Examples Of Revenge In The Scarlet Letter

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Desire for revenge

In puritan society the desire for revenge has remained the same as in today’s society. In the novel The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester Prynne has an affair with Arthur Dimmesdale and as a result of this her husband, Roger Chillingworth, seeks revenge on Dimmesdale through making him feel guilty. In seeking his revenge Chillingworth takes in a sick Dimmesdale, and the fact that Dimmesdale will never be free of Chillingworth is how he seeks his revenge. In today’s society there are many examples of how revenge is present, one example comes from a British man named Roy Allison Snr. He believed that his son's best friend Duncan Bell supplied his son Roy Allison Jr. with the drugs that killed him and as his revenge …show more content…

In The Scarlet Letter Chillingworth uses guilt as a way to get revenge on the man who his wife committed adultery with, Arthur Dimmesdale. When Chillingworth is asking Hester who the father of Pearl is he says “Let him live! Let him hide himself in outward honor, if he may! Not the less he shall be mine!” (69) Roger Chillingworth says “Let him live!” he plans to get his revenge with guilt, not by letting someone die so that the man his wife cheated with can live with his guilt. Another example of revenge in The Scarlet Letter is the Scarlet Letter itself. The scarlet letter is how authorities and the town sought their revenge on Hester for doing wrong in the community. The narrator states “Measured by the prisoner's experience, however, it might reckoned a journey of some length; for, haughty as her demeanor was, she perchance underwent an agony from every footstep of those that thronged to see her, as if her heart had been flung in the street for them all to spurn and trample upon.”(52) Because of the scarlet letter the entire town has turned on Hester, she is so isolated that even when she is surrounded by people she is still alone. The scarlet letter was used to shame her and as a way to make her feel guilt for what she has done. People in the puritan society used revenge as a way to get their own justice for other people wrong …show more content…

In American society today and in puritan society people respond the same to people who have done wrong to them, someone they love, in the community, or who have violated the social norms. In the scarlet letter Roger Chillingworth gets revenge through guilt and making Arthur Dimmesdale feel hurt and can never be relieved of the guilt he feels toward Chillingworth. And in an example from today's society Mr. Allison Snr. gets revenge by killing and hurting Duncan to avenge his son's death. Another way authority and government gets revenge in The Scarlet Letter is with the scarlet letter itself and the entire town and authority get revenge by using this to isolate her. In today’s society we use jail as revenge for people who have broken the law in communities and as a way to punish them for their wrongdoings. The desire for revenge in today's and the puritan society has remained the

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