Role Of Hawthorne

’s Women Essay, Research Paper

The Role of Hawthorne s Women

Authors of the nineteenth century have long ignored the fact that women

had equal roles in the founding of this country. Nathaniel Hawthorne was one of the first writers to feature women as prominent figures in his literary works. He got the idea to use women characters from Sir Walter Scott, who changed the role of women characters forever when he wrote the novel, The Heart of Midlothian. In this work, no stereotypical roles were assigned to his female characters such as Magdalene, Eve, madonna, the wife of Bath, drudge, or vampire. In Hawthorne s works, The Scarlet Letter, Rappaccinni s Daughter, and The Birth-mark, each female character is portrayed as unique and unconventional. Hawthorne expanded the characters of women through his use of five recurring themes: the nature of women, the power of passion, the discovery of evil, the problem of guilt, alienation, pride, and initiation.

According to some, Hawthorne is able to capture the beauty and intensity of the female character because of his upbringing. Hawthorne grew up with two sisters and a widowed mother. He married Sophia Peabody, an intellectual and emotional peer, and together they raised two outspoken daughters. To Hawthorne, women were companions, not threats, which would explain why he thought the choice of a female main character was simply a natural necessity. Almost no women characters existed in American literature before Hawthorne, and interestingly, Roy Male seems to be the only Hawthorne scholar to note the scarcity of women as major characters in early American literature. Male writes:

In this predominately masculine enterprise [writing], the role of

women has always been anomalous. The notorious ineptitude of

the heroine in Western films serves as a constant reminder that in a

world of movement in space, a woman was simply an encumbrance.

Her alternatives were to remain behind in the ancestral covered wagon

and the squatter s hut. Without destiny and flamboyant marksman-

ship of Hurricane in the dime novels. Before The Scarlet Letter no

American writer understood the values of time, tragedy, or woman-

hood well enough to create a woman in fiction.

In Hawthorne s most widely recognized novel, The Scarlet Letter, he uses two of his recurring themes accompanied by an additional theme, which was used in this work only. The Scarlet Letter uses the themes of alienation, the nature of women, and show how the main character deals with the punishment given to her. In this novel, which takes place in the 1650s, the prominent character is Hester Prynne, who is accused of adultery and forced to wear a scarlet A on her chest for the rest of her time here on earth as punishment. Puritans of seventeenth century Massachusetts so seriously condemned adultery, which was prohibited by the Seventh Commandment, that it was often times punished by death. The character of Hester was seen as lady-like too, after the manner of the feminine gentility of those days; characterized by a certain state and dignity, rather than a delicate, evanescent, and indescribable grace, which is now recognized as its indication. (Letter, 50). Hester was a very courageous woman, who would not divulge the identity of the father of her child. She felt that her child must seek a heavenly Father; [because Pearl] shall never know an earthly one! Upon hearing this conversation, Pearl s father, Reverend Dimmesdale said the Hester possessed wondrous strength and generosity of a woman s heart [because] she [would] not speak. (Hawthorne 64).

The punishment of wearing a scarlet letter is a historical fact, which inspired Hawthorne to write this novel. The scarlet A that Hester wore was a constant display of her sin that anyone could see. It burned upon Hester s breast cast a fiery glow upon her, which isolated her from mankind. As the story developed, the townspeople no longer saw Hester as a person. The scarlet letter becomes the dominant figure, and everything is tinged with sinister glare of the red A . Hester s frailty is developed as a natural and necessary result of the Scriptural law of marriage, which held her hopelessly to her vows and made her heart an easy victim to the adulterer. Hester did not deliberately calculate to commit the deadly sin of adultery nor did she deliberately plan to injure anyone she encountered. Hester fully acknowledged her sin while boldly displaying it to both herself and her townspeople. Hester proudly displayed that she had nothing to hide by elaborately embroidering her symbol of shame, dressing her daughter Pearl in scarlet, and wearing the scarlet A long after she could have removed it. Her salvation lies in the truth.

Hester learns from her sin and grows strong as a result of her acceptance of her punishment. For Hester, the scarlet letter was her passport into regions where other women dared not tread. Shame, Despair, Solitude! These had been her teachers stern and wild ones and they had made her strong. At the end of the novel, Hester emerged from her experiences as a respected woman capable of helping others, and she has the happiness that comes from being at peace with oneself, one s fellow men, and with one s God.

Hester s pride sustained her from the opening scene until she dies still wearing the scarl

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