

Goodman Brown stated in the story that he came from a line of good Christian men, so he most likely knows the difference from wrong and right. In the eyes of the Puritans, his first shortfall is when he decides to take the journey in the woods. On this journey, he falls more and more into temptation. Every time he said he was going to turn back to go home, the older man always convinced him to keep going deeper into the woods. Humans have the freewill to decide what they want. Goodman Brown could have easily resisted temptation and went back home but the temptation to go deeper into the woods kept him from doing so. As the good Christian man, he is presented to be, Goodman Brown knows should not have be taking a journey into the wood. Even Faith, his wife warned him not to go into the woods because she knew something was not right about it. We as human being imperfect, we sin daily even the righteous make mistakes that cause them to fall short of their religious beliefs.

Young Goodman Brown's inability to acknowledge, and even embrace Faith's humanity, leads to the climatic loss of his "faith" in the forest. He beholds the pink ribbon that has

     The main focus of the story “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne is the triumph of evil over good. A supposedly good man is tempted by evil and allows himself to be converted into a man of evil. This is much like the situation that arises in Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, where two people are tempted to sin and give in thus submitting themselves to the power of the devil. In this novel, the area where the devil resides is strictly parallel to that in “Young Goodman Brown”.

In disbelief Young Goodman Brown is devastated, but knows that he still has his Faith. "It would break her dear little heart; and I'd rather break my own!' (214). Trying desperately he holds on to his Christian belief, that he is going to Heaven, even when he recognizes the old woman who passes and says "That old woman taught me catechism!" (215). Soon after he also hears Deacon Gookin and the minister discussing the evenings event. Knowing that these people, in his mind were the forefront of goodness on Earth, he is shattered as, " Young Goodman Brown caught hold of a tree, for support, being ready to sink down on the ground, faint and overburdened with the heavy sickness of his heart " (216).

      Growing up as a dedicated puritan, Young Goodman Brown was raised under strict religious guidelines that he must obey wholly according to his religion. He married a lovely woman named Faith within his deeply religious community. Faith is Young Goodman Browns dear wife, but also serves as a symbol for his commitment to the puritan religion. In Freud

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.

In the short story “Young Goodman Brown,” the author Nathaniel Hawthorne shows the fragility of humans when it comes to their morality. Goodman Brown goes on a journey through the forest with the devil to watch the witches’ ritual and observes the evil in the Puritan society. He loses his faith as he sees the people he respects the most participating in the sinful ritual. Nathaniel Hawthorne utilizes setting, and symbolism in his short story “Young Goodman Brown,” to show how a person’s perspective can change by showing the hypocritical nature of the Puritan society

Young Goodman Brown is a short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Written in 1835, the story deals with a late night meeting between a man and the Devil. On the surface this is all the story is, but if one looks closer one would find the story to be littered with symbolic images.

Finally, Goodman Brown arrives at the initiation ceremony only to be confronted by the image of his wife at the unholy altar. Although Hawthorne never offers any true evidence that Goodman Brownâs experience in the woods was anything more than a dream or hallucination, the Puritan passes judgment on Faith, and forever doubts her goodness. By allowing his audience to internally assess Faithâs guilt or innocence, Hawthorne forces his reader into a role of complicity with Goodman Brown (McFarland 37). Thus, Hawthorne has created a troubling character with both light and dark facets.

Even though faith is generally used in a positive connotation, Nathaniel Hawthorne knows that faith can be weaponized and used to prosecute adversaries, as it was in the Salem Witch Trials. He had great family history and personal guilt surrounding the events because his grandfather was the only judge who partook in the trials that did not repent for his perpetrations. He wrote this controversial story to invert the trials and made the narrator convict faith and the community instead. The short story “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne‎ is an allegory that is anchored by the character Faith, Young Goodman Brown’s wife. Faith is both his innocent and angelic physical wife, and a representation

deeper meanings than what the reader can see on the surface. The allegorical meaning is the writer’s real purpose in writing the narrative so that a lesson can be found when reading below the surface. “Young Goodman Brown”, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a perfect example of an allegorical story and is filled with many symbolic elements.

In Nathaniel Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown," Hawthorne introduces Goodman Brown, who doubts himself and reiterates his false confidence to himself repeatedly. His struggle between the evil temptations, the devil, and the proper church abiding life, is a struggle he does not think he can handle. This story is about a man who challenges his faith in himself and in the community in which he resides. Goodman Brown must venture on a journey into the local forest, refuse the temptations of the devil, and return to the village before the sunrise.

One can question whether it is his lack of experience as a married man or his inability to handle his wife's sexuality that drives Goodman into the forest. They are rightfully married so he has done no wrong. Yet, his guilt is so great that he leaves his Faith to go on this errand. It has been argued in the past that Brown can not accept his own sexuality. "Brown is prevented from developing into his sexual elder because of sheer sexual adolescence or personal idealism." (Loving 223) The key word here is adolescence. Brown is still young, not mature enough to accept these repressed feelings.

     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.