Scarlet Letter Analytical Essay

Societies are often formed with certain ideologies in mind, as groups of people come together looking for others who think like them. Then, the ideology begins to dominate as laws are formed and consequently change is resisted, even when the ideology is flawed. This process goes unnoticed by those involved, why should they question it? Why go deeper? On the other hand, an outsider of that society can be free of that society's bias, and have a clearer perspective of it is those who see what truly needs to be done, and what needs to be changed. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a prime example of an outside-in view of a society. It contrasts the nature of the puritan town of Boston against the wildness of a girl who grew up outside of the town, Pearl. In doing so he reveals a society that values dullness, intolerance, and suppressiveness.

From the very beginning Pearl was different, she was a baby born from her parents sin. When her mother stood trial for her sin she was there. Even more then the titicular scarlet letter, Pearl was a sign of sin; the sign that shown indecisively what Hester had done, and both were exiled because of this. “An imp of evil, emblem and product of sin, she had no right among christened infants” (53). This shows the intolerance of puritan culture, for, in most religious
A society that is in some ways still existing even past Hawthorn’s time, to this very day. We as society still have puritanical ideas, that need to draw inside the lines, just to a lesser extent. Pearl is just as good of a mirror to our culture as she was back in the day. We are in some ways just as dull, intolerant and supressive as the puritans were, but we have a lot more outsiders to point it out. The world is becoming bigger by the second and things are bound to change, as they have done before. Perhaps another wild child is all it will take, to change it for