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The common definition says that a symbol is a sign or token of something We take symbols like these pretty much for granted. They are a part of everyday experience. In literature, matters are a little more complicated. Literary symbols usually don t have instantly recognizable meanings. Rather they take their meanings from the work of which they are part (The Scarlet Letter 8).
An example of symbols that most take for granted would be the rosebush, which Hawthorne selects a flower from as an offering to the reader, to the elfish child Pearl, to the scarlet letter A; these are all symbols that Hawthorne uses. The average reader may take it for granted, but each symbol within this novel has a purpose. Nathaniel Hawthorne uses all of these symbols to build his story, to make it come to life. Nathaniel Hawthorne s The Scarlet Letter is created around the different symbols within the novel. The most obvious symbol of the novel is the one from which the book takes its title, the scarlet letter A. The scarlet letter must be separated from the literary form, in order to find full understanding of the letter.
The literary symbol for he scarlet letter is a concrete and an untranslatable presentation of an idea (Weiss 19). The scarlet letter cannot find its way into the real life, except through the meditation of the symbol (Weiss 20). The scarlet letter is therefore a punishment by the Puritan society s desire to bring for the truth, but it was brought to life by Hester. Hawthorne also lets the scarlet letter take on many other forms. The scarlet letter not only stands for adulteress, but for angel and able. It is also a reminder to both Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale of the sins that they have brought upon themselves.
The Puritan community is another form that the scarlet letter A symbolizes. The scarlet letter A is a reminder for Hester, Dimmesdale, and the Puritan community of their sins. For Hester, the scarlet letter represents her sin of adultery. She becomes the scarlet letter, taking the symbol upon herself.
She gives up her individuality, she becomes the general symbol at which the preacher and moralist might point, and which they might vivify and embody their images of woman s frailty and sinful passion (Hawthorne 74). Dimmesdale also becomes letter, just as Hester took it upon herself, he does too. He lets the letter take him over by tattooing it upon his chest. He also lets the scarlet letter engulf him, making him weak and vulnerable. His weakness is shown when Hester and he meet in the forest, for he immediately agrees to run away and leave his problems behind. For the Puritans the scarlet letter provokes hostile feelings in the citizens of Boston (Scarlet Letter 8).
Weiss explains the symbolism of the scarlet letter in the following paragraph: The world s great symbols, as they emerge in religious icons symbols of rebirth, rejuvenation, resurrection are seen as memorials to the anxieties that attend our biological rhythms. The anxiety is mastered by being displayed to a universal religious, scientific, philosophical, or a meaningful aesthetic experience. The anxiety is mastered by dint of repetitions, by the substitution of controlled rituals, and by condensation into unified and benign experience (Weiss 21). This shows that the scarlet letter fulfills for the Puritans a social and religious function; the letter creates a story for them to tell and to show the sins that Hester has committed. Another symbol the scarlet letter A takes on is adultery, able, and angel. The scarlet letter stands for adultery because of the crime that Hester committed.
Hester committed the crime with Dimmesdale and brought forth a child from it. Hester now has to wear the symbol A upon her chest to represent the crime of adultery. The scarlet letter stands for able, because after Hester was committed of the crime she helped the citizens in the community. Sorrow awakens her sympathies, so that she becomes a nurse.
In fact, the best deeds of Hester s life come about through her fall from grace. Her charity to the poor, her comfort to the broken-hearted, her unquestioned presence in times of trouble are the direct result of her search for repentance (Scarlet Letter 3). The scarlet letter A also symbolizes angel, because the letter appeared in the sky after the Governor died. The Puritan community took this as a sign from God that the Governor passed on to heaven and became an angel. The gravestone for both Dimmesdale and Hester is seen only by one ever glowing point of light gloomier than the shadow and the light reveals the letter A symbolizing angle.
This symbolizes angel, because both Hester and Dimmesdale were united after death and their sins were forgiven (Waggoner 239 - 240). One main symbol in the novel is the struggle between light and darkness, which represents the fight between good and evil. The rose bush is an example of a symbol for the struggle between light and darkness. The Scarlet Letter was suppose to have a happy conclusion and that is what the rose bush by the prison was suppose to symbolize in the first chapter.
Instead, the rose just added light to Hawthorne s dark tale. The forest scene in the novel is another example of the fight between darkness and light. The forest scenes showed the hardships that Hester had to face every day, such as when she reaches into the light and it moves away from her hand: Mother, the sunshine does not love you. It runs away and hides itself, because it is afraid of something on your bosom.
Now see! There it is, playing a good way off. Stand you here, and let me run and catch it. I am but a child.
It will not flee from me, for I wear no thing on my bosom yet! (Hawthorne 192). This scene suggests that she will never be welcome in the light and that she must stay in the forest where it is dark. Lightness also takes on another form for Hester, she is both dark and light. The light will not accept her, but in her own way she is light, explained in this passage: Hester tries to subdue her spirit and sensuality, hiding it all beneath a sad cap.
But she can t do it. One breath of fresh air, one ray of sunlight, one moment alone with her lover in the forest, and she is herself again, reaching passionately for a life of freedom and fulfillment (Scarlet Letter 3). This shows how she has turned towards darkness. She has become able, giving her help to those in the Puritan community; yet, with one moment alone with Dimmesdale and she lost everything that she strived for. This shows another struggle between light and darkness.
