Born and raised in Massachusetts, author Nathaniel Hawthorne formulates The Scarlet Letter through the comfort and familiarity of his childhood home. Set in the Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony in the seventeenth-century, Hawthorne unravels the themes of corruption and sin in humanity through the character of Hester Prynne, otherwise known as the town adulterer. After conceiving her daughter, Pearl, through a forbidden affair, society alienates Hester as she brawls to conquer her self-condemnation and dignity. In a period where public discipline was almost unanimously accepted in order to correct undesirable behavior, the Puritans stress the importance of the moral code in their close-knit society. Although Hawthorne effectively utilizes the
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The Puritan doctrine of the newfound colonies emphasizes original sin, the belief that in God’s perspective all humans are pre-programmed to misbehave as a direct result of Adam’s offense in the Garden of Eve. Even though the Puritans anticipate an “Utopia of human virtue and happiness,” they realize the natural flaws in humanity and therefore, build a prison and cemetery (41). The founders perceive that savagery and death remain unavoidable. Moreover, Puritans also practice predestination, or the theory that unearthly forces predicate one’s fate. The town minister Arthur Dimmesdale, who also participated in the adultery, views himself as “irrevocably doomed” (157). By intertwining with Hester in a barbaric act, yet escaping public recognition, he accepts a sorrowful lifestyle without forceful resistance and sinks into a funnel of gloom, which leaves physical and emotional scars, such as the pain in Dimmesdale’s chest. Without the limitations of a set path, Hester implements her own free will and resists inferiority. While walking to the scaffold, Hester “stood fully revealed before the crowd,” not once shedding a tear or lowering her face in shame (45). Prior to reading The Scarlet Letter, the audience must comprehend the Puritan’s
The Puritan doctrine of the newfound colonies emphasizes original sin, the belief that in God’s perspective all humans are pre-programmed to misbehave as a direct result of Adam’s offense in the Garden of Eve. Even though the Puritans anticipate an “Utopia of human virtue and happiness,” they realize the natural flaws in humanity and therefore, build a prison and cemetery (41). The founders perceive that savagery and death remain unavoidable. Moreover, Puritans also practice predestination, or the theory that unearthly forces predicate one’s fate. The town minister Arthur Dimmesdale, who also participated in the adultery, views himself as “irrevocably doomed” (157). By intertwining with Hester in a barbaric act, yet escaping public recognition, he accepts a sorrowful lifestyle without forceful resistance and sinks into a funnel of gloom, which leaves physical and emotional scars, such as the pain in Dimmesdale’s chest. Without the limitations of a set path, Hester implements her own free will and resists inferiority. While walking to the scaffold, Hester “stood fully revealed before the crowd,” not once shedding a tear or lowering her face in shame (45). Prior to reading The Scarlet Letter, the audience must comprehend the Puritan’s