An Analysis of Symbolism: The Scarlet Letter

"A small troglodyte made his appearance here at ten minutes to six o'clock this morning, who claimed to be your nephew". -Nathaniel Hawthorne to his sister after the birth of his son.

The most beautiful symbol in Hawthorne's most successful novel, was without a doubt the name given to Hester's child. Pearl.

From the depths of the sea, snug within the hard shell clam, the pearl grows. Pearl came from the depths of extreme religion, a bastard child born to a sinful mother. She was beautiful and full of life. Blameless in the sin which produced her.

In Chapter Eight, Pearl is introduced to the pious old wind bag, Governor Bellingham, who, finding her wandering about the halls of his estate, demands to know her identity. The child tells him, "I am my mother's child...and my name is Pearl!", completely ignoring his investigation of her religious beliefs.

Pearl was segregated with her mother and the children would tease her, but this was not seen as a reason that she was "impish", rather, that she somehow deserved it. Here we see the tradition of condemnation which was prevalent in those days, (and now is prevalent as a "class" issue). The child was actually suspected of bearing some horrifying evil within her due to her sinful beginning. Whereas, Hawthorne, himself, naming her Pearl acts as her "Christ".

This actually reveals much about Hawthorne himself. His compassionate nature, as well as his superior intelligence.

Men of Hawthorne's day, and I'm sure those before, were not naive to the ways of the "harlot". The red A sewn to the breast of Hester's clothing was not for the distinguishable benefit of men or women, rather, it was to appease the jealous nature of women and cast a burden of responsibility upon the woman's psyche. Perhaps a D, for dionysian would have been more fitting.

In the last chapter of The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne muses "little Pearl, at a marriageable period of life, might have mingled her wild blood with the lineage of the devoutest Puritan among them all."

A spirited woman is good to have? Wild women can be tamed? It is here, that Hawthorne is relating male wisdom. He then removes them for a time. Until Pearl becomes a young woman. When Hester returns, she willingly puts the scarlet letter clothing back on. She cannot be forgiven. She accepts her condemnation.

Hawthorne sprung from a family involved at one time with the Salem witch trials and he was not proud of that. It is said that he altered the spelling of his last name to remove himself from that shame.

Subjectively asserting, Pearl was a little miracle of hope and babies are meant to be the pearls of human hope. For even the hardest of hearts and wild women have produced innocent babies. Such hope did Hawthorne have for Pearl, that he removed her from the awful, condemning village in which she was born and suffered ridicule.

Hawthorne possessed a quality that not many men own. He cared about the future.

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