Another symbol that leads to the struggle between light and darkness is the way Hester and Dimmesdale hide their love for each other. Hawthorne uses Hester and Dimmesdale to symbolize the conflict between the desire to confess and the necessity of self-concealment (Crews). The forest scenes and the scaffold scenes are examples of the struggle for Hester and Dimmesdale. When the two meet in the forest and the scaffold, it proves that they can never show their love to each other in public. Their sin has become so great that is has created a different world for them, forcing them to meet in the darkness of the shadows. The way Hester and Dimmesdale plan their escape is another example of the struggle between light and darkness.
They meet in the darkness of the forest shows that their escape is bound to fail. There is a storm over them and shadows upon them, showing that they cannot get away from their sins. This is proved when Dimmesdale turn himself in at the scaffold, because no matter how hard he tries he can not get away for his sins. Hester Prynne is another symbol within the novel, she symbolizes the heroine of the novel.
Hester stands up for herself and for what she believes. She is a woman fighting for her natural rights and freedoms. Compared to the tight-mouthed Puritans she is a true woman. She knows that she has committed a crime and has accepted it and learned to live with it.
Hester has even tried to relieve herself of the sin by doing good deeds for the Puritan society, although they have treated her with such disrespect, knowing that they will never truly accept her. A symbol is shown in Hester s dress on the day she stand for the first time on the pillory: The young woman the mother on the child stood fully revealed before the crowd, with a burning blush, and yet a haughty smiles, and a glance that would not be abashed, looked around at her towns people and neighbors. On the breast of her gown, in fine red cloth surrounded with an elaborate embroidery and fantastic flourishes of gold thread, appeared the letter A. It was so artistically done, and with so much fertility and gorgeous luxuriance of fancy, that it has all the effect of a last and fitting decoration to the apparel which she wore; and which was of a splendor in accordance with the taste of the age, but greatly beyond what was allowed by the sumptuary regulations of the colony (Hawthorne 57). The symbol that this creates is one that she creates for herself, it expresses her desire and individuality.
Dimmesdale symbolizes the coward in the story as well as the hypocrite. Dimmesdale continues to try to make peace with God, although he never will. Dimmesdale cannot make peace with God for one simple fact, he does not know how to do so. He not only does not know how to, he does not care if he lives or dies, and by the end of the novel he is so weak he can barely lift himself.
The sin has engulfed him into a void that he does not know how to leave. When he meets Hester in the forest, he sees it as a way out. He is so weak and willing to try anything that he accepts Hester s plan without much hesitation. Yet, being the hypocrite that he is, he turns around and confesses everything at the scaffold. Pearl is another main symbol that the novel is built around. Pearl symbolizes Hawthorne s first child, Una.
Pearl symbolizes Una because she was actually modeled after her. Pearl also represents the idea that the full acceptance of responsibility for sin is better then denying it. Accepting the consequences fully is also better that ignoring this responsibility altogether or even accepting it halfway. Hester accepted the responsibility for her sin, which was Pearl. In fact, Pearl was not only Hester s responsibility, but her gift. Pearl was indeed Hester s pearl.
Pearl was a treasure that Hester paid for greatly, and took the consequences. Hester paid by giving her life up for Pearl, she lost everything she ever had or could have gained in the Puritan society. The Puritans cast Hester away, making her an outsider for the community. More importantly, Pearl symbolizes the scarlet letter A and the fate of Hester. Pearl looks very much like the scarlet letter.
When Pearl is first introduced she is dressed in crimson and gold, just like the A that Hester wears upon her chest. Pearl continually reminds Hester of her sin. Pearl reminds Hester so much of her sin, because of the fact that she dresses her like the letter. Hester also is reminded of her sin by Pearl because of her childlike wonder of the letter; Pearl is always asking why her mother wears the letter upon her chest, and why she cannot wear one. Not only does Peal represent the scarlet letter, but she also symbolizes fate. In the forest scene, she tells her mother to go and pick up her own letter, pointing to it.
Fate also points it s finger at the letter saying that she must live with the sin that she has committed. The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne was written around the symbols in the novel itself. Each symbol had an effect within the novel that should not be taken for granted. The symbols in the novel are not just signs or tokens of something. They are in fact the meaning from the work of which they are part. Hawthorne uses double meanings for every symbol within the novel, leaving the final definition of the symbols entirely up to the reader (The Scarlet Letter 8) Member 8 Work Cited Crews, Frederick.
Nathaniel Hawthorne. In the 1997 Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia. Grolier Interactive Inc, 1997. Hawthorn, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. New York: St.
Martins Press, 1991. Nathaniel Hawthorn 1804 - 1864. A Treasury of American Literature. Ed. Joe Lee Davis. New York: Grolier, 1948. 877 - 892.
Scarlet Letter. [Online] Avaliable web The Scarlet Letter. [Online] Available web The Scarlet Letter, By Nathaniel Hawthorne. [Online] Available web not / essays /Scarlet Letter 2. htm. Waggoner, Hyatt H. Nathaniel Hawthorn 1804 - 1864. American Writers II.
Ed. Leonard Unger. New York: Charles Scribner s Sons, 1974. 223 - 246. Weiss, Daniel. The Critic Agonistes. The Critic Agonistes: Psychology, Myth, and the Art of Fiction.
Ed. Stephen Arkin. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1985. 5 - 32.
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