Scarlet Letter Relationship Between Men And Women

There has been a dynamic relationship between men and women throughout history. In the traditional patriarchal societies, women have been disproportionately prejudiced and discriminated against more than men. Albeit with some similarities, men-women relationships have been depicted differently in Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter and Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans. The different portrayals of such relationships in the two texts reflect the different settings and time periods in which the texts represent. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter is a narrative regarding an adulterous woman, Hester Prynne who is obliged to put on a scarlet cloth shaped like letter “A” while her husband, Roger Chillingworth is seeking vengeance against the Prynne’s lover. However, Prynne’s adulterous lover, Arthur Dimmesdale remains largely anonymous although tormented by guilt. The letter “A” symbolizes adultery as …show more content…
In The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne underscores the Puritan’s strengths and weaknesses regarding the way they treated women. The troubling relationship between the males and females is underscored by Hester’s argument that: “In Heaven’s own time, a new truth would be revealed, in order to establish the whole relation between man and woman on a surer ground on surer ground of mutual happiness” (Hawthorne, 188). One can construe this statement as implying two important things. On the surface, the statement reflects Hester’s consolation to women who have been prejudiced and wronged by the oppressive Puritan rule. It is noteworthy that women of the time were oppressed on grounds that they have committed sins including adultery. The other implication of the argument is that the relationship between men and women is not based on mutual happiness. In other words, the Puritan oppressive rule oppresses women disproportionately more than