...The Scarlet Letter summaries. Chapter 1 This chapter somewhat introduces seventeenth-century Boston, where a group of gloomy, sad Puritans stand in front of an old prison in Boston, which seems to be a horrible and degrading place. By the descriptions given (heavy oak door, with spikes) it sounds like the prison is meant to keep and hold deadly murderers and ax murderers. The area around the prison is gray and gloomy. Decay and ugliness are in the author's descriptions, the only thing that sticks out is a lovely wild rosebush, blooming by the prison door. I believe the rosebush links us to Hester. They are both in full bloom, the rosebush in numbers of roses, and Hester in her humiliation. They both stand out. Chapter 2 The chapter opens to townspeople talking about Hester Prynne’s sin. Hester comes out of the prison and walks to the scaffold wearing an elaborately embroidered scarlet letter A on her breast, and carrying a small infant in her arms. When she did this she was to be ashamed of her sin, and the townspeople made mockery and fun of her. One of the most ugly woman in town implied that she be killed for her sin. As Hester looks out over the crowd, she realizes that her future will be lonely, being alone. Just her daughter and herself. When she realizes this, she squeezes Pearl so hard she starts to cry. The market place is described as the punishment of Hester. She was compared to Mary. Chapter 3 While standing on the platform, Hester sees and...
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...The Scarlet Letter In the Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, A young woman named Hester Prynne in Boston is prosecuted for adultery. To symbolize her crime, she has an “A” imprinted on her bosom. As a result of her committing adultery, she and Reverend Dimmesdale (his identity is not identified until later in the book) have a child. She is a very curious child, and her name is Pearl. Roger Chillingworth, comes to see Hester on the scaffold and he doesn’t want his identity revealed either but it does get revealed in later chapters. In the Scarlet letter, the author uses different symbols, literary devices, and themes that help Nathaniel’s purpose of writing. Symbolism A symbol in the Scarlet Letter is literally the Scarlet Letter...
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...The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, its plot is developed around the characters of Hester Prynne, Pearl, Roger Chillingworth, and Arthur Dimmesdale. At the beginning of chapter IX: The Leech, takes place when Chillingworth was wondering on the outskirts of a crowd exactly on the day Hester was set up in front of the pillory. He did not want anyone to know who he was so placed his finger to his lip so Hester would not reveal his identity. Later, Chillingworth tells Hester he forgives her but makes her promise to not reveal who he is and swears he will find out Pearl’s real father. Chillingworth builds a new identity as a doctor in where he picks Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale as his spiritual guide and reveals great concern for his health but Mr. Dimmesdale seems to refuse Chillingworth offer of care. In Chapter XV: Hester and Pearl, Hester admits to herself that she hates her husband, it was all a self-delusion. Pearl’s curiosity about the letter A on her chest grows, and would not drop the subject regardless. Pearl is an intelligent child so she questions her mother about the connection between the scarlet letter and the minister’s hand always over his heart. However, Hester feels ashamed and refuses to answer Pearl’s suspicion since she thinks Pearl is too young to understand the situation. One of the evident relationships is between Roger Chillingworth and Reverend Dimmesdale. Chillingworth settles in a Puritan town under the disguise in helping Revered Mr. Dimmesdale with...
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...In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne explored the superficially-Christian ideals of Boston's Puritan society by revealing the sins committed by many individuals in the community. In this novel, Hester Prynne was an obvious sinner, forced by the community to forever harbor the scarlet letter on her chest as a reminder of her sin. Roger Chillingworth could also be considered a sinner for lying about his identity and mentally torturing his patient, Arthur Dimmesdale. However, one would be surprised to find that the worst sinner in this novel was one of the most pious men in the community. Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale was the most sinful in this novel, because he committed adultery with Hester, lived a hypocritical life, and doubted God's ability...
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...Secrecy In The Scarlet Letter Hawthorne reveals that while guilt and secrecy will ultimately have a negative effect on your life, guilt and secrecy can also make you a better person for a short while. Dimmesdale is the reverend of the town, and he is also the man Hester had an affair with. While Dimmesdale forces himself to keep his affair a secret, “the health of Mr. Dimmesdale [has] evidently begun to fail” because the self-condemnation and guilt he is bestowing upon himself is eating him alive (Hawthorne 99). Dimmesdale’s health is failing to the self-condemnation he is bestowing upon himself. Hawthorne is trying to convey to the reader that they usually judge themselves more harshly than anyone else would probably judge them. However, the guilt and self-condemnation has also had a positive effect on Dimmesdale too. Because of the affair, Dimmesdale has become a better reverend in that he is “devot[ed] to study, … scrupulous[ly] fulfill[s] parochial duty, and … fasts” (99). Dimmesdale’s guilt has caused him to focus on his religion, for he feels that he can fix the sin he has committed if he focuses on being a good Christian. Because of his serious devotion to religion, many believed that they were “not worthy to be any longer trodden by his feet” (100). Dimmesdale’s secrecy and guilt has cause the town to love him even more as a reverend. They are able to connect with Dimmesdale because they feel like he can actually understand their sin. Throughout The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne...
