Free Essays: Symbolism in Hawthornes Young Goodman Brown :: Young Goodman Brown YGB

Nathaniel Hawthornes work is typically troubled with symbolism, much of it deriving from his puritan ances undertake. Hawthorne was obsessed with the themes of sin and guilt. John Roth notes that A number of recurring thematic patterns and character types appear in Hawthornes novels and tales (Roth 76). Beca pulmonary tuberculosis he is speaking of what we would later come to call the unconscious, Hawthorne extensively employed the use of symbolism, which bypasses the conscious to tap into its more(prenominal) dream- like process below (Roth 76). In his short story boyish Goodman Brown, the main character Goodman Brown goes finish up into the woods and undergoes what will be a life changing invite. Young Goodman Brown, was written in the nineteenth century alone is undoubtedly narrow in the seventeenth century, and for the early Americans in this time period the woodwind instrument was a symbol of the test of strength, courage, and endurance. It took a lot of courage to fai l there, and the young person entering the forest would not emerge the same. notwithstanding the story is more symbolic than realistic, and the dangers that Goodman Brown encounters in the forest argon not Indians or bears they are dangers of the spirit. It is no accident that such an experience should have taken place in the forest, because there is a gigantic and extremely profound tradition in American literature where experiences of this temper haven taken place in forest settings. Psychologist Bruno Betelheim observes that Since ancient time the near impenetrable forest in which we get lost has symbolized the dark, orphic near-impenetrable world of our unconscious (Betelheim, 94). However, this does not appear in Young Goodman Brown. sort of of bravely battling down the dangers of the forest and emerging a more be on person, Goodman Brown emerges a ruined man. It should not go unrecognized that Goodman Browns wife, a light-hearted, genuine woman, has the name Faith. Fait h is not by any subject matter an unusual name for a woman, especially in puritan times, but it becomes significant in the story because she is presented to us first as a very young bride with pink ribbons in her hair, almost like a child. Her pink ribbons symbolize her youth, and her name symbolizes her husbands childlike spirituality at the etymon of the story. Christianity historically has been a religion of obedience and devotion much more than one of logic, as much as the framers of the age of reason would try to argue otherwise.