The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne Book Review

In The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne simply agrees with Romantic ideas, and at the same time some transcendental ideas. At the beginning of the novel, as the townpeople are mocking and degrading Hester for her sin, Hester enters the scene, “on the breast of her gown, in the fine red cloth, surrounded with an elaborate embroidery and fantastic flourishes of gold thread,...the letter A”(61). By introducing the readers to Hester in this positive light, Hawthorne does not recognize Hester as a sinner. The townspeople’s (society) degradation of her, in turn, is painted negatively. In a conversation with Chillingworth, Hester disagrees when heard of the magistrate’s plan to rid her of the scarlet letter, “It lies not in the pleasure of the magistrate to take off this badge, were I worthy to be quit of it, it would fall away of its own nature, or be transformed into something that should speak a different purport”(182). Hester disagreement to the magistrate plan contributes to the transcendental idea of how she felt no conflict between her heart and head thus she did not deny moral law but went above it to a “higher law”. Later in the novel, Hester and Dimsdale’s love was embrace in the forest by “Nature-[the] wild, heathen Nature of the forest, never subjugated by human law, nor illuminated by the higher truth…”(218). The sunshine which avoided Hester’s sadness earlier is now shone upon the couple and their passion. In the deep forest away from the evil pressure of society, Hawthorne uses Nature to praise the couple’s passion. In not painting Hester as a sinner and Nature embracing her love and Dimsdale, Hawthorne strongly agrees with the Romantic ideas of society’s suppression is evil and nature, man’s passion is good. At the same time, Hawthorne also agrees with the transcendental idea of a higher law.