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Character of hester prynne
Character development the scarlet letter
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The Scarlet Letter Think about how much you love your family. How would you feel if someone tried to take them away from you? In the book The Scarlet Letter a young woman named Hester Prynne had to face this dire situation. After a heavily regretted mistake with a man from her village, Hester gave birth to a beautiful little girl whom she named Pearl. Pearl’s beauty radiated and everyone who saw her noticed it with great awe. However, despite her physical beauty, on the inside Pearl appeared a rather strange child, almost acting as a witch. When Pearl reached the age of about six, she and her mother, Hester, visited upon request the governor’s home to discuss something. Once they arrived the men present aroused the issue of whether …show more content…
Even though she may not have always portrayed it in the most obvious ways, Pearl loved Hester. Hester and the red badge of shame she wore, represented comfort and love to sweet Pearl and she loved both. Gaining Pearl’s trust seemed extremely rare if not impossible for virtually everyone, that is except Hester. All of Pearl’s trust abided in her caring mother Hester, and in no one else. If the village had insisted on removing her from her mother’s care, it would have terrified Pearl, as she only trusted that one single loving person. Pearl needed her to stay with her mother so that she could always rely on and trust the person most vital to her. If Pearl moved in with a different family, not only would Pearl suffer, but so would that family. Pearl possessed a quite different personality than most children. She almost appeared a witch to most people who observed her wild behavior. She lived in her own world most of the time, whether embracing her surroundings and seemingly becoming them, or running around like a possessed being all through the village. Only Hester knew how to best handle and control Pearl’s unique behavior, and therefore they needed to stay together. Pearl needed someone who would love her to the fullest no matter how wild or different she acted. Hester and Hester alone were this person. Pearl’s desperate need for love and reliance, she only found in her mother
The two of them, after Dimmesdale dies, continue with their plans to go back to England where they hope for a better life. Once in England, the two are able to change their lives around for the better. Pearl is even found to have a family of her own: “Mr. Surveyor Pue, who made investigations a century later, … Pearl was not only alive, but married, and happy, and mindful of her mother; and that she would most joyfully have entertained that sad and lonely mother at her fireside” ( Hawthorne 392). Pearl was able to overcome her old life and create a new one, a better one, one that was just for her. Even though her mother was no longer around she tried her best to kept in touch with her. She also kept her and her mother’s experience in mind never to let herself go back to that life. After spending many years in England, Hester finally returns to New England. When she returns she is full of sorrow and regret; however, she continues to wear her A on upon her chest as a reminder of her pain. With returning to the land of sin, people came to Hester, mostly women, with problems of their own. They hope by talking to someone who has been through so much will help them, or give them insight on what life is like to be on the outside: “And, as Hester Prynne had no selfish ends, nor lived in any measure for her own profit and enjoyment, people brought all their sorrows and perplexities, and besought her counsel, as one who had herself gone through a mighty trouble. Women, more especially,—in the continually recurring trials of wounded, wasted, wronged, misplaced, or erring and sinful passion,—or with the dreary burden of a heart unyielded, because unvalued and unsought,—came to Hester’s cottage, demanding why they were so wretched, and what the remedy! Hester comforted and counseled them, as best she might” (Hawthorne 392-393). Even though Hester was miserable and thought that no
Growing up with Hester, Pearl never really associated with children from her age group. This happened because whenever Hester and Pearl went into town, they were tormented and harassed. In retaliation, Pearl began to throw rocks back at the children. This kind of thing only happened in the beginning of Pearl's life. Later on, the kids stopped harassing Pearl because her mom's sin did not have as much effect on the people of the town.
“Woman, it is thy badge of shame!" (107). Governor Bellingham was describing the scarlet letter to Hester while they were discussing if the punishments that Hester had to go through were adequate enough for the crime. Hester was living in the outskirts of the city in a small abandoned cottage for several years with the only thing that had any monetary value in her life, her child and the product of committing adultery, Pearl. She and her little Pearl were shunned from the community for her acts. In the Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester is punished in more than one way, and she is able to deal with it openly so the community will, over time, forgive her.
No one is perfect. Especially when it comes to parenting. Even Book characters have trouble being good parents. One example of this is Hester Prynne. She is a book character for the book The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Now, Hester is not the worst mother, but she is not the best either. How can you be the best mother in the world with a heathenish daughter like Pearl? Still, Hester does her best, and that's all anyone should ask for. Hester is a good mother because she looks out for Pearl's future, she knows when to be stern and she is a great role model.
As a living reminder of Hester’s extreme sin, Pearl is her constant companion. From the beginning Pearl has always been considered as an evil child. For Hester to take care of such a demanding child, put lots of stress onto her life. Hester at times was in a state of uncontrollable pressure. “Gazing at Pearl, Hester Prynne often dropped her work upon her knees, and cried out with an agony which she would fain have hidden, but which made utterance for itself, betwixt speech and a groan, ‘O Father in heaven- if Thou art still my Father- what is this being which I have brought into the world!’” (Hawthorne, 77).
Pearl and the other Puritan children have a huge role in Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. Pearl is displayed as very different from any of the other children in the book. The attitudes of the children tell the reader a lot about the lives of the Puritans. The story emphasizes that children were to be seen but not heard however, Hester chooses to let Pearl live a full and exciting life. Hester does not restrict pearl or hide her from anyone or anything. This is part of the reason that Pearl becomes such a colorful child. People see Pearl as a child of sin; the devil’s child. Pearl is quite the opposite. She is a happy and intelligent little girl. Pearl is born with an incredible sense of intuition. She sees the pain her mother feels but does not understand where the pain is coming from. Pearl knows somehow deep in her heart that Dimmesdale is her father. She takes a very strong liking to him. This makes it much harder on dimmesdale to work through the guilt seeing what a beautiful thing came from his terrible secret. Pearl serves as a blessing to and a curse to Hester. Hester Prynne loves her daughter dearly but she is a constant reminder of the mistakes she has made.
