entry four: themes

Forgiveness: 

In the novel, two of the main characters make the effort to be forgiven for their sins. Dimmesdale throughout the entire story, struggles with being forgiven for his horrible sin of adultery. Being the minister of the town, he was expected to be god like, however her committed a huge sin, and he struggles with forgiving himself and having the town forgive him through the novel. In the end, he comes to terms with his sin and realizes whats one is done, and he died accepting that. The town forgives him as well, when he dies, and almost no one speaks of him wrongdoing because his good deeds outshone the bad ones. 
Hester, too, struggles with forgiveness. The entire novel is based on the fact that she made a sin, and no ones forgives her, so everyday she works to rid herself of her bad name. She tries her hardest to be forgiven, and in the end, the town does forgive her, and they accept her and her daughter for who they are. 

Forgiveness is a big theme in our religion. God is open to teshuvah- he pushes us to admit to our sins and own up to them, so that we can do better next time.  God knows and understands that man isn't perfect, and he doesn't expect us to be, and so he loves when we do teshuvah, so that we can learn for the next time. 

Judgement: 
A BIG BIG BIG theme throughout the novel is judgement. Hester and Pearl both live everyday knowing that they are being judged. The novel starts off with Hester walking out onto the scaffold, and everyone judging her and looking at her and categorizing her with her sin. Even her child, Pearl, who her herself did no wrong, and is only a product of a wrongdoing, is judged by the whole town. She is looked at as the bastard child. even her mother, Hester, judges her and says she is weird. Theres a big case of judgment going around town! Dimmesdale too, is a product of judgment. His character is based around him having a self dilemma about whether or not he should confess to being the father of Pearl. He fears the towns judgment. 

This theme is relevant to our own lives. Hate to say it, but people are quick to judge, and we must remember that and act as if there is always someone watching and judging us. If we don't want to be judged for doing something, then we shouldn't do it, because word goes around and we are bound to be judged for it. 

Repentance and Penitence:

In the novel, Dimmesdale struggles with repenting for his sins. He has a very hard time coming to terms with his sins, and so he can't fully repent. If you don't admit to your sins fully, you can't repent to your best ability. In the end, Dimmesdale admits to what he did, and he merges his inner beliefs with what he preaches, and once he comes to terms with his doing, he is able to repent, and even die happy and accepting of who he really is. 

Like I said before, we Jews are very into repentance. We even have yom kippur- a full day dedicated for repentance. We also believe that you must come to terms with your wrongdoings in order to fully do teshuvah and repent for them. As you can see, a lot of the themes in this novel apply to everyday people and moments. 

Romanticism:

In the novel, there are a lot of romantic elements. The meteor, for example, flew through the sky with a huge letter "A" engraved into it. This, my friends, is quite supernatural. Thats not an everyday occurrence. Pearl, too, is a romantic element. She is looked at as the weird, quirky, elfish, angel/ demon girl (depends what chapter you look at lol)- all of which are romantic. Most of the townspeople see Pearl as a supernatural. They don't think she's a normal, little Puritan girl. The scenes in the forest, too, are romantic. So pretty much, this book is stuffed with romantic and supernatural elements. 

I don't really think we have romanticism in everyday life. You know life's not all supernatural and fun and rainbows and meteors flying through the sky. Life's pretty real so.... yeah this doesn't apply to real life. 

entry three: characterization

In the start of the novel, Roger Chillingworth came to Boston to the Puritan society to rekindle with his wife Hester. Once he gets there, he finds out that Hester had an affair and had a bastard child. He speaks with Hester and he explains that, "we have wronged each other. Mine was the first wrong, when I betrayed thy budding youth into a false and unnatural relation with my decay." Here he admits that he is part of the reason that Hester cheated on him, and he is part of the reason she sinned. Both of them had faults, and so his first wrongdoing lead to hers. He starts off by coming to town to take revenge on the man that had an affair with his wife Hester, however he is not taken over by it.  He is even somewhat (somewhat lol, not really but somewhat) understanding. 

