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Scarlet Letter Ambiguity Quotes

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In 1850, novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne published a book that is still studied today due to its abundance of moral ambiguity. The book takes place in the 17th century Puritan town of Salem. His main character, Hester Prynne, causes widespread clamor due to her unloyal ways to her husband, Roger Chillingworth. To escape the hate of the town she spends time with her illegitimate child, Pearl in the forest. This is where she can release her wild side. However, her husband has found her, and is determined to find the man who solicited the baby his wife gave birth to. Ambiguity is portrayed throughout the book by utilizing characters, symbolism, and setting. Hester’s husband Roger Chillingworth, is an extremely deceptive character. While his actions are cruel, they are in the name of his love, Hester. …show more content…

She is responsible for all of the hate that is portrayed upon Hester. However, what pearl represents to Hester, is her wild side, how she can be herself and not care about what the town thinks. In chapter 14 Hester and Pearl are at the beach, “Hester bade little Pearl run down to the margin of the water,and play with the shells and tangles sea-weed, until she should have talked awhile with yonder gatherer of herbs. So the child flew away like a bird, and, making bare her small white feet, went pattering along the moist margin of the sea...the image of a little maid, whom Pearl, having no other playmate, invited to take her hand, and run a race with her.”(154) Pearl is happy and free and influences Hester be the same way. Although while she embodies, Hester’s wild side, she also represents the sin that she committed to create her. Pearl is the reason she has the scarlet “A” on her clothes. In first scaffold scene, Hester hides her scarlet “A” by shielding it with Pearl, irony was prevalent, as she was hiding what literally called her an adulterer, with something that symbolized her being an

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  • What Does Pearl Symbolize In The Scarlet Letter

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    Avenging and vengeful is the man who is wronged! This statement could be applied to several characters throughout the novel The Scarlet Letter, written by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne. Sinful acts are inflicted upon many of the minute cast of characters, which impose a riveting journey for the reader to endure. Even more so are the reactions these prominent characters have toward their anguish and adversities as they heave themselves into the depths of solitariness, self-inflicted agony, and woe. Among these richly intriguing personalities is the town’s sinful stain, Hester Prynne, who has committed adultery; the demon-child, Pearl, who was a product to her mother’s adultery; the unholy clergyman, Arthur Dimmesdale, the other adulterer; and the implacable Doctor, Roger Chillingworth.

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