First in The Scarlet Letter, we were taught by Hawthorne about overcoming the initial stereotypes and biases of specific characters in the novel including himself. The author uses slow transitions in the novel to change our The view and his portrayal of Hester. He also uses Hester’s character to compare and bring attention to himself. Hester in particular, is first described in the novel by Hawthorne as deviant
Nathaniel Hawthorne Puritan Influence Nathaniel Hawthorne drew from his personal and childhood experiences to write his literary works. The event that affected him and showed in his writing was “...the infamous Salem witch trials had taken place more than 100 years earlier, the events still hung over the town and made a lasting impression on the young Hawthorne…("The Scarlet,"History.com). By the event having a impact on him from a young age it affected his writing and helped him in the development of a strong minded main character in his book The Scarlet Letter. Knowing about the earlier life of Nathaniel Hawthorne will help the reader better understand why Puritanism is the bulk of his literary works. Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in Salem, Massachusetts in 1804 and was the only son of Nathaniel and Elizabeth Clark Hathorne, his father was a sea captain [who] died in 1808 of yellow fever while at sea ("The
Puritan’s harsh beliefs represented the beginning of the Nineteenth Century in the newly colonized America. Their community ruled with an iron fist: unforgiving, pitiless, stern. In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne expresses his disagreement with puritan priorities by revealing the hypocrisy widely practiced throughout their community. Hawthorne’s utilization of dim diction aids in the establishment of his scornful tone, while inclusion of symbols and intricate juxtaposition all serve to accentuate the Puritan’s duplicity. All these factors combine to develop a critical tone which rebukes puritan society.
This paper points out what Nathaniel Hawthorn portrays in Scarlet Letter relating to Emersonian’s self-Reliance. The movement to self-reliance in which it started in the 19th century by Emerson has grasped many writers’ attentions. Hawthorn, as one of the admirers of the idea, views a great endorsement to it in Scarlet Letter. Readers observe how significantly Hawthorn devotes characters, theme, and setting of the text in serve to the idea. Scarlet Letter provides a clear depiction regarding the idea and a conflict resulting from combating two different perspectives, self—reliance and puritan tradition.
Anti-Transcendentalism, Nathaniel Hawthorne, who many of his novels (or “romances,” to him) were dark, twisted but held a shimmer of light and hope within them. A particular novel, one of which is considered a great piece of American Romantic literature, The Scarlet Letter, due to its story line being set in the remote past of the Puritan era, focuses on the strict laws of the Puritan society and the battle for love, happiness, and acceptance in an anti-Puritan situation. Throughout the novel it becomes evident that this Puritan society is filled with corruption. However, in a way to brighten the dark and twisted storyline that is The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne uses the truth that is reflected in the surrounding nature as a way to convey an overall mood of select chapters, a way to describe the characters
The Scarlet letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne can be regarded a work of feminist literature. It is a story about Hester Prynne and her daughter and the hardship Hester had to go through in the Puritan society. The Puritan society then overlooked humanity and Puritan rules were imposed on the people. The narrator in the novel depicts women’s low status and the hardship in the puritan society during the seventeenth-century. Hawthorne emphases a unique character of exceptional courage, gender equality, non-conformity and self-reliance associated with a woman in the time when the society was not in favor of.
Hawthorne’s use of nature, emotion, and imagination in order to show the importance of individuality makes The Scarlet Letter a magnificent romantic novel. To begin with, Hester acts as an individualist in the story. Although Hester has challenged the Puritans’ rules and people look at her as an outcast, she finds a place for herself in the society through her charity and needle works. As a result, people start interpreting the scarlet letter as “Able” instead of “Adulterer” (Hawthorne 158). The narrator describes Hester as a heroic individual who accepts her punishment by keeping the scarlet letter on her chest and starts rebuilding her life.
During the Romantic Period in American literature, Nathaniel Hawthorne looked back at the behavior of the Puritans in American history and, in The Scarlet Letter, offered a scathing view of their strict religious standards and harsh attempts to control people’s behavior. By Hawthorne’s time in the mid-1800s, society had relaxed its strict religious standards, advocating that people follow their individual consciences rather than adhering to a morality dictated by society. It was with this focus on a person’s right to pursue that which he deems valuable and right that Hawthorne wrote The Scarlet Letter. His sympathetic and at times admiring tone in writing about the village adulterer, Hester, demonstrates that he believes the town is wrongly
Statement of problem Hawthorne’s high rank among American novelists is due to three main aspects of his work: first, his novels show him to be a skillful craftsman. He has a sense of unity of structure. Hawthorne shows a sense of style also. His style of writing is remarkable for its directness, clarity and firmness. There is an infallible rightness of language in his style.
In the novel, Hester, a young woman involved in adultery after leaving her husband in Europe, is at the center of ridicule and exclusion from the rest of the Puritan community due to her actions. This ideology of community over the individual is prevalent throughout the book, and it has far-reaching effects on not only Hester but her daughter Pearl as well. One of the key forces behind the societal exclusion in The Scarlet Letter is the Puritan ministry. As one of the most powerful groups in New England in the 17th century, they exerted a large presence in local governments. According to Hall’s A Reforming People, Puritan presence in the government came suddenly along with the influx of colonists to New England: “Bringing with them a deep fear of arbitrary, unlimited authority, these settlers based their churches on the participation of laypeople and insisted on "consent" as a premise of all civil governance.