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The Scarlet Letter: Pearl: A Gift Or A Curse

885 Words4 Pages

John White
Mrs. Edgar
The Scarlet Letter
October 10, 2014
Pearl: A Gift or a Curse?

In The Scarlet Letter, our characters are expressed as detailed and as expressive as they should. The children in the book are by far the most expressed and true. Ever since she was born, The Scarlet Letter defines Pearl as the symbol of Hesther’s crime. In other words, Pearl is considered Hester’s curse. She is the one who was blamed for all the trouble that our main characters came across. Readers tend to put down Pearl’s role in the novel. Actually, as contradicting as it may sound, I was one of those readers. However, now I believe that she deserves more credit than she gets. Though her imagination and her determination offer both as a gift and a curse …show more content…

Hester Prynne now starts to live a non-social life and works from home by illustrating her broidery talent into works and clothing that she can sell. Her life suddenly turns to be lonely and almost completely miserable. Nevertheless, that all begins to change with the birth of her daughter. Hester’s gem is in the body of the tiny, little infant: “But she named the daughter ‘Pearl’, as being of great price—purchased with all she had—her mother’s only treasure!” (Hawthorne 41). The sad woman, Hester, commences to watch her delightful child grow each day; and each day she grows more beautiful, more intelligent than the last (Hawthorne 41). However, as we begin to see more of Pearl, it is obvious that the little gem has inherited all of Hester’s main characteristics: her moodiness, her passion, her defiance, and her constant mischief. Although Hesther sees Pearl as the best thing that has ever happened to her, she begins to worry about the little girl. This sparks the everlasting conflict between Pearl and the Puritan …show more content…

Pearl uses her mischievousness and utter curiosity to gain clues, or to depict other characters. Without Pearl’s opinion, Arthur Dimmesdale probably would not have agreed to confess his sin along with Hester. Pearl is never, throughout the entire novel, afraid to “spit it out”. Her mother constantly tries to shush her little girl due to her becoming embarrassed by her daughter’s random outbursts. Using her “fiendish” techniques, Pearl realizes the identity of her father fairly early in The Scarlet Letter which utilizes Dimmesdale to hear from Pearl to “take her and her mother’s hand” (Hawthorne 139,

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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.

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She is the result of the sin that was committed by Hester and Dimmesdale. Throughout the story Pearl asks difficult questions to her mother. She also has a slight obsession with her mothers embroidered A on her clothes. Pearl acts as a constant reminder that she can never escape her sin as someone who has committed adultery. However, Hester loves her daughter so much.

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In the Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Pearl starts of as a secondary character as the novel progresses Pearl becomes significant to many of the key events of the story. Some examples of this are the scene in the scaffold at night, when Hester meets Dimmsdale in the woods, and when she makes the connection about the letter in her mother's bosom and the reason why the minister holds his hand on his chest. Pearl is a very intuitive, smart, wild and clever child; and at her young age is impressive how this child knows who to trust. She is acts as Hester's conscience as the novel progresses in many ways. Pearl is a very intuitive character making her more interesting.

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Pearl of Great Price Pearl, a precious and valuable object that ironically starts off from an object of no value; a parasite or simply a grain of sand that invades the oyster. The allusion to The Pearl of Great Price in The Scarlet Letter means that Pearl is of high value, Hester is seeking a holy life, and due to Pearl, Hester can achieve that. From the commencement of The Scarlet Letter, readers are aware that Hester has a child, but no one knew she would become so influential to Hester and her life. Pearl was the one that saved Hester. By simply existing Pearl was the enticement of sympathy from the spiteful Magistrates.

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While reading The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, it is obvious that he uses a lot of symbolism throughout his writing to give the readers a deeper understanding of the Puritans and their views in these times. In this book, the community forces Hester Prynne to wear a scarlet letter on her chest to show her abashment for committing adultery and having a child, Pearl. However, Pearl is actually used as a symbol throughout this book to represent the physical embodiment of Hester’s sin, the repercussions of her breaking the law, and an unworldly being in the usual strict Puritan society. In the beginning of the book, Hawthorne uses Pearl as a way to constantly remind Hester of her sin and as a link between the secret relationship of Hester

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In addition to that, her inner turmoil further leads her to doubt her own reliability of keeping Pearl and she begins to consider committing suicide; she fears that if the child would rather be better off without her. “The scarlet letter had not done its office” (Hawthorne, 182). Towards the end, Hawthorne develops a tone of irony as he describes the affect the scarlet letter had on her. Instead of severely punishing and humiliating her, the scarlet letter did the opposite of its intended

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Rossi1 Matthew Rossi Asha Appel English 4 11/15/14 Growing up Through the Actions of Others In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne Pearl changes when different characters thoughts and believes are portrayed through voice or objects. This leads her to be very malleable to and be ever evolving. The townspeople, Hester, and Dimmesdale now play a key role in shaping Pearl from a product of sin into a god like child.

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This child is not meant to be a realistic character but rather a symbol of Hester’s sin, blessing and scarlet letter. Pearl is the scarlet letter, a blessing and curse, and the love and passion of a dangerous relationship. More than a child Pearl is a symbol of the love and passion between Hester and the minister. Pearl is a symbol that connect her parents forever even if they couldn’t be together. The narrator says, “God, as a direct consequence of the sin which man thus punished, had given her a lovely child, whose place was on that same dishonoured bosom, to connect her parent forever with the race and descent of mortals, and to be finally a blessed soul in heaven!”(86)

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She cannot be defined by just one label, but both. She is a mother to Pearl, who is a child born from adultery. She is a caregiver, seamstress, a lover, and a counselor, but the Puritanical society Hester lives in constantly reminds her that she is just a whore. By subscribing to this label, Hester loses her identity in a way. The effect of being an outsider due to the letter causes her to become a shell of her former self.

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The society sees Hester as corrupt, but does not call Pearl the same. Pearl’s name even represents purity, something she definitely was not born of. However, Pearl is able to grow up as normal as possible, though not a lot is said about her life and she does act a bit

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Both Dimmesdale and Hester commited the same sin of adultery, resulting in Pearl. However, because Hester confessed the sin early on, she had the rest of her life to try and change the purpose of her scarlet A to mean something more than just sin. Which she succeeds in, the people refused to interpret the scarlet letter for sin and instead for “Able.” Soon after, the people had almost forgotten what the original meaning of the scarlet letter was. On the contrary Dimmesdale doesn’t confess his sin and lives a terrible life of self-harming and guilt.

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This effects her every day life going out in public and getting ridiculed by all the towns people she is surrounded by. Hester Prynne doesn’t just have to live with a mistake right on her shirt, but people also help her remember past. She does have her daughter or her “sole treasure.” The young girls name is pearl and she is not exactly like the others. It isn't easy because her and her mother are considered different in the community so she is lonely but very

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In The Scarlet Letter is merely a symbol in the story, her function is to remind Hester of her sin which affects her role in the story to become more antagonistic to Hester. Pearl is a character, yes, but in the novel, she is mostly a symbol. The way Hawthorne writes her, she is not like a regular person, and she 's not

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