Allegory And Symbolism In Hawthorne's Young Goodman Brown

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Whenever people look at any object, whether it is concrete or not, they will judge it by its appearance. C.S. Lewis once said, “Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.” Lewis is saying that people’s perspective will change if they will just look in a different direction. In Flannery O’Connor’s “Revelation” and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown”, the characters saw their peers like they wanted to. The characters wanted to make themselves feel better, so they judged others. They continuously ignored the signs of their own imperfections which, in the end, caused a new outlook on their lives. Mrs. Turpin and Goodman Brown met people who interfered with how they view themselves as well. Their peers change their …show more content…
Hawthorne presents Goodman’s wife, Faith, as the first allegory in the story. She is an allegory of his faith and love that fills his heart. “My love and my Faith…of all nights in the year, this one night must I tarry away from thee. My journey, as thou callest, forth and back again, must be done ‘twixt now and sunrise” (Hawthorne 245). Goodman had so much love for both his faith and his wife that he had to make the journey that his ancestors had taken. He will meet several people that will alter how he sees how he views himself and his peers. The forest he enters symbolizes darkness or evil. This is where he finds out the ones he trusts are nothing but evil. “But irreverently consorting with these grave, reputable, and pious people, these elders of the church, the chaste and dewy virgins, there were men of dissolute lives and women of spotted fame, wretches given over to all mean and filthy vice, and suspected even of horrid crimes” (Hawthorne 253). All of these people were there to participate in witchcraft. Goodman thought all of this people were so full of faith and trustworthy, but his perspective was inaccurate. This made him believe he was evil as well. While he was busy looking at everyone else, he then realized his own identity was changing. He too was becoming

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