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Introduction
Just like Hester Prynne, Arthurs individuality is based on the outward incidences than on his intrinsic personality. A scholar of the famous Oxford University is how Arthur is portrayed to the reader. Lack of natural compassion for regular men and women is how Arthurs past reflects him especially with his aloofness despite having extraordinary conscience. Arthurs mental anguish as well as bodily failing compels him to have compassion for others as a result of all the guilt being heaped on Hester for their collective transgression which stirs up his ethics.
His parishioners benefit from his meaningful religious leadership as a result of his inner turmoil with Hester emotionally which makes him an eloquent and influential speaker.
Paradoxically, Arthurs assertions of sinfulness are not believed by the townspeople do not. Given his background and his liking for metaphoric speech, Arthurs congregation in general interprets his sermons metaphorically rather than as expressions of any personal guiltiness. As a result, this worsens his spiritual as well as physical condition that drives him to further internalize his guiltiness and self-punishment as well. The towns adoration of Arthur reaches new status after his Election Day sermon that happened to be his last. In his demise, Arthur becomes even more of an icon than he was when he was alive. While others believe Arthurs fate was a case of divine judgment, many consider his affirmation as an emblematic act
Main Body
A surveyor then at the customhouse in Salem, Massachusetts, the narrator starts with a long preamble about how the Scarlet Letter came to be written. In the customhouses attic, the narrator comes across a number of documents, among them a scarlet, gold-embroidered patch of cloth in the shape of an A bundled manuscript. This manuscript contained events that had happened two hundred years ago covered by a past surveyor. After the narrator lost his customs post after a political change, the scarlet letter is the imaginary description of the events contained in the manuscript.
The story begins in the seventeenth-century Boston, and then a Puritan settlement, Hester Prynne, a young woman, is led from the town prison reprimanded for adultery carrying an infant daughter Pearl in her arms and the scarlet letter A on her breast. (Hawthorne, 1950)
Hesters husband, a researcher and much more grown-up send his spouse in advance to Boston. After Hesters husband doesnt show up in Boston even after a long wait, lost at sea becomes the wide-ranging agreement from everyone. Hester gives birth to a child after having an affair while waiting for the arrival of the husband and conceals the identity of the childs father. On the way to the town scaffold, Hester declines to name the childs father despite being scolded by the towns fathers. The scarlet letter as well as public shaming is the penalty for infidelity, a man in the crowd elucidates to an elderly onlooker in the crowd. It turns out, Hesters missing husband is the elderly person who was in the crowd, practicing medicine and going by the name Roger Chillingworth who settles in Boston keen on revenge. (Hawthorne, 1950)
As Pearl grows into a headstrong, playful child, Hester supports herself working as a seamstress. Roger Chillingworth discloses his correct identity to Hester though sworn to secrecy. Hester and her daughter find a small hut on the periphery of Boston they call home since the rest of the society rejects them. The community officials effort to take away Pearl from her mother is thwarted when Hester manages to get help from Arthur, then a young and eloquent minister. Dimmesdale appears to be wasting away, going through what appears to be a mysterious heart ailment caused by emotional distress.
To grant round-the-clock medical care, Chillingworth ultimately attaches himself to the ailing minister by moving in with him. To make out what could be ailing the minister, Chillingworth thinks there is a relation between Hesters secret and the ministers anguish and decides to test him. It did not take long before Chillingworths suspicion was confirmed when a mark on the ministers breast was exposed while asleep one afternoon. Chillingworth formulated new tortures that intensified Dimmesdales mental agony whereas charitable deeds as well as quiet humbleness gave Hester a reprieve from the communitys ridicule. (Hawthorne, 1950)
After a visiting someones deathbed one night, Hester and her seven years old daughter on their way home found Dimmesdale inflicting torture on himself for his transgressions atop the town gallows. A meteor marks a dull red A in the night sky as Hester and Pearl join him and the trio links hands. Acknowledge me publicly tomorrow Pearl requests but Dimmesdale refuses. On seeing the ministers situation getting poorer, Hester decides to intercede. Even after Hesters appeal, Chillingworth refuses to bring to an end the ministers self-torment. (Hawthorne, 1950)
Aware that Chillingworth might guess her next move of exposing the truth to Dimmesdale, Hester plans to meet Dimmesdale in the forest to hatch a plan of taking a ship from Boston in four days time and flee so that the three can live as a family in Europe. Both feel a sense of liberation as Hester removes her scarlet letter and lets her hair down. Playing nearby, Pearl couldnt recognize her mother without the scarlet letter.
A day before the ship is set to sail, Dimmesdale delivers the most articulate sermon ever as the townspeople congregate for a holiday. Hester realizes Chillingworth has booked passage on the same ship too, aware of their plan to flee. After leaving church, with Hester and Pearl, Dimmesdale spontaneously gets on the scaffold and confesses publicly exposing a scarlet letter seared into the flesh of his chest. As Pearl kisses him in appreciation, Dimmesdale falls dead. (Hawthorne, 1950)
Discouraged in his revenge, Chillingworth dies a year later. After they go away to Boston, no one knows what happens to Hester and Pearl. After several years Hester returns alone still wearing the scarlet letter. She resumes her charity work residing in the same old cottage she once lived. Hester occasionally receives letters from her daughter rumored to have married a European aristocrat and having a family of her own. All of Chillingworths money is inherited by Pearl despite knowing she was not the daughter Hesters tragic indiscretion is finally forgiven by all the women. This act eventually brings a sense of liberation to the townspeople and Hester at large. Beside which Kings Chapel has since been built, a new grave near an old and sunken one was built with a space in between quite evident, as if the dust has no right to mingle just like the two sleepers had. Yet both were served by one tombstone. Decorated with a letter A , Hester and Dimmesdale shared the same tombstone after Hester died. (Hawthorne, 1950)
In Judeo- Christian tradition, sin and knowledge are linked. After eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden of Eden. After being expelled from the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve are made aware of their insubordination as a result of their comprehension that separates them from the divine and from other creatures by being forced to toil and to procreate. These are the two labors that characterize the human condition after being expelled from the Garden of Eden.
