What Does The Golden Chain Mean In The Scarlet Letter

In the novel, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne has many symbols. Two of the symbols being the golden chain and the Black Man. The golden chain can be interpreted to symbolize a sign of slave trade, love, or a religious image. The Black Man, also known as the Devil, can be related to sin. Towards the end of the novel, Pearl, Hester Prynne, and Arthur Dimmesdale were taking a trip to the Old World. On the ship the shipmaster wanted to lay hands on Pearl but was not able to kiss her. The shipmaster “took from his hat the gold chain that was twisted about it, and threw it to the child. Pearl immediately twined it around her neck and waist with such happy skill that, once seen there, it became a part of her, and it was difficult to imagine her without it” (Hawthorne 329). The golden chain is not talked …show more content…
“To some extent, the language suggests the theme of control. Uncatchable as she is, Pearl instead incorporates a portion of her pursuer into herself,” (Manheim 117). Pearl, when she meets the shipmaster, is at a point in her life where she is very curious. Pearl wanted anything she could find whether that be “man or thing” (Hawthorne 329). One critic took notice to the gold chain, how it made Pearl so happy, and she says this about Hawthorne’s novel: “explicates his art’s dependence on a material economy tied to slavery, and reveals the romancer’s role in mystifying that relation” (Goddu 65). Most people would not automatically think of the golden chain as being a sign of slave trade. In, The Golden Chain, Gwendolyn Overton says the golden chain is a symbol of love. The 1852, Oasis, has a poem about “Friendship, Love, and Truth”. It describes Love as “a tie, a golden chain, / That binds with stronger hand / Than iron shackles of the cell, / or all the arts of man” (Oasis 48). That being said, in