Dudley–Winthrop family

The past of America is portrayed in both The Devil in the Shape of a Woman by Carol F. Karlsen and The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, giving us a better perspective into our past. Puritan New England sets the stage for the two novels because the society is what shapes the characters and the events of both novels. Both novels show relations with Puritan society, sin, and women 's sexuality. However, the portrayal of the different sides of Puritan America and the focus of the novels are…

The Scarlet Letter tells the tale of a woman named Hester Prynne, who has an illegitimate child, Pearl, with one of Boston’s well-known ministers, Arthur Dimmesdale. Set in Puritan New England in the 1700s, the environment encircles the Puritan beliefs as well as the Puritan government. Caught by the town when her pregnancy starts to show, Hester is sentenced to prison time and public humiliation for her adultery. As she raises Pearl she encounters her eccentric behavior and wild actions in…

The justification behind the concept of punishment takes many different forms. In Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, the primary rationale behind the Puritans’ punishment of Hester Prynne, the accused adulteress, is retributive, in proportional to the nature of the transgression. The Puritans intend their punishment of ostracism and forced visibility of the letter “A” to match Hester’s crime of adultery by shaming her with a sense of damnation. However, ironically this punishment brings an…

Nonconformity in The Scarlet Letter In the Romantic period, philosophers, artists, and authors emphasized the idea of individualism. They thought that it was better for a person to be unique as opposed to being a conformist to society. Romanticists also encouraged the support of new ideas as opposed to traditional ideas. The author of The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne, was a Romantic author, and he used these Romantic ideals in his works. In The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne uses Hester and…

1630, Puritan layman and leader John Winthrop delivered a sermon to the Puritan people on board the ship Arbella while en route to the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Unbeknownst to him or those in attenedence, his sermon would go down in history and serve as a defining literary example of American colonization. The main purpose of his speech can be linked to preparing the puritans on how to develop a new society in a dangerous environment. During the sermon, Winthrop reminded the colony of its…

In The Scarlet Letter Nathaniel Hawthorne helps the reader understand the actions of the Townspeople through giving an understanding of the time period and the setting. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s piece The Scarlet Letter narrates a story that is based in the New England Colonies during the mid-17th century. During this time the puritans were running from religious prosecution and came to the New World to further reform The Church of England. The Town is a setting in The Scarlet Letter…

During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, a group of people named the Puritans sought to flee from the country of England in an effort to escape the Anglican church to find religious freedom. The Puritans sought to purify the church and remove some factors, such as corruption. After first attempting to settle in Holland, they immigrated to the New World where they began to live in communities that allowed them to be within close proximity to each other. Inside of these tightly knit…

In “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the difficult time many people went through is seen. It is mostly seen how women did not have as many choices as men did, it shows how women were judged and watched for every little thing that they did. Their actions spoke louder than their words, because no one was willing to hear what they had to say, they were just willing to see the outcome. The beliefs that society had, compared to the ones that society has today were very different yet in a…

Guilt is a menacing monster that lurks in the conscience of one’s mind. It can remain in one’s conscience whether or not the person chooses to be aware of it. If one does not acknowledge their guilt, then the guilt will continue to linger and grow. Thus, when left alone too long, that monster can evolve and completely consume the person’s mind, eating them alive. One novel that most notably explains the consequences of a guilty conscience is Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. Hawthorne’s…

Hester’s life acts as a guide on her path to normality and happiness by acting as the positive, natural side of the scarlet letter in her life. Adversely, Dimmesdale has not yet lost much through his sin and neglects to see the importance of valuing family. When Dimmesdale stands on the scaffold during his vigil, Pearl questions if he will stand beside Hester and her the following day at noon. *simple* Dimmesdale replies, "Not so, my child. I shall, indeed, stand with thy mother and thee one…