Rhetorical Devices In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter

According to Hawthorne, the consequence of sin is mental deterioration as represented by Reverend Dimmesdale. Dimmesdale is a priest that has committed a vile crime, although only a scanty amount of people know about it. Dimmesdale has not publically announced his sin, which in turn worsens his mental health due to guilt. Dimmesdale stood in front of the town when his past lover, Hester, was being publically humiliated and never uttered a word, only placed “his hand upon his heart” (59). The consequence of not admitting his immoral sin was ultimate guilt. Dimmesdale suffered through each day with the unbending remorse for what he had done. This sin deteriorated Dimmesdale’s mental health, leaving him with minute strength and power. Dimmesdale

Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, one of the protagonists of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel The Scarlet Letter, stands as a highly conflicted character. The source of his divide stems from the consequences of private sins, and is prevalent within the first paragraphs of Chapter 12, “The Minister’s Vigil,” where the narration chronicles Dimmesdale’s surroundings as he dream walks through the town in a state of limbo. He is portrayed as a model citizen who lacks moral imperfections to the general public yet suffers privately from the juxtaposition of his sins to his position within the community. In this specific passage, Hawthorne uses somber diction and imagery to illustrate Dimmesdale’s strife, while portraying his internal conflict through the formation

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. By negatively depicting the Puritans with his depressing diction, Hawthorne establishes a scornful tone that highlights the Puritan’s

As a Priest, Arthur Dimmesdale has a status that places him above the ordinary townsperson. Coming from, “one of the great English universities,” (Hawthorne 61) he has an excellent education to use in his preaching, placing him on a social pedestal, above everybody else, including Hester. As he speaks to

Throughout the passage from The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne uses Hester’s baby, Pearl, to illuminate the theme of beauty in a dark place. Once released from prison, Hester, an adulterer, becomes a public spectacle. Through this hard time, Hester has her daughter Pearl to soothe her and to bring her strength and hope for a better future. By using vivid imagery and juxtaposition, Hawthorne depicts Pearl as Hester’s happiness, light, and beauty during a sad and lonely time.

However, he also uses these allusions to create a new side to his narrative as evident when he describes Hester’s resilience, and to create a new element in the plot as evident in his description of Dimmesdale’s penance and need for redemption. Therefore, Hawthorne demonstrates an effective use of allusions to craft a religious and detailed narrative for The Scarlet Letter by reviewing on parallels between the Bible and the novel’s main characters. There’s more to The Scarlet Letter than these allusions though, and there are many questions to answer about this book. These questions may never be answered fully, but by reading the novel itself, we might find the right places to start searching for answers and formulate our own opinions on the matter. What’s important from this novel is the realistic warning about what might happens when an individual place themselves too highly among others, a message Hawthorne writes to warn against the fervor of transcendentalism of his time. With these insights, we might finally appreciate the novel for what it is and the message it tries to

Arthur Dimmesdale, the minister, a clergyman had committed the horrid sin of adultery, the same sin as Hester. Dimmesdale’s holy affiliation gave him a kind and pure disposition and this was solidified by his dimwittedness, making him seem almost childlike. By having a character with these qualities, Hawthorne contradicts the stereotype he has set up by having Dimmesdale be “unworth...[y] to [complete his] humblest mission” (71), a quality virtually unheard of among ministers. The author then has Dimmesdale confess his “sin so awfully revealed!”(211) in order for both Hester and Dimmesdale to redeem themselves of sin and restore the goodness. Hawthorne wanted his readers to understand that two people who have sinned can seek forgiveness and receive it.

Arthur Miller's utilization of incongruity in The Crucible shows exactly how tricky the human species is. He makes a situation that spins around the congregation and how the general population must take after their decrees and keep their dedication to God, however all they truly do conflicts with their ten edicts. John submitted infidelity by yearning for Abbigail when he was at that point wedded to Elizabeth and had constructed a family with her. Abigail is desirous of Elizabeth for having John and her yearning for retaliation drives her to lie and control the town as she did. It is essentially unexpected how all through every one of the allegations and guards, everyone would lecture their confidence in God and the congregation yet whatever they did was definitely not what they were required to. Mill operator shows the incongruity in the story by uncovering the truths in every characters heart and how none of them are honest.

