Scarlet Letter Passion

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Passion is something possessed by all; however, the sources of all passion are not necessarily the same. When one becomes passionate about something it is very overwhelming. Passion can entirely consume a person and ultimately determine the course of his or her life. It is easy to say passion is just a human flaw, but it is that really so? Throughout his novel, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne suggests that passion is in fact a part of human nature and acceptable privately and moderately but, when passion becomes excessive and publicly displayed it is the root of sin and evil. Additionally, Hawthorne shows that passion has a great amount of power that ultimately surpasses anything else. The scarlet letter on Hester’s chest symbolizes…show more content…
“Seen in the brook, once more, was the shadowy wrath of Pearl’s image, crowned and girdled with flowers, but stamping its foot, wildly gesticulating, and, in the midst of all, still pointing its forefinger at Hester’s bosom! ‘I see what ails the child,’ whispered Hester to the clergyman, and turning pale in spite of a small effort to conceal her trouble and annoyance. ‘Children will not abide any, the slightest, change in the accustomed aspect of things that are daily before their eyes. Pearl misses something she has always seen me wear” (198-199)! Since committing her adultery, the “A” on Hester’s chest has become a part of who she is. It became not that she had just committed her sin, but she was a representation of sin. The question on hand is, was her adultery a sin? Well, the answer is no, it was a genuine act of passion, and although the A on her chest began as a symbol for adultery, it…show more content…
Pearl’s role as this works to show the complexity of passion and prove how influential it can be on the life of a person. Through most of the novel, Pearl is perceived as evil and unnatural. Her eerie demeanor along with her embodiment of passion displays how excessive and outward sin quickly translates to evil. “‘God gave me the child!’ cried she. ‘He gave me her in requital of all things else, which we had taken from me. She is my happiness!—she is my torture, none the less! Pearl keeps me here in life! Pearl punishes me too! See ye not, she is the scarlet letter, only capable of being loved, and so endowed with a millionfold the power of retribution for my sin’”(112)? Pearl is known to be a strange child; however, as time goes on she is shown to be the one thing that connects her mother to her humanity and the people around her. Like passion, she is the string that connects people to each other. Every person may be different, but one of the strongest bonds that keep them intertwined is the bonds of passion. Hawthorne manages to raise the idea that passion is evil and without it humanity would not be able to exist as a
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