Hawthorne's Secrete sin in The Scarlet Letter paper no 10

   

 Name : Gohil Hetalba   

       Std      :  M.A. – ii Sem – iii

       Roll no :  08

       Sub : paper no ( 10 ) American Literature

       Topic  : Hawthorne’s Secrete Sin in The Scarlet

                                                          Letter

       Submitted to :  Dept. Of English

                                 Maharaja Krishna Kumarsinhji Bhavnagar university.

Year : 2013 - 2014 

                                  

                                   

   

v    Introduction

                                            Nathaniel Hawthorne was born on July 4 1804. His father was captain Nathaniel Hawthorne and his mother was Elizabeth Clarke Manning Hawthorne. He married Sophia Peabody. Financial problems continued to plague his family. With the help of his friends , Hawthorne succeeded in being appointed “ Surveyor for the District of Salem and Beverly and inspector of the Revenue for the port of Salem.” He could take time for writing now. His experiences during this time, however, provided some of the material which he later used in the “ Custom House” section of ‘ The Scarlet Letter’.

                The victory of the Whigs in the 1848 presidential election cost Hawthorne his position. It was financial shock to the family, but the loss of the position at the custom house provided the time necessary for him to write ‘ The Scarlet Letter’. The Scarlet Letter was finished after very hard work but unfortunately the book was pirated by two London publisher. It was sold well but the author could not get reward. His health started decorating . His life was mixed with pleasure and frustration. Hawthorne died in his sleep on May 19,1864.

[ Note : He added ‘W’ to his family name later on ]

v Hawthorne and The Scarlet Letter

Most modern critics consider. The Scarlet Letter is his master piece. Evidence of the continued popularity of this work, even among people not usually concerned with literary work, appeared in two 1984 issues of the New England Journal of Medicine. Hawthorne’s work had proof in medical science. Also he was concerned with his family history and with colonial history. Hawthorne’s ancestors are not forgotten by him. Moral is placed by Hawthorne in the final chapter of the novel where he writers. “ Be true! Be true! Show freely to the world , if not your worst yet some trait whereby the worst may be inferred.

        When Hawthorne finished ‘ The Scarlet Letter ’ , he had already written most of the works that were to make him famous. Thus many stylistic techniques and themes which are characteristic of a work by Hawthorne were already a habitual part of his style. Those elements include- 

1)   Hawthorne's theory of the romance as a literary form.

2)  Hawthorne’s use of symbolism in the novel.

3)  Hawthorne’s Style.

4)  Hawthorne’s use of historical materials and figures as part of setting.    

5)  Hawthorne’s use of ambiguity.

v Hawthorne and the Romance    Tradition

During his writing career, Hawthorne was convinced that his works were not as popular as they might be. The technique, or style, developed throughout his longer works, produced his version of what he termed “ the romance novel”. Hawthorne attempts to clarify his concept of the romance is found in the “ Custom House”. Section of “ The Scarlet Letter”. After explaining how he supposedly, by accident found a scarlet letter ‘ A ’ and “ small roll of dingy paper ” around which the scarlet letter had been twisted. Using the image of a ‘ deserted parlour lighted only by the glimmering coal fire and the moon’, Hawthorne outlines the frame of mind necessary for both writing and for reading his romance.

 “ Moon light ............. making every object so minutely visible, yet so unlike a morning or noontide visibility, - is a medium the most suited for a romance writer to get acquainted with illusive guests”. 

             The sentence above shows his concern for romance.

v   Hawthorne’s Style

              The style of ‘ The Scarlet Letter’ is clean, precise and effective. The diction is wide and well controlled. During Hawthorne time, his prose was extraordinarily precise. It was not overly ornate, as it sometimes seem to be. It is the contemporary language of his time . He frequently used images. He used fresh and effective metaphors and similes. He made skilful colours use from the red rose of opening chapter to the red, black and gray predominating the novel. The effect of colours is seen throughout the novel. Hawthorne failed to individualize the dialogue, or to make the speech consistent with the character and situation of the speaker, is a weakness which later novelist tried to avoid.

v Historical Materials and Figures

  As Hawthorne indicates in the “ Custom House” chapter of The Scarlet Letter, two of his ancestors were eminent and powerful men during the early days of Massachusetts Bay Colony. One was a magistrate who participated in the persecution of the Quakers and another was a judge in the in famous Salem witch trials. Because of this family association, Hawthorne had keen interest in the early history of Massachusetts, and form his college days on, ha read widely in that field. The Scarlet Letter doesn't fall strictly in the historical category. The author conveys some timeless and universal truths about sin and conscience and psychology than he is in relating minutely accurate information about a specific place. The time of the novel’s opening pages is about 1650 AD. Hawthorne was quite familiar with the period he wrote about. The use of Governor Bellingham and Reverend Mr. Wilson, the passing reference to Isaac Johnson’s lot, king’s Chapel, prison Lane , Anne Hutchinson, John Eliot, Increase Mather, and a handful of other historical figures. The detailed treatment of Puritan methods of punishment, as well as Hawthorne’s description of the Election Day crowed are superbly described with historical accuracy. The only felt of his is he doesn't give minute details. He doesn't say anything  about the family custom, their recreation of their educational system. The description of Governor Bellingham and some details about the Puritan’s clothing and the general facial expression of people and indication of their popular public recreations. The main four characters are somewhat isolated from the community. We can say that Hawthorne may not be a realist. He was a symbolist. The Scaffold the forest, Mistress Hibbins, Governor Bellingham the Election Sermon, the drab and Solemn town people have symbolic importance Hawthorne is able to mellow the lights, deepening and enriching the shadow of the world of The Scarlet Letter.

vHawthorne's use of Ambiguity in The Scarlet Letter :

He uses ambiguity to defuse the skeptical objection of his readers. Hawthorne remarks “ We impart it.......... solely to the disease in his own eye and heart, that the minster looking upward to the zenith beheld there the appearance of an immense letter, the letter ‘ A ’ marked out in lines of dull red light.’’