In the “Scarlet Letter,” Nathaniel Hawthorne portrays hypocrisy of the Puritan society, where the protagonist Hester Prynne face many consequences of her actions and the how she tries to redeem herself to the society. During the seventeenth puritans believe that it is their mission to punish the ones who do not follow God’s word and it is their job to stop those from sinning. Therefore, the hypercritical puritan society punishes Hester harshly for committing adultery, but in Hester’s mind, she believes that what she did was not a sin but acts of love for her man. Eventually, she redeems herself by turning her crime into an advantage to help those in need, yet the Puritan society still view her as a “naughty bagger.” (Hawthorne 78)

Nature is the basic characteristic into which something or someone is naturally presented. These characteristics are used in this novel as the scars into which no one is able to escape. Nature in The Scarlet Letter was used as a representation of many ideas and beliefs the puritan society tried to suppress. These representations came throughout the development of the novel as Hester’s escapement and can even be argued that Hawthorne used nature to show the violent and demonic sides of the puritan’s angst.

The definition of integrity in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is a firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values. A character with integrity is willing to sacrifice anything of sentimental or physical value, even their life or reputation, to defend the moral system they govern themselves by. It takes someone of strong character to possess integrity, because the temptation to give in is every so often immensely appealing. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne is a character of such integrity, because she upholds her promise with Chillingworth and refuses to flee from the punishment of the scarlet letter “A”. (Hawthorne 55) On the other hand, Dimmesdale was a man of low integrity, because he would not confess the truth about

He was suffering from chest pain because of the secret he was hiding from the Puritan society. He was dying every day from inside because he could not carry the weight of his sin. He was totally consumed by guilt; his “form grew emaciated; his voice ...... his hand over his heart, with first a flush and then a paleness, indicative of plain” ( Hawthorne 13 ). This quote shows that Dimmesdale’s guilt had an impact on his health. Dimmesdale’s decision to hide his sin was truly killing him from inside. He got weaker, more fragile, and pale and his suffering began to turn out to be more agonizing. The decision he makes not tell his sin to the Puritan community literally destroys him. In the end, he dies from a heart problem. This indicates that heart disease is a symbol of emotional distress. Moreover, In chapter 14 Foster talked about the importance of Christ figure. Hester can be seen as Christ figure in the Scarlet Letter. In order to become Christ figure, a character needs to have a certain characteristic such as “self-sacrificing, very forgiving, good with children, and in agony” ( Foster 125

In The Scarlet Letter, the author sets a mood from the beginning of the book. The setting is old and beat up in front of an aged wooden prison with judgmental Puritans ready to tear a women apart. The Puritans are hypocrites and the author portrays that in the story. Nathaniel Hawthorne did not always speak positively toward the Puritans, but he has respect for the group. The main symbol that stands out is the scarlet letter “A” that was stuck on Hester Prynne for her actions of adultery which is a theme for this book. Another symbol is the rose bush that grew right outside of the old, rusty, decaying prison

Hawthorne uses great symbolism in both “Young Goodman Brown” and “The Ministers Black Veil”. I am going to point out all the excellent uses of symbolism.

Nathaniel Hawthorne displays his use of allusions and microcosm throughout his writings through his avid use of mythological, literature, m and biblical references. He relates many of his stories to Adam and Eve and the fall of mankind with the introduction of sin. Many characters, in both Rappaccini’s Daughter and The Birthmark, will relate to a biblical character or a mythological character with how they relate to something or how they act. Hawthorne relates his writings to things that are well know and makes it much easier for the reader to understand or relate to. Some of these examples are displayed in Rappaccini’s Daughter with how the garden and the scientist relate to biblical figures.