Later in the novel, Chillingworth becomes overwhelmed and defined by his vengeance. As "calm, gentle, passionless as he appeared, there was ye, we fear, a quiet depth of malice, hitherto latent, but active now, in this unfortunate old man, which led him to imagine a ore intimate revenge than any mortal had ever wreaked upon an enemy." His entire being became getting revenge on the man that slept with his wife (Dimmesdale), and over the course of the novel, he changed from wanting revenge, to revenge defining him. He controlled the revenge in the beginning, hover after a while, the revenge controlled him. 

The thing that made this transformation and transition, was his need for revenge and the fact that he had nothing else in his life to focus on. Chillingworth "had grown to exist only by this perpetual poison of the dearest revenge!"  With the only thing keeping him alive, the only ting for him to live for, being revenge... that would make anybody go insane. And so Chillingworth fell into the trap of revenge- he took it too far, and  in the end, it effected him, more than the person he was seeking revenge on. 

So, overall, Chillingworth started off by simply getting revenge on a man, yet because of his lack of anything else to live for, he was consumed by it, and eventually was defined by the revenge. 

entry two: language

"God gave me the child!" cried she. "He gave her in requital of all things else, which ye had taken from me. She is my happiness!- she is my torture, none the less! pearl keeps me here in life! Pearl punishes me too! See ye not, she is the scarlet letter, only capable of being loved, and so endowed with a million-fold the power of retribution for my sin? Ye shall not take her! I will die first!" 

In this passage,  Hester is pleading with the Minister of the town to not take Pearl away from her. Her words here are interesting, because she admits that she loves her daughter, while at the same time she admits that Pearl is a blatant symbol of her sin.
To add, Hester is showing that even though she committed she crime of adultery and betrayed god, god gave her the child. So even while god is punishing her, he is still involved in all that happens. Even though she betrayed god, god still gave her one of the greatest gifts. 
Hester is also exclaiming that Pearl is simultaneously good and bad for her. She says that she is her happiness, but at the same time, she is her torture. Pearl is the reason Hester is alive, and yet at the same time Pearl is her punishment. She is the shameful real life scarlet letter, but at the same time she is always loved. Pearl herself is somewhat of her own paradox- she is good, yet she is bad. 

This passage as a whole I think is very crucial. I think this is Hester's realization that although Pearl may be a product of her sin and represents bad and sin, she is still her daughter and she still brings her joy. Pearl is Hester's punishment, yet she loves her anyway. 

entry one: setting

So- the setting of the Scarlet Letter. Here we go...
In the beginning of the novel, the Puritans of Boston, Massachusetts surround the town prison waiting for news or action. It is the day that Hester Prynne is going to be released, and people being people, everyone was very curious to know what was going on. " A throng of bearded men, in sad colored garments, and grey, steeple-crowned hats, intermixed with women, some wearing hoods and others bareheaded, was assembled in front of a wooden edifice, the door of which was heavily timbered with oak, and studded with iron spikes." With everyone standing around, Hester walks out of the prison doors, holding her baby (of course conceived while committing the sin of adultery) and everyone looks at her, her baby, and the scarlet letter "A" that she has waved on her chest to represent her sin. After deciding to show off her baby and scarlet letter, she "passed through this portion of her ordeal, and came to a sort of scaffold, at the western extremely of the market-place." 

So, pretty much, the townspeople surround the town jail on a bright summers day to watch Hester Prynne be released from her sentence in prison for committing adultery. 

The Puritans of Boston are very into god and religion. So, when Hester slept with another man and had a baby, she was sent to prison, because she committed a big sin and, in the eyes of the Puritans, needed to be punished for it. Our community would have done the same to a woman who had a bay out of wedlock. She would have been "shunned" from the community, sadly her child along with her. However she wouldn't of been sent to jail, because here in New York, we have a separation between Jewish law and American law. 

I find that the Puritans are also quote nosy- they're all up in everyones grill and are interested in the entire communities business! The book even says that Hester was relieved "from this intense consciousness of being the object of severe and universal observation." Hester was relieved that everyone wasn't all over her for a few minutes! In our community, we tend to talk... news travels fast. Everyone talks and and watches what others are doing (don't mean to be bashing- I love the community!) But I feel like I could see our community doing the exact same thing. Now that i think about it the Puritans aren't so different than the SY's! The puritans are more extreme, of course, however some of the same attitudes and ideas are the same.