  While a telling how the forest animals befriend pearl. Hawthorne writes. ‘ A wolf , it is said , - but here the late has surely lapsed into the improbable came up and smelt of pearl’s robe and offered, his savage head to be patted by her hand.        

         In all the cases Hawthorne leaves the solution to the reader, the reader must decide what is “ literary true”. It seems as if Hawthorne wishes to make use of the supernatural or fantastic devices on behalf of symbol he also offered the explanation for the literal- minded  to whom the fantastic is not Justified not even for an artistic effect.

v      Hester Prynne’s Sin

Hester is introduced as being young, tall and beautiful, with an elegant figure, abundant glossy dark hair, a rich complexion and deepest black eyes.

 She comes from an impoverished but gentle English family, having lived in a decayed house of gray stone, with a poverty – stricken aspect but retaining a half – obliterated  held of arms over the portal in token of antique gentility.” But even without that specific indication of her high birth, the reader would know that Hester is a lady, from her bearing and pride, especially when she bravely faces the humiliation of the Scaffold : “ And never had Hester Prynne appeared more lady – like, in the antique interpretation of the term than as she issued from the prison.”

 It is Hester’s pride which sustain her, from that opening scene until she dies, still wearing the scarlet letter A. And coupled with that pride is a passion which is demonstrated not only through her relation with Dimmesdale but also in her emotional attachment to Pearl, in her defiance of Governor Bellingham, and even in her conversations with her husband old Chillingworth.

       Hester’s sin the sin which gives the book its title and around which the action of the book revolves , Adultery prohibited by the seventh commandment was so seriously condemned by the Puritans of seventeenth century Massachusetts that it was often punished by death.

    In contrast, Hawthorne doesn't condone Hester’s adultery, but he does find it less serious a sin than the sin of Dimmesdale and Chillingworth. Clearly Hawthorne sees Hester as a victim. He emphasizes, for example, that Hester is a victim of her own youth living in age which forced her to marry Chillingworth without loving him. Second Hester is a victim of Chillingworth’s selfishness, which permitted him to marry the young and passionate girl knowing all the while that she did not return his love and knowing that he was not suited to the role of her husband. Third, Hester is the victim of Chillingworth stupidity in sending his young wife ahead of him to the Massachusetts colony while he remained in Amsterdam. Fourth, Hester is a victim of fate which led to Chillingworth’s capture by the Indians and left Hester without any word from him to indicate even that he was alive. And fifth Hester is a victim of Dimmsdale’s weakness, he allowed their love affair to develop when he knew that he was unprepared to either marry Hester or share responsibility for their child if she were to become pregnant which she did, of course.

  But the most important facts distinguishes her from Chillingworth. He deliberately, with his intellect, sets out to destroy Dimmesdale. In addition Hester’s sin is openly acknowledged, rather than concealed in her heart. This fact distinguishes her from Dimmesdale, who choose to hide his sin.

   Hester did not with deliberate calculation plan to commit the sin of adultery nor did she deliberately plan to do injury to others. That she deeply loved Dimmesdale is obvious throughout the book. Her fault was that her passion and her love were stronger than her respect for the New world’s Puritan code of morals. As she says “ What we did had a consecration of its own. We felt it so, we said to each other!”

     Although Hester is clearly not a Puritan and it is doubtful that her respect for the Puritan code ever truly overcomes her independent passions. Hester does fully acknowledge her sin and she boldly displays it to the world. The elaborateness with which she embroiders her. Symbol of shame, dresses Pearl in scarlet as a second symbol, and wears the scarlet ‘ A ’ long after she could have removed it all these facts are proof that she is trying to hide nothing. Hester’s salvation lies in truth.

           When apologizing for having concealed Chillingworth’s identity ; she tells Dimmesdale “ In all things all else, I have striven to be true! Truth was the one virtue which I might have held fast and did hold fast through all extremity ...... A lie is never good, even though death threaten on the other side ! ’’

 Hester learns from sin and she grows strong as a result of accepting , her punishment . “ The Scarlet Letter was her passport into regions where other women dared not tread. Shame, Despair , solitude! These had been her teacher stern and wild ones and they had made her strong.”  At the end of the novel , Hester emerges from her experience and is revealed to be  a woman capable of helping others and respected  by them. She has the happiness that comes of being at peace with one self one’s fellow men, and with one’s God.

v    Conclusion

“ Thou shalt not commit adutlery”

                                                   __ Bible

The above sentence is considered to be the seventh commandment are sinners. Hester, the heroine and Dimmesdale committed adultery. So, The Scarlet Letter is a story of sin.

 The Scarlet Letter deals with Puritan settlers and their ideology. The title of the book is derived from the custom strictly practiced by the settlers. The women who is caught is adultery had to wear ‘ A ’ embroidered in scarlet on her dress. Dimmsdale’s sin, Chillingworth’s sin are unpardonable. Hester’s sin seems to be pardonable compared to both male’s sin. Chillingworth did the worst sin where as Dimmesdale confessed his before the end of his life.

   Hawthorne believed that the greatest sin of all is __

  “ the violation of another soul, another heart simply for the purpose of finding out hoe it would react.”

 The character of Chillingworth is made more sinister as he is shown using black magic after he decided to revenge his wife’s lover. On this side if we see, Hester’s loneliness was responsible for her sin but the secret sins are more painful then Hester’s open sin.

                 Sources :  The text book of The Scarlet Letter

                                  Class note

                                   Cliff note.