Has society ever stood in the way of you and the one you love because your union just wouldn’t be “right”? Have your feelings for someone ever been so strong that you would be willing to give away your reputation for the sake of saving theirs? In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel The Scarlet Letter Hester Prynne is faced with these very situations. Her love for the father of her child is so great that she gives everything away to save his reputation. This unending love she feels for him is what makes the novel the love story that it is, without her commitment the story wouldn’t be the masterpiece that it is.
Faced with a life changing decision placed before her by the Puritan elders of her community at the beginning of the novel Hester Prynne has only seconds to decide what the fate of her, her child and the father of her child will be. If she should disclose the name of her lover the punishment she would receive would be far less than the shameful display of the scarlet letter A that she is forced to wear as a label for the rest of her life. She could have let her pride get the best of her and ignored the reputation of the man and lived a more self gratifying life but the love she had for Arthur Dimmesdale was so great that she took the wrath that was to be shared and carried it all on her shoulders. For years she lived keeping him at arms length because of the strict rules their society had them live by. A union between Hester and Arthur would have been a scandal and a momentous display of adultery. Also, without the punishment of Hester the story would have no plot and therefore be no more than a tale of adultery, knowing this, Hawthorne composed a beautiful tale that goes deep into the heart of a woman and brings out the love she has for a man.
Had Hester given into the constant pressuring of the elders and told the identity of her daughter’s father The Scarlet Letter would be nothing more than a story of adultery but because of the selflessness...