Scarlet Letter Women

Being considered the dominant sex has more advantages than those that can just be listed. One of society’s greatest ales is how the image of women does not vary far past the stereotypical fragile and incapable cutout. In other words, power comes more naturally with the right “parts”. The idea that the importance of women is minimized in the eyes of the public is illustrated throughout “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne utilizing the way Hester Prynne is treated compared from the beginning to the end of the novel. Hawthorne first introduces the reader to Hester as a woman on the scaffold because she committed adultery. A part of her punishment is that “she should stand a certain time upon the platform” illustrating how Hester is on

By doing so this treatment toward the main character demonstrates how poorly women appear in the minds of the citizens. Hester is only half of the guilty party responsible for committing adultery, yet she must suffer publicly and is turned into an example of what not to do. The first day Hester is judged she is still a young girl being treated like a gruesome criminal who becomes “overwhelmed by her situation… and regard[ed] herself as a sinner” (Milder). Instead of the Puritans treating her like a young girl who is facing the new challenges that come with motherhood, the whole community bashes Hester and insults her daughter Pearl, the bastard child. The image painted of Hester is that of a weak woman who could not resist the urges of being with another man even though most people thought that her husband, Roger Chillingworth, already died before making it to the colony. Not only does Hawthorne create an adverse connotation toward women who do not follow the rules approved by the patriarchy, but also locks females into a gender role by stating how “women derive a pleasure, incomprehensible to the other sex, from the delicate toil of the needle” (Hawthorne

They said that it meant Able; so strong was Hester Prynne, with a woman’s strength” (Hawthorne 146). The people of the town start to view Hester as strong and capable since she has been doing charity work for years; however, the statement is like a back-handed complement because Hawthorne mentions how Hester has a woman’s strength. Implying which gender her strong will and unbreakable spirit are associated with means that she is not thought to have a greater or even equal amount of strength as a man. Despite the half way change of heart by the townspeople, Hester’s opinion on marriage is revealed and how women should “let men tremble to win the hand of a woman, unless they win along with it the utmost passion of her heart” (Hawthorne 159). Through Hester’s thought on love it illustrates how marriage should not be imposed on women and bind them to expectations and rules when the husband does not have a lady’s best interests in mind. The way Hester has been treated by men has pushed her to realize she does not want to be inferior in a relationship. Women deserve happiness, but no man is willing to sacrifice his selfish needs in order to, in a way, free a woman. Hester is near her release from the chains of guilt that forced her into a mental prison since she is “more of a victim of circumstances than a