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...Hunter Lindblade Mrs. Byrne English 11 Honors 1 November 2013 Role of Secret Sin in The Scarlet Letter In many of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novels, secret sin plays a large role throughout the stories. Hawthorne’s novel “The Scarlet Letter”, contains the theme of secret sin which plays a very important role in the story of the novel. Secret sin in the novel “The Scarlet Letter” plays an important role because it both physically and emotionally damages the characters throughout the story. The character of Roger Chillingworth undergoes a very drastic emotional and physical change throughout the novel due to secret sin. In the beginning of the novel, Hester goes up to the scaffold since she is punished to public humiliation for committing the crime of adultery. Her husband, Roger Chillingworth, comes to the town to see that his wife has cheated on him with another man and now bears a child that is not his. The result of Hester’s partner’s secret sin on Chillingworth changes his inner and outer emotions immediately. Hawthorne writes “ A writing horror twisted itself across his features, like a snake gliding swiftly over them, and making one little pause, with all its wreathed intervolutions in open sight. His face darkened with some powerful emotion” (Hawthorne 45). By using very descriptive imagery and similes, Hawthorne showed that the secret sin was starting to change Roger’s inner and outer emotions. Before Roger saw Hester he was a normal person but once he saw her he started...
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...The Scarlet Letter By Nathaniel Hawthorne “The Scarlet Letter” written by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a historic novel that shows how symbolism plays a role not only in a novel, but in life itself. The Scarlet Letter begins in the seventeenth century in Boston, Massachusetts during the time of the Puritan settlement. The Scarlet Letter tells the life story of Hester Prynne who is a loving and passionate woman, but however gets mistreated because she sin. Although, Hester faces criticism and judgment throughout her community she decides to stay, deal with the hatred, and the feeling of being alone for the rest of her life. The scarlet letter takes place in the seventeenth century during the puritan settlement in Boston. Hester Prynne and her...
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...what American Literature is in itself and which pieces of writing we can include within this label. It is believed that when a piece is written in North America, more precisely in the USA, it would automatically be given this epithet. But it should be taken into account that this idea is quite broad and doesn’t reflect the real essence of the term. However, there is also another definition that gathers this essence: American Literature is the one that represents the Americanism, the singularity of the USA philosophy and culture. This way, instead of focusing on who the author is, it is focused on the content of the writing. In that which concerns Fiction, the following documents are the ones considered as narrative: Speeches Letters Short Stories Essays Political Documents Sermons Novels Diaries 1 FIRST LITERARY EXPRESSIONS The first documents in which the idea of Americanism is very present are the Sermons. They respond to the strict Protestantism settled in the New Continent after the arrival of the Pilgrim Fathers and Puritans in the Mayflower (1620) and the Arabella (1630). They established a theocratic community whose main and only point of reference was the Bible. That is why the idea of the ‘city upon a hill’ is still very present in American mentality. As we all know, their community was also governed by the concept of Predestination. This belief was based in the idea that we are...
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...Educational Psychology: Developing Learners This is a protected document. Please enter your ANGEL username and password. Username: Password: Login Need assistance logging in? Click here! If you experience any technical difficulty or have any technical questions, please contact technical support during the following hours: M-F, 6am-12am MST or Sat-Sun, 7am-12am MST by phone at (800) 800-9776 ext. 7200 or submit a ticket online by visiting http://help.gcu.edu. Doc ID: 1009-0001-158C-0000158D Jeanne Ellis Ormrod Professor Emerita, University of Northern Colorado University of New Hampshire ISBN 0-558-65860-1 Boston ● Columbus ● Indianapolis ● New York ● San Francisco ● Upper Saddle River Amsterdam ● Cape Town ● Dubai ● London ● Madrid ● Milan ● Munich ● Paris ● Montreal ● Toronto Delhi ● Mexico City ● Sao Paula ● Sydney ● Hong Kong ● Seoul ● Singapore ● Taipei ● Tokyo Educational Psychology: Developing Learners, Seventh Edition, by Jeanne Ellis Ormrod. Published by Allyn & Bacon. Copyright © 2011 by Pearson Education, Inc. Editor-in-Chief: Paul A. Smith Development Editor: Christina Robb Editorial Assistant: Matthew Buchholz Vice President, Director of Marketing: Quinn Perkson Marketing Manager: Jared Brueckner Production Editor: Annette Joseph Editorial Production Service: Marty Tenney, Modern Graphics, Inc. Manufacturing Buyer: Megan Cochran Electronic Composition: Modern Graphics, Inc. Interior Design: Denise Hoffman, Glenview Studios Photo...
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...Educational Psychology: Developing Learners This is a protected document. Please enter your ANGEL username and password. Username: Password: Login Need assistance logging in? Click here! If you experience any technical difficulty or have any technical questions, please contact technical support during the following hours: M-F, 6am-12am MST or Sat-Sun, 7am-12am MST by phone at (800) 800-9776 ext. 7200 or submit a ticket online by visiting http://help.gcu.edu. Doc ID: 1009-0001-191D-0000191E DEVELOPING LEARNERS JEANNE ELLIS ORMROD Professor Emerita, University of Northern Colorado EIGHTH EDITION ISBN 1-256-96292-9 Boston Columbus Indianapolis New York San Francisco Upper Saddle River Amsterdam Cape Town Dubai London Madrid Milan Munich Paris Montreal Toronto Delhi Mexico City São Paulo Sydney Hong Kong Seoul Singapore Taipei Tokyo Educational Psychology: Developing Learners, Eighth Edition, by Jeanne Ellis Ormrod. Published by Pearson. Copyright © 2014 by Pearson Education, Inc. Vice President and Editorial Director: Jeffery W. Johnston Vice President and Publisher: Kevin Davis Editorial Assistant: Lauren Carlson Development Editor: Christina Robb Vice President, Director of Marketing: Margaret Waples Marketing Manager: Joanna Sabella Senior Managing Editor: Pamela D. Bennett Project Manager: Kerry Rubadue Senior Operations Supervisor: Matthew Ottenweller Senior Art Director: Diane Lorenzo Text Designer: Candace Rowley Cover Designer:...
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