Children In The Scarlet Letter

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In the Hands of Children Disunity is prevalent in the modern world, despite international attempts to promote peace, stability, and unity within nations and communities. While societal conflicts can be hidden behind adult mannerisms, the truth becomes extremely clear in the children who hurt one another and call each other names they do not understand. Some dismiss such behavior as typical of immature children, but in reality, such actions are selfish by nature and affect the growth of society. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne is ostracized for committing adultery by the Puritan townspeople, and her isolation is then imitated by the Puritan children towards Hester’s daughter, Pearl. These actions and their effect …show more content…

Fundamentally, children imitate the treatment of others by adults in society, revealing a selfish desire to assert superiority at the expense of others. Throughout the novel, the Puritan children notice the way the townspeople outcast Hester and Pearl and copy this in their own actions. This imitation can be seen when the pair walks past the children on their way to the governor’s house and “those sombre little urchins” look up from “what passed for play.” Hawthorne deliberately comments on the serious and intolerant lifestyle of these children to demonstrate how the Puritans reflect the strict beliefs modeled by their parents. The Puritan children then name Hester as “the woman of the scarlet letter” and Pearl as “the likeness of the scarlet letter,” which suggests that the townspeople’s branding of the pair leads to the children’s definition of the two by simply the symbol of sin, the scarlet letter. Following this declaration with the transition “therefore” and then an attack by the Puritans, Hawthorne connects the symbol of sin to the children’s reason for “fling[ing] mud” at the mother and child—a …show more content…

After Pearl is attacked by the Puritan children with mud, she “stamp[s] her foot, and shak[es] her little hand” with “threatening gestures,” actions used by Hawthorne to illustrate a feeling of frustration at an injustice but also the inability to fully act on it which mirrors Hester’s suppressed resentment against her unfair treatment by the townspeople. However, Pearl is young and unrestrained and thus, is able to “ma[ke] a rush” at the Puritan children, who are described as a “knot of enemies.” This phrase highlights the strength in numbers held by the Puritan children who are like a “knot,” while also describing them as “enemies”—a word that Hawthorne uses to emphasize reciprocated enmity. He then describes the retaliating child as “an infant pestilence” or an “angel of judgement, —whose mission was to punish the sins of the rising generation,” which refer to the harm caused by the Puritan children (70). Through this metaphor, Pearl’s actions can be seen as a reaction to the Puritans’ actions as she is elevated to an “angel,” an entity that is above human standards, and deals out “judgment” which implies justice. However, this justice is self-made, and in blaming the Puritan children’s faults, Pearl reinforces her own victimization, selfishly downplaying the sin for which the

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