Hawthorne effect

We first realize the grave’s close proximity as Hawthorne writes about Dimmesdale with “His elbow on the sill of the open window, that looked towards the graveyard” while talking to Roger. At the time, Roger had been gathering “dark” herbs he found in the graveyard. He found them on someone's grave and claimed they represented “some hideous secret that was buried with him, and which he had done better to confess during his lifetime”(page). Hawthorne used foreboding diction here to quickly…

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne presents three important scaffold scenes that help determine the genre of the novel. The genre could be classified as a romantic tragedy and historical fiction, which is Romanticism for this novel. Even though the story is more of a tragedy, the romantic elements are littered throughout the story, which is why some people consider the novel a romance. The romantic genre could mean two different types of romance, a love story, or Romanticism, a movement…

Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter portrays the ramifications of a forbidden romance: a romance built around the complications of marriage, sin, and societal positions. As remarked on by Hawthorne, these ramifications solidify each character in the novel as victims to their own frailties, resulting in immeasurable sorrow for everyone. As a result of Hester Prynne's actions and his own, Roger Chillingworth succumbs to a state of desolation where he experiences emasculation and a loss of…

In the novel The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the theme of sin and hypocrisy which is used throughout the characters of Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale to show the biggest flaw that everyone carries, sin. Sin is an unavoidable, immoral action that every individual cannot deny and in this novel specifically; judgment is the main sin that takes place within the town and is directed towards Hester. Although the sin committed that the townspeople noticed and shamed Hester for was…

Nathaniel Hawthorne was an eighteenth-century writer that lived in Salem, Oregon. He was a descendant of the judge, John Hathorne, of the Salem Witch Trials. These trials are said to have inspired his writing; in most of his books, there is a ruler that cruelly oppresses people. This is a depiction of John Hathorne and Nathaniel’s other ancestors, whom he outrightly denounces (Brooks). Many of Hawthorne’s works are based upon “the guilt that [he] felt over the actions of his ancestors” (Fider).…

The Scarlet Letter is a very well known book written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. In The Scarlet Letter two of the main characters, Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale become victims of punishment. They both suffer the punishment imposed upon them by others as well as self-imposed punishment. Hester Prynne is the victim of both types of punishment given to her by her community and the punishment she imposes on herself. After Hester is discovered to have committed the act of adultery, she is…

Romanticism describes an 18th century genre of writing. Hawthorne embodies the Romantic writer through his interest in the supernatural. Nathaniel Hawthorne's “Young Goodman Brown” depicts Romantic characteristics of writing through the topics of distrust of civilization, emphasis on the individual, and concern for hidden truth. Hawthorne emphasizes Romantic characteristics through Brown’s distrust of the surrounding civilization. Brown escapes civilization by fleeing into the woods. After Brown…

Dark Romanticism in American Literature: Hawthorne and Poe During the Romantic period of the American Renaissance, several authors found success writing dark romance, or Gothic fiction. Dark romanticism can best be described as a form of literature using symbols and terrifying themes to discuss man’s moral weakness. Characters in dark romances struggle against the forces of good and evil, usually with evil winning. Literature explores the concept of evilness, blurring the lines between reality…

The Power of “A” The novel The Scarlet Letter was written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Hawthorne wrote the novel in 1850, making it a part of the Romanticism era that lasted from 1750 to 1870. The Romanticism era was a literary movement that focused on the liberation from rules, relationships between humans and nature, and the use of imaginary worlds and beings. The novel became an instant best-seller and was the start of Hawthorne’s most productive period. Although it was very popular, several…

In his historical novel, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne depicts the immense struggles and sorrows of a young woman, Hester Prynne, during her life as a social exile from 17th century Boston’s rigid Puritanical theocracy. Despite the perpetual discrimination that Hester’s receives from the Puritans as a result of her adulterous sins, Hawthorne seemingly sympathizes with Hester throughout the course of the story by intentionally elucidating a number of hypocrisies and shortcomings that…