Thursday, November 3, 2011
Hester Prynne & Arthur Dimmesdale
Even though both Hester and Mr.Dimmesdale lived their lives trying to repent for their sin and both even admitted to it publicly, they still were not left to be happy or together in the afterlife. They remained separated as we find out when the position of their graves are described. Why do you think this happens? Are they just used to reiterate the values of the Puritans and their ideas of predestination, or is it used to effect the reader and our emotions? What do you think?
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Even though they were forgiven, I think that they didn't bury them together because they weren't married, so they weren't officially together. Plus, they didn't have the right to be together since Hester was still Chillingworth's wife.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Cedrik I don't think it has anything to do with predestination because Hester had Pearl with Dimmesdale even though she was still married to Chillingworth. Them not being burried together is because she committed adultery with Dimmesdale and this was seen as a really bad sin in their Puritan society and the two of them could never be together becasue of the society they lived in. Not because the people said you two can't be together, because they didn't know Dimmesdale was the father until the end, but because the Puritan social order prevailed and Hester and Dimmesdale tried to break it but failed.
ReplyDeleteI think they were buried with a space between them becuase the Puritan society that the book takes place in would never have allowed them to end up together. No matter how much the readers want them to be together with a happy ending, the book wouldn't have been able to realistically end like this. They still committed a major sin and neither of them ever fully repented, becuase Hester never fully regretted her actions and Dimmesdale failed to publically repent until the end of his life.
ReplyDeleteI think that at the end of the novel they can't be together because they are sinner. The sins that they have committed are to strong and even after they confessed and went on with their lives in the end they were not able to be together. They can never escape from what they did and so they will alway be punished. I think it is because of puritan values and for the reader. The puritans did not want them together because they were not married and they had to be punished for their sins. For the readers it is away to keep the readers attached to the characters, of course we want them to be happy and live happily ever after. The end of the story is a way to tie two of the ideas of the story together. But ultimately because they have sinned they can not ever be together no matter what.
ReplyDeleteI think Dimmesdale and Hester were not able to be together because of how different their characters were at the end of the book. Hester was able to move on with her life after confessing her sin. However, Dimmesdale was not able to change and let go of his own sin, therefore they could not be together. Although she did not die like Dimmesdale, Hester still faced a punishment for her sin, by not being able to be with the one she loved. I completely agree with lauren that the reader becomes so attached to Dimmesdale and Hester's love story. We want them to be able to live happily ever after, but Hawthorne does a wonderful job of letting us accept why they can't be together. Dimmesdale was no able to move on, until it was too late so his life came to an end.
ReplyDeleteI think that Hawthorne's decision to keep Hester and Dimmesdale apart even in the after life is kind of his last, ending criticism, of the Puritans in The Scarlet Letter. I think that by doing this, he is pointing out the Puritan's inability to simply forgive Hester, even after all the good she did in the community after being sentenced. Hawthorne wrote at one point that people had begun to see the A as meaning "able" instead of "adulteress," but it's original meaning was obviously not forgotten.
ReplyDeleteAs far as effecting the reader, I found this very frustrating. It's almost as if Hawthorne is getting in the last word, preventing the happiness so long desired by the reader from ever coming into being.
in my essay for the scarlet letter my thesis talked about ambiguity. i talked about how close minded all of the characters were. i think that Hawthorne kept hester and dimmesdale apart in the end as punishment for the fact that they were so close minded. Hawthorne was trying to make a statement that maybe if they had been more open minded and thoughtful, things could have worked out. this criticizes predestination and puritan values
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