Nathaniel hawthorne Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Nathaniel hawthorne - Essay Example Particularly, I will compare these protagonists, Hilda and Prynne Hester. The Marble Faun is a story that tells of Donatello, a faun, who found himself among the human race. The narrative explored themes such as innocence corrupted by passion, the progress from a guilty despair to penitence and responsibility, and happiness regained but tinged with sorrow. This would also be the theme examined in The Scarlet Letter as the novel criticized the Puritan morality with characters created to challenge not only traditional basis of morality but also the more recent foundation in the gender conventions of the nineteenth century. Few characters are more objectionable to the modern reader than Hawthorne’s Hilda, the daughter of the Puritans. She is accused of being egotistic and frigid, and her rejection of Miriam is considered inexcusable. The principle that Hilda represented was that of a mortal’s first duty to his own salvation. While Hawthorne sufficiently underscored the objectionable characteristics of Hilda as seen and highlighted by other characters, he strived to suggest that the unswerving virtue in the pursuit of her salvation, though others may find selfish, is a valid and important religious conduct. He stressed this through Kenyon’s character: while he depended upon a reasoned morality, he believed that Hilda’s heart knows the truth and that like a steel blade to which she is twice compared, she sliced a clear distinction between good and evil. In the end, in an approach that would also be employed in Scarlet Letter’s Prynne, Hawthorne, would not condemn but so ften Hilda’s flaws as some form of redemption. The daughter of the Puritan was placed in a position to that in which she had found Miriam when she rejected her and hence, carried an overwhelming burden and needs to confide in someone. The ensuing experiences would let us find Hilda changed. She still affirmed that there