“Young Goodman Brown” is a short narrative written by Nathaniel Hawthorne about a immature adult male who has to digest the experience of enticements of evil and dance with the Satan. Goodman Brown is a immature grownup who has influences all around him rocking him towards evil that he felt were dependable function theoretical accounts. Hawthorne utilizations literary devices to expose many different significances in this narrative. In the narrative. the most common devices are imagery and symbolism. The imagination used is to assist the reader understand the symbolism he is portraying.
He uses these devices to develop a subject to the narrative and supply different facets of good and evil. Many people now a yearss autumn under the enticement of wickedness. even Christians. Having religion with God is normally seen as a good relationship to hold and gives you a positive mentality on life. but after losing that religion. your universe darkens and non everything seems every bit bright as it did. Hawthorne’s usage of symbolism and imagination helps to develop the subject of Christians losing religion through enticement and peer force per unit area as Goodman Brown does.
Hawthorne uses symbolism throughout the whole narrative to connote influences of immorality around Goodman Brown. The immature adult male decides to take a journey one dark because he feels compelled to. His married woman Faith begged him non to travel. but to remain at that place with her and keep off the journey until the forenoon. Hawthorne uses his wife’s name as Faith non by accident ; she symbolizes his Faith in God and the artlessness left in Goodman Brown. Faith has on her individual pink threads ; these threads represent the artlessness in Faith because the colour pink is known as artlessness.
Brown does non hold to his wife’s wants and departs on his journey right around sundown. Brown must go forth Faith behind while he goes on his escapade. by that Hawthorne means he non merely leaves his married woman behind. but besides his religious religion. He travels through the forest which in itself is symbolism. He walks through the wood at dark when it’s dark ; Brown non holding much visibleness the farther into the wood he goes is stand foring his confusion with life right now. non cognizing where to travel or what to make.
Throughout the narrative. the forest grows darker and darker. stand foring God’s visible radiation melting off and Brown losing his religion. “The small town is a topographic point of visible radiation and order. while the wood is a topographic point of darkness and unknown panics. ” ( Xia-Chun ) Brown so meets a adult male on his journey ; this adult male is really influential in the narrative. The adult male is the devil transporting a staff that Hawthorne describes as serpent-like typifying the scriptural mention of a snake being an evil devil. In the Book of Genesis. the snake is the chief enticement Eve has to seek the fruit of the out tree.
Similar to that. Goodman Brown accepts the devil’s offer of his staff. or snake. in order to go quicker. Brown fell under the enticement of the Satan. The farther into the forest Brown goes. the more he learns about his equals and aged and the trades with the Satan that they have made. therefore doing Brown to lose religion. Once he is able to acquire back into the town of Salem. although he was able to defy the Satan. he is still a changed adult male. Before his journey. he thought the universe was a perfect topographic point and no 1 was capable of aching anyone or perpetrating the act of wickedness.
The relationship between Creator and animal. and between adult male and fellow adult male. is destroyed by sin…” ( Fairbanks 25 ) After the journey. he realized that there is a batch of darkness and wickedness in the universe and that more people than he realized were capable of unthinkable things and transgressing in ways he ne’er would hold dreamt of. Hawthorne uses a good sum of symbolism in this narrative. most of it is obvious symbolism that he wants any reader to understand. non by analysing profoundly but merely by holding some common cognition. Therefore. he uses imagination to truly assist the reader recognize the symbolism he is connoting.
At the beginning of the narrative. Hawthorne notes that Brown is get downing this journey right at sundown ; the idea of sundown is considered light melting off and finally going darkness. The usage of this imagination provides the idea of symbolism that the immature adult male is traveling into the unknown darkness and his visible radiation. which is a symbol besides for his religion. is melting. Another good usage of imagination is in the beginning of the narrative when Hawthorne writes “And Faith. as the married woman was competently named. thrust her ain pretty caput into the street. allowing the air current drama with the pink threads of her cap. while she called to Goodman Brown” ( 435 ) .
Hawthorne is utilizing the air current to non merely stress the pink threads Faith wears and aid readers understand that those threads have significance and is a symbol to her artlessness. but besides to explicate the beauty of nature in Salem before his head turns pessimistic and the town slices to darkness. Brown’s position of the town at the beginning before he was revealed all of the wickedness was a bright. pleasant town full of true-spirited people. The experience of this one dark in the wood alterations Goodman Brown for the remainder of his life. for it poisons his relationship with his married woman. isolates him from his neighbours. and destroys his ability to idolize God. ” ( Easterly 55 ) After his trip with the Satan. he was a changed adult male and saw the town with blackened eyes. merely able to see the incorrect in people and the capablenesss of the Satan. Hawthorne develops multiple subjects during the narrative of Young Goodman Brown utilizing the literary devices of symbolism and imagination.
In stating the narrative of the journey Brown embarks on. Hawthorne brings the immature adult male through the forest explaining to him that he is non the lone 1 that has fell under the enticement of the Satan and wickedness. For illustration. Goodman Brown looked up to his male parent and gramps merely as any immature grownup adult male would. When he was informed of the impossible idea of them doing a trade with the Satan: I have been every bit good acquainted with your household as with of all time a 1 among the Puritans ; and that’s non trifle to state. I helped your gramps. the constable. when he lashed the Quaker adult female so cleverly through the streets of Salem.
And it was I that brought your male parent a pitch-pine knot. kindled at my ain fireplace. to put fire to an Indian small town. in King Philip’s war. ( Hawthorne 436-437 ) The Satan stating Brown about this was a surprise to Goodman because he ever looked up to his male parent and gramps and ne’er imagined that either of them would be associated with the Satan. The Satan shows Goodman Brown the familiarities. loved 1s. public figures of the town who have all fallen into the Satans trap and have sinned even when Brown looked up to them and thought none of them had evil in them. …young naif adult male who accepts both society in general and his fellowmen as persons at their ain rating. is in one awful dark presented with the vision of human Evil. and is of all time afterwards “A after part. a sad. a darkly meditative. a distrustful. if non despairing man…”” ( Fogle 207 ) The incredible cognition given to him take him into the devil’s trap and no longer saw the universe as a pleasant topographic point ; he now merely saw the immorality in people.
Merely as anyone today would make. Brown fell under enticement and peer force per unit area and became a figure of wickedness. Hawthorne explains throughout the narrative about the enticements and peer force per unit area of immorality that Brown faces. The idea of seeing childhood graven images that were perfect in your head involved in trades with the Satan could take you to experience otherwise about those people and oppugn your ain lessons learned from them.
Sing these people around you engaged in wickedness and falling into enticements brings a batch of equal force per unit area to you and leads you to rethink your life style and do you vulnerable to making things you wouldn’t usually. He explains that Christians lose faith easy and fall into wickedness through the narrative of immature Goodman Brown utilizing symbolism and imagination.
