Changes Of A Scarlet Letter Essay Research

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In the first true American novel, The Scarlet Letter, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, there is an inspiring young women named Hester Prynne. This character changes from the beginning of the novel to chapter thirteen.

At the outset of this book Hester is a very beautiful and strong women. When she walks out of the prison she is very beautiful. ?The young woman was tall, with a figure of perfect elegance . . . she had dark and abundant hair, so glossy that it threw off the sun with a gleam, and a face which, besides being beautiful from regularity of feature . . . the impressive belonging to a marked brow and deep black eyes?(51). The author show Hester?s beauty threw phsyical appearance. She is also a very strong woman as she stands up on the scaffold. While she stands there her head is kept high and she doesn?t cover of the scarlet letter. She tries to be as proud and brave as she can, while on the scaffold. Here again the author shows that Hester has a lot of emotional strenght.

In chapter thirteen, just seven years later, Hester undergoes some changes in both her beauty and strength. Hester?s beauty is no longer the perfect as it once was. ?It was a sad transformation, too, that her rich and luxuriant hair had either been cut off or was so completely hidden by a cap, that not a shining lock of it ever once gushed into the shunshine?(160). Her beauty is leaving her and she is becoming ugly. Hester?s strength, that was so built up at the ouset of the novel, now is gone. ?At times, afearful doubt strove to posses her soul, whether it were better to send Pearl at once to heaven, and go herself to such futurity as Eternal Justice should provide?(163). Hester contimplates suicide, and this is her low point in the book.

In just The Scarlet Letter?s first half of the novel, Nathaniel Hawthorne shows Hester Prynne?s beauty and strength go from a great statious to to something sadden and ugly.