Hawthorne's "The Scarlett Letter" and "Young Goodman Brown"

Paper Summary:

This paper uses examples from two of Nathanial Hawthorne's greatest works, "The Scarlett Letter" and "Young Goodman Brown" to demonstrate how these works use symbolism to represent sin and morality.

From the Paper:

"Hawthorne, being of Puritan heritage, sets his "Scarlet Letter" in the seventeenth-century Puritan settlement of Boston. The protagonist of his story, Hester, is forced to wear the scarlet letter "A" on her breast to symbolize her sin of infidelity, of which resulted in a daughter, Pearl. Then when town officials try to take the child away, a young minister comes to the aid of the mother and child, enabling them to stay together. In this story, man is sinful and moreover, human maladies are essentially punishments from God. Although Hawthorne portrays the young minister as compassionate and just, he also depicts him with physical and psychological symptoms that are taken to represent an unhealthy mind and spirit and thus, are basically are the result of guilt. Hawthorne writes, "Most of the spectators testified to having seen, on the breast of the unhappy minister, a SCARLET LETTER - the very semblance of that worn by Hester Prynne -imprinted in the flesh" (Scarlet pp)."

More papers on Hawthorne's "The Scarlett Letter" and "Young Goodman Brown":

• Book Review # 107619 : "Literary Symbolism"
• Analytical Essay # 123212 : "Darkness and 'Young Goodman Brown'"
• Analytical Essay # 66833 : "Oedipus Rex" and "Young Goodman Brown"

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