Alienation and Moral Dilemma as Portrayed by Nathaniel...

Alienation and Moral Dilemma as Portrayed by Nathaniel Hawthorne Nathaniel Hawthorn was born in Salem, Massachusetts in 1804 during Puritan times. He created many stories that reflect his life experiences growing up as a Puritan. He writes stories that end with a moral that was learned through the struggles of the characters. These characters are almost always faced with a dilemma where they must choose what is right versus what is wrong. Another common theme in his writing is alienation. These concepts can be found in the stories â€Å"Young Goodman Brown,† â€Å"The Minister’s Black Veil,† and â€Å"The Birth Mark.† They are all about a life altering decision one must face and the consequences of that decision. In â€Å"Young Goodman Brown,† the†¦show more content†¦There are many obvious cues in â€Å"Young Goodman Brown.† The first example is the name, Goodman Brown. His name is symbolic of the good man he is and of the fait h he bestows. Another example is his wife named Faith, â€Å"and Faith, as the wife was aptly named.† (Nathaniel Hawthorne, â€Å"Young Goodman Brown†) She is a representation of his own religious ‘faith’ and reflects their innocence and purity, sin, the consummation between married couples, and the complications of living in a world where these qualities are mingled. When she thrust her own pretty head into the street, letting the wind play with the pink ribbons of her cap(Nathaniel Hawthorne, â€Å"Young Goodman Brown†) we associate the purity of ‘Faith’ and the ‘pink ribbons’ as a sign of the innocence and goodness of the town he must leave behind. His leaving her to enter the dark and dismal forest is symbolic of him leaving his faith in the religious sense. This is the first decision he has to make - to leave his faith and enter the evil that is the forest. It is obvious that he is frightened as he walks through the f orest. He runs into an old man there holding a staff that resembles a serpent. This is the man that he was looking for. This man is evil and Goodman Brown is confident that he can resist the temptations he is offered. It is obvious that this man is representative of the Devil who Goodman Brown so obviously fears and wants to avoid. This can be seen in their first interaction. ’You areShow MoreRelatedMoby Dick, By Edgar Melville1981 Words   |  8 Pageshonest and courageous not to try to do one or the other. If he were a religious man, he would be one of the most truly religious and reverential; he has a very high and noble nature, and better worth immortality than most of us (Braswell 3). Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote these words in his journal in 1856, speaking of his old friend Herman Melville. Melville did indeed find himself stranded between belief and unbelief, torn between the stringent and widely accepted Calvinist doctrine of New England, and