Scarlet Letter 

The Scarlet Letter is a story about a woman named Hester who gave birth to a child out of wedlock and was married to another man in the meantime. This story covers sensitive topics such as religion, sin, gender equality, and social alienation. There are many meaningful life lessons that we can or still cannot but need to learn from the Scarlet Letter, which I will examine in the following paragraphs.

At the beginning of the story, only negative things about the character of Hester are revealed, just like in real life. A person is described only based on information we know, which is a "mistake" in our opinion, without knowing any details. Later in the story, it becomes clear that Hester is actually much more than an outcast, sinful character. The evolving character of Hester shows that she is a strong, helpful, and compassionate person, and she puts on a show with her wonderful motherhood. Instead of seeing her daughter as a punishment or a sin and blaming her like the other people in the town, she rejoices in their shared existence with the man she loves and does not deprive her daughter of anything, most of all her love. We can actually see the Dimmesdale character as a cowardly child. He is a character that tries to be developed throughout the story, but in my opinion, he is a little boy who is a coward and dies as a coward. A coward who could not protect his love and, out of fear, allowed the woman and her child, whose life he ruined by saying he loved her, to be excluded and humiliated for years. He would feel ashamed of society and harm himself when no one was there, but I can't stop thinking about this: Could the pain of someone who suffers the punishment of an open injustice and whose heart hurts be the same as that of someone who harms himself for the sake of a show he will later perform away from public attention? Or is shame only for women? As you can understand from this sentence, our little chicken Dimmesdale is applauded at the end of the story by opening his chest like Superman and showing the wounds he inflicted. Are you surprised? I wasn't surprised at all.

As for our little girl Pearl, she is a character I cannot sympathize with. She is a selfish character who I think is not forced by this situation because her normal life is isolation, and she takes advantage of her mother's isolation. Of course, it is easy to judge from the outside like this, I can't even imagine the traumas she experienced, but I don't think what she went through could be bad for her without learning what the concept of good and bad is. For Hester, if we talk about her daughter, we can say that she is the only reason she holds on to life. Society sees it as a reminder of her sin, but I just laughed at it. I don't think anything that happens between God and man is something that people can take credit for and watch over morality. In fact, combining religion with the court system or trying to manipulate people with religion is not something we are unfamiliar with, but the biggest comedy is that it is always a part of what is condemned by those who do this and use religion.

Hawthorne illustrated Puritan Culture in his book. Given the intertwining of the court system and religion, Hester Prynne's sentence served as a clear example of how harsh the elites were towards people who disobeyed the law and sinned. This was another example of the society's morality and unwavering devotion to religion. At least that's what they really meant. The fact that Dimmesdale is repeatedly ignored for committing the same sin also shows the strong belief that men are superior. Men who held positions of authority in the government and church and were the only people authorized to hold those positions inflicted the punishment on her. As always, men had a say in women's bodies and lives. Chillingworth is a hypocrite because he enjoys seeing his patients suffer while claiming to be a doctor of the best class. Chillingworth promised to care for his patients' physical and mental health, but he actually enjoyed their suffering. In addition to the examples mentioned above, Hawthorne exposes the hypocrisy present in Puritan culture and shows that perhaps the Puritans were not so "clean" after all. The Scarlet Letter contained numerous examples of the Puritan way of life, including the legal system, moral code, and religious beliefs. The main message of the novel is not how the consequences of your actions may affect the people around you, but actually being about our own happiness while submitting to the right or wrong of others. We see Hester commit a “sin” in the name of love, but the after-effects have caused both her and her daughter Pearl to be put under the spotlight and alienated from society. We can also see that Chillingworth is so affected by his wife's infidelity that he attempts to harm his patient, Dimmesdale, who is silently suffering from the guilt of infidelity. But here again, the person who is thought to have caused the mistake is blamed, rather than the one who made the mistake. The biggest difference between the novel and the film adaptation is the plot itself. In the film, Chillingworth becomes devoted to uncovering the identity of Hester's lover, which leads him to start a conflict between Native Americans and American colonists and later kill himself. Dimmesdale reveals his identity as the little girl's father and Hester's forbidden love, and they escape to Carolina with their little girl to start a new life together without Hester's red.

Even though this is not what is meant, the reality that I understand and cannot stand is the misogyny that has not changed from past to present. It is the letter of shame for something that is applauded when a man does it, but a woman has to carry it until the end of her life. injustice has never developed over centuries. But it is the result of women's efforts and never giving up despite the scarlet letter on their necks. Therefore, the letter that should be moved should not be the adulterous "A" but the amazing "A".