Hester Prynne In The Scarlett Letter

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The Puritan community did not take wrong actions lightly, and they seriously frowned upon sins such as witchcraft, adultery, and dishonesty. People who committed these actions received severe consequences and humiliation. In The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne committed adultery against her husband, Roger Chillingworth, with a man named Arthur Dimmesdale. Hester acquired not only a large scarlet letter A on her chest, but also a daughter named Pearl. Even though Hester wore a beautifully embroidered A, she still received disdain from the society. However, the view of Hester changed after she completed various benevolent acts. After Hester stood upon the scaffold, the society looked down on her. But, after she cut herself off from society and …show more content…
The townspeople began to accept Hester instead of shunning her like they had done before. She realized that she had to be better than she had been before, and was more active in the community. Many people did not interpret the A on Hester's chest by it's “... original signification. They said that it meant able” (111). The meaning of the scarlet letter drastically shifted from detrimental to positive. Hester became more compassionate and generous, which can be seen through her charitable actions. The magnificently embroidered A on Hester's chest was now a symbol of “.. [her] position in respect to society... on the mind of Hester Prynne herself, was powerful and peculiar” (112). Hester helped other people in their society, and therefore they viewed her in a more compelling way than before. A comparable shift happened for Pearl, who the community now saw as an actual human being rather than the Devil. As time passed, the society’s view of Hester changed, along with their view of the scarlet letter. Because she gave up her time and carried out benevolent acts, it is fully clear that the community took Hester's sin exceedingly seriously, but also considered how the person acts when treating

Hester Prynne In The Scarlett Letter By Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Scarlet Letter is a 19th century novel about 17th century Puritans written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. In this novel, Hawthorne follows the life of Hester Prynne, an adulteress forced to live the rest of her life with a scarlet A engraved on her clothes. For almost seven years after being publicly shamed, she resides in a cottage outside the skirts of the town as a single mother with her illegitimate child, Pearl. She does not breathe a word of the father’s name to anyone, even when her husband,…

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society believes in. Throughout The Scarlett Letter, Arthur Dimmesdale portrays an ambiguous character who shows two different sides of his life. Arthur Dimmesdale is an intelligent man who is rather pale, skinny, and very delicate looking man. With large eyes and a skinny frame, the reverend man’s his job every day to satisfy the beliefs of society. In this time period, many were very strict in their religious beliefs and had no sympathy for those who sin. Hester Prynne is a women waiting for her husband…

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