I am a Cage, in Search of a Bird Franz Kafka, an Austrian-Hungarian Gothic writer, alleged that “I write differently from what I speak, I speak differently from what I think, I think differently from the way I ought to think, and so it all proceeds into deepest darkness.” Nathaniel Hawthorne conveys this in his novel The Scarlet Letter, where Hester Prynne, a newcomer to the Puritan colony of Boston, commits the crime of adultery with the town priest Arthur Dimmesdale. As punishment, she must wear a scarlet A. Dimmesdale, her lover, hides his involvement, leading to his guilt consuming him. Furthermore, Hester 's presumably dead husband, Chillingworth, appears to plot revenge against Hester 's lover, eventually living with Dimmesdale as his
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By living on the border of Puritan society and nature, Hester shows she can not live within the constraints of Puritan society. She lives on the border and not in the forest, an “unredeemed, unchristianised, lawless” area, and Hester continues holding on to Dimmesdale and her role in society as “a living sermon against sin” (302, 95). By living on the border, between sin and morality, Hester 's desire to abandon her sin for a new beginning grows and her chains of longing for her fellow adulterer prevent her from making the jump. This forces Hester to instead face her sin and accept it as part of herself. In doing so, Hester developed a sense of goodness that only arises from soaking one 's self in sin, so as to know the perspective of both sinners and 'do-gooders. ' Showing this, Hester overcame her passion for Dimmesdale, who isolated himself and allowed his guilt to fester, and gave him advice as “[his] better angel,” even though Hester herself bears the mark of sin on her chest, as Hester lays on the line between sin and morality, rather than falling into one spectrum or the other (303). Hester 's house, on the border of Puritanism and freedom, allows escape from the everyday Puritan facades of the characters. By changing and exposing their sin, they develop morality to counteract their sinful nature, as the
By living on the border of Puritan society and nature, Hester shows she can not live within the constraints of Puritan society. She lives on the border and not in the forest, an “unredeemed, unchristianised, lawless” area, and Hester continues holding on to Dimmesdale and her role in society as “a living sermon against sin” (302, 95). By living on the border, between sin and morality, Hester 's desire to abandon her sin for a new beginning grows and her chains of longing for her fellow adulterer prevent her from making the jump. This forces Hester to instead face her sin and accept it as part of herself. In doing so, Hester developed a sense of goodness that only arises from soaking one 's self in sin, so as to know the perspective of both sinners and 'do-gooders. ' Showing this, Hester overcame her passion for Dimmesdale, who isolated himself and allowed his guilt to fester, and gave him advice as “[his] better angel,” even though Hester herself bears the mark of sin on her chest, as Hester lays on the line between sin and morality, rather than falling into one spectrum or the other (303). Hester 's house, on the border of Puritanism and freedom, allows escape from the everyday Puritan facades of the characters. By changing and exposing their sin, they develop morality to counteract their sinful nature, as the