Darkness Symbolism In Young Goodman Brown

There are times where we enter a metaphorical rabbit’s hole, where we leave the surface of what is around us, and enter the abyss wandering through the depths and mazes of our beings into the darkness of the world before us. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Young Goodman Brown, a young man sets out away from his faith into the paths of the forest where darkness lies: Young Goodman Brown came forth at sunset into the street of Salem village; but his head turned back, after crossing the threshold, to exchange a parting kiss with his young wife… “Dearest heart,” whispered she, softly and rather sadly, when her lips, were close to his ear, “pr’ithee put off your journey until sunrise and sleep in your bed tonight”… “My love and my Faith,” replied young Goodman Brown, “of all nights in the year, this one night must I tarry away from thee” (1). Goodman Brown symbolizes innocence and youth, his journey into the …show more content…
It is not until the voice of one young woman that he begins to have permanent doubt in the light around him: “There was one voice, of a young woman, uttering lamentations, yet with an uncertain sorrow, and entreating for some favor, which, perhaps, it would grieve her to obtain; and all the unseen multitude, both saints and sinners, seemed to encourage her onward” (7). Everything comes to a moment where the forces of good and evil become aligned in their task as the young woman moves forward to her destiny that will make her whole and diminishes a part of the innocence she holds within. This frightens Goodman Brown as he fears that not only he but is wife which represents light and goodness within himself will become distorted and clouded in a murkiness that cannot be