Hester and Dimmesdale experienced the story of Adam and Eve because, in both cases, expulsion and suffering occur after sinning. Apart from that, it offers understanding of what it means to be human. For Hester, the scarlet letter functions as her passport into regions where other women dared not tread, more fearlessly than anyone else in New England, the scarlet letter led Hester to contemplate about that particular society at that time. (Hawthorne, 1950)
This sin offers, Sympathies so intimate with the sinful brotherhood of mankind, so that his chest vibrates in unison with theirs. As far as the cheating minister Dimmesdale is concerned. The ministers articulate and influential sermons emanate from his sense of empathy. The account of the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale is in line with the oldest and most fully certified principles in Christian thought. The minister ends in dishonesty after beginning in transparency. Believable at every point of the sacred pilgrimage to be saved, the fine point is that the minister betrayed himself. (Hawthorne, 1950)
Its attractiveness, a remarkable disparity to all its environs is the rosebush, as the later the magnificently larger-than-life scarlet A, in part as an enticement, will be held out to discover some sweet honorable blossom in the consequent, heartbreaking account and in part as an illustration that the bottomless spirit of nature (perhaps God) may look more compassionately on the sinful Hester and the Daughter Pearl (the roses among the weeds) than the Puritan neighbors do. The natural world images disparity with the severe gloom of the Puritans and the systems throughout the work is something worth pondering about. (Hawthorne, 1950)
Parallel to the way Dimmesdales illness discloses his inner commotion, Chillingworths twisted body replicates the wickedness inside the soul. The state of the heart echoes the noticeable man. The primary purpose of Pearl within the novel is a representation nonetheless of a complex character. The personification of the scarlet letter is Pearl rightly clad in a stunning dress of scarlet, embroidered with gold thread, just like the scarlet upon Hester bosom (Hawthorne, 1950)
It is important not to conflate the two writers despite the narrator having a lot in common with Nathaniel Hawthorne. The two writers worked as customs officers, had Puritan ancestors and lost their jobs due to o political changes. The narrator is carefully created to boost the book aesthetically as well as philosophically. In very momentous ways, Hawthorne sets up the narrator to parallel Hester Prynne. The narrator, just like Hester, is encircled by people from whom there is always a sense of hostility. Different from the career customs officers, the narrator is reasonably young with a lot of vivacities. One of the explanations that could have prompted Hester to wrongdoing and ultimate estrangement ultimately is attributed to the fact that Hester had a youthful enthusiasm for life. The narrator seeks out the few who will understand him, just like Hester.
The account of the scarlet letter as well as the narrators own tale is addressed to this select group. Someday the narrator will be reduced to a name on a custom stamp just as Hester was condensed to a stack of old papers and a scrap of cloth is the link the narrator finds between himself and Hester. The reader is able to universalize Hesters story and to see its relevance to another society through the narrators identification with Hester. (Hawthorne, 1950)
The narrator has difficulty writing Hesters tale despite the commitment to it. The narrator is not able to write until any real career responsibilities are shelved. Furthermore the narrator feels the Puritan ancestors would find it perky. Also, relating to events that took place two hundred years ago will no doubt have a very small audience. To write in such a way as to make the story accessible to all types of people especially to those no longer young at heart is no easy task from the experience the narrator got spending time in company of other customhouse men. Telling Hesters story in a way that makes it both significant well as psychologically emotive to all readers is the narrators challenge that needs to be conquered. Putting an end to the real world of work as well as small-mindedness and give up on the romance atmosphere of the story is the final step of preparation for the narrator to start writing. (Hawthorne, 1950)
Conclusion
Different from the narrators Puritan ancestors allegations, the narrator finds writing both beneficial and sensible. A well-argued discussion on American history and culture is provided by producing exceptionally good American writers. Hawthorne wrote at a time when America wanted to differentiate itself from centuries of European practice by encouraging loyalty through the enlargement of the worlds sense of Americas comparatively short history. To write an exciting story, the narrator, just like Hawthorne, had to balance the need to institute a weighty past with the equally undeniable want to write a story. Just as the eagle above the customhouse door offers both protection and appears geared up to attack, Americanness remains both a guarantee and a danger. The authenticity of American history and culture is enhanced by the account of the scarlet letter; however, American culture can only embrace its own in the world by surpassing its Americanness and institute a common appeal. First recounted through John Pue and then through the narrator, Hesters story is twice refined. The person who reads it gets a better judgment of its seclusion from the present-day life, historic traits as well as a feeling of the past with a record through the consciousness of the storys various phases of action. (Hawthorne, 1950)
Reference
Hawthorne, N. (1950). The Scarlet Letter. Boston: Hayes Barton Press.
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