Young Goodman Brown Nathaniel Hawthorne The story takes place in Salem, Massachusetts around sunset during the 17thcentury. Goodman Brown is leaving his home and his wife to take care of a task that must be done before sunrise. He meets with a mysterious figure in the forest. After the two meet, they continue into the woods and there is a sense that the person who Goodman Brown is traveling with is the devil. There is also a hint that the purpose of this meeting is for some unholy ritual. While they are traveling, Brown starts to feel reluctant and nervous about leaving but he continues on. Further on, Brown starts to see others traveling to the same meeting; he recognizes these others as his neighbors and townsfolk which he thought were christians. Seeing these others makes him want to turn back but he continues. He then hears his own wife’s voice realizing she is going to be initiated. Once he realizes that he has lost his faith in more ways than one, he decides to just continue with the task at hand and join the procession. At the ceremony, and carried out at a flame-lit, crude rocky altar in a clearing deep in the forest, the new converts are called up. He approaches the altar with his wife and, as they are about to be anointed in blood to seal their alliance with wickedness, he yells out to Faith to look to heaven and resist. In the next instant he finds himself standing alone in the forest, next to the cold, wet rock. After arriving back in Salem the next morning, Goodman Brown is uncertain whether his experience was real or only a dream, but he is nevertheless deeply shaken. His view of his neighbors is distorted by his memories of that night. He lives on with a tarnished view of his fellow neighbors and a suspicious, cynical man, wary of everyone around him, including his wife Faith. The protagonistof the story is Young Goodman Brown himself who has a strong belief in the Puritan faith. During this meeting and throuhgout the entire ordeal, his faith...