Pearl is not only a symbol of Hester but also a symbol to Dimmsdale. Pearl will not let him into her life until he accepts his sin. She wants him as a father but will not let him until he will not hide his sin in public. Pearl knows that Dimmsdale will not be seen holding her hand in the public eye and this bothers her. She asks her mother, " wilt tho promise to hold my and thy mothers hand to-morrow?"(105)
...er to overcome the passion, once so wild that had brought her to ruin and shame." (Hawthorne, 165) It was Hester's motherly sentiments to nurture and love her child that saved her from temptation and from death and opened her heart to the poor and needy around her. It was the torturous fixation of her child upon her shame that tempered and refined her character and led her toward the precious virtue of being true to herself and others. And it was the reflection of her own character, even at Its worst, in her child that brought Hester to a greater understanding of herself and a desire to build a better life for Pearl. Pearl was more than merely her mother's tormentor--she was her blessing, her life, and the giver of the freedom to live a life true to herself and to her God.
Although Pearl is looked at as the result of Hester’s sin, she is a blessing to her mother as well. Her name, “Pearl,” is fitting because of what she means to Hester. For instance “Hester names her”Pearl” because she has come to great price, and Hester believed that Pearl is her only reason for living,” (Johnson: Understanding The Scarlet Letter pg.1). Pearl motivates her mother to keep on going when she is tempted to give up. In the novel, Mistress Hibbins asks Hester to join her in a witches gathering, but she declines saying if she had lost Pearl, she would have gone.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, the Puritan community banned all forms of sin. Sin was looked upon as evil, being connected to the devil and his dark ways. Hester Prynne, the main character of the story, was shunned by the rest of the Puritan world after committing the sin of adultery. She lived in a world where it was not accepted. She was isolated from the world around her, having little hope. Throughout the novel, symbols such as the character of the kind woman, the wild rose bush outside of the prison doors and the character of Pearl, Hester Prynne's illegitimate child, are used to show that even in a world full of sin and darkness, there is always hope.
Through observation of the dialogue and actions of others, she seemingly makes connections between these behaviors in order to draw conclusions about her relationship with other members of the community when these are not explicitly explained. After the custody battle in which Hester fights for the right to remain as the guardian of her child, "Pearl…stole softly towards [the reverend], and taking his hand in the grasp of both her own, laid her cheek against it" (78). This appears to be Pearl’s act of gratitude towards the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, yet it is interesting that this otherwise short-tempered and spunky child behaved in such a gentle manner towards the man. Perhaps she notes her mother’s frantic voice and posture as Hester pleads with the men who wish to take Pearl away, establishing that her relationship with such men is not a pleasant one. Pearl may also notice Dimmesdale’s request that the child remain with her mother, followed by the softening of Hester’s face as her crisis is brought to an end; it is evident that the relationship between this man and her mother is more sympathetic than the aforementioned one. Without hearing a single word uttered, Pearl realizes that Dimmesdale has, in a way, saved both
By being with Hester, Pearl got to experience a different manner in life which enabled her to see an outside perspective of Puritan life and learn moral lessons from it. Pearl was not born into the typica...
They both are connected to one another. Not only like a mother and a daughter, but actually the mother, as a sinner, and the daughter, as the result of the sin. In that way, Pearl has the same wild nature that her mother had before her birth. But that motherhood had begun to soften it away from Hester. In the book the author stated “Hester could only account for the child’s character—and even then, most vaguely and imperfectly—by recalling what she herself had been, during that momentous period while Pearl was imbibing her soul from the
Pearl has spent her entire life knowing who her mother is and identifies her with and only with the letter on. “Pearl’s image, crowned, and girdled with flowers, but stamping its foot, wildly gesticulating, and in the midst of all, still pointing its small forefinger at Hester’s bosom!” (Hawthorne 173). In this scene, Hester takes the letter off when she is with Dimmesdale, and Pearl refuses to come near her until she puts the letter back on; she recognizes that the letter is a part of who her mother is. The identity of herself is also uncovered as a result of the letter. Pearl sees how the Puritan society treats her mother and refuses to act likewise. Not only does she stand up to those who judge Hester, but she also practices being kind instead. “Pearl was almost sure, [the bird] had been hit by a pebble and fluttered away with a broken wing. But then the elf-child sighed, and gave up her sport; because it grieved her to have done harm to a little being that was as wild as the sea-breeze, or as wild as Pearl herself” (Hawthorne 147). Pearl cares for the wellbeing of those around her, both human and animal. This has shaped who she is through her kindness and her intelligence; it becomes what her identity is and displays how she identifies her mother, verifying that she was impacted the most by the scarlet
Her relationship with society was unusual because she was shunned for being an illegitimate child, but this hurdle further deepened the bond between Hester and Pearl. Human interaction to Pearl was essential for her growth even if the relationship itself was flawed as seen by her questionable relationship with society. This all relates back to how Pearl has the title as a Child of Nature because she has a certain connection with the natural world and can be seen forming relationships with that world. “Pearl’s relationship with Nature was intensified, like her relationship with her mother, by her ostracism. Hester’s dwelling on the verge of the forest, at the outskirts of the