Blogs 13 and 14, Scarlet Letter Essay Topics: Initial Brainstorming and Organizing of Ideas
Blogs 13 and 14
Scarlet Letter Essay Topics: Initial Brainstorming and Organizing of Ideas
1. How does communal pressure to conform, exerted upon an individual, help to shape that person’s identity? Consider this concept by developing an argument about Hester OR Dimmesdale (choose one).
Hester: she commits a crime, which displays a certain attitude of non-conformity, but when fronted with the pressure to conform, after she has committed this crime, Hester’s outwardly displays conformity to the community, but, inside, she questions the society, and she is very different from the Puritan community and who they want her to be. This makes Hester a very conflicted person in that she does not truly feel and agree with what she outwardly shows. The pressure to conform does affect Hester’s identity in that she is forced to conform to society in terms of her behavior, and how she conducts herself in society, but the pressure to conform also makes her more and more aware of what is wrong with the Puritan community and aspects of it that she disagrees with.
Dimmesdale: Most of Dimmesdale’s pressure to conform is a result of what is assumed of a minister and it also comes down to his own pressure that he exerts upon himself. The pressure to conform deeply affects Dimmesdale, because he has committed a crime and he realizes the impact his confession of committing this crime will have on the community. If Dimmesdale admits that he committed adultery with Hester, the community will explode, the values will dissolve, and all will be chaos. The Puritan society is so focused on religion and achieving salvation and reaching heaven, that the Puritan towns were arranged so that they would be very close to each other, so the Puritan neighbors could watch over each other. If anything suspicious happened, a Puritan could be punished for putting the other members of the community’s chances of achieving salvation in jeopardy. Dimmesdale was the ultimate example and ideal of what was good and what was pure, and he, for many people, even represented God, because he was said to have such a close connection with God. Dimmesdale was venerated, the people worshiped him, and he realized that if he confessed to committing Adultery, the community and everything it was built on would crumble. The pressure to conform causes Dimmesdale to go crazy, essentially. He has midnight vigils, he sees visions, he becomes weak and sick, all because of his own guilt, which he could completely get rid of, if only he could confess to his crime. However, the pressure to conform prevents Dimmesdale from doing this.
2. Often in a relationship between the individual and the community, we see an individual’s nature or intuition at odds with the community’s values and laws. If these are so far apart, how can an individual thrive in that community? What does it take to live, if one is so alienated from the majority? Explore your answers to these questions by developing an argument about Hester OR Dimmesdale.
Hester: Hester is able to thrive in the Puritan community because she lives on her own and she pretends to conform to the society on the outside, while on the inside, she questions the community and its values
-In order to live on her own, Hester must develop her own way of life. Because her neighbors aren’t constantly watching her, she is able to live her own life. Hester lives within the general rules of the puritan community, but the isolation of where she lives allows her to not be restricted from the strict rules of the Puritan community. Because she lives so far away from the community, she has a certain amount of freedom in the way she lives and what she does.
-Hester outwardly shows what the community wants her to: conformity and being completely committed to the Puritan values in society, but inwardly, she questions the community and its values, which is very controversial because it is unclear whether she conforms or does not conform to society. I think that Hester does not conform, because, inwardly, she strongly defies the Puritan community and its values. Even though she does not outwardly show how she truly feels, what she feels in her heart and what she thinks in her head are what she really thinks and feels.
Dimmesdale: Thrives in the community in that he is venerated, but is so guilty that he becomes weak and sick. In Dimmesdale’s case, he needed more freedom and creativity to live his own life, rather than the life that the community expected him to live.
It takes strength and independence to live outside a community. One must be able to produce their own food and means of living, and they cannot be discouraged by the fact that they are essentially ostracized from the community.
3. What is the role of an outsider? To shake things up? To observe and record? To undergo his own journey? Explore your answer to this question by developing an argument about Chillingworth. Ultimately, what is Chillingworth’s purpose in the novel?
An outsider has many roles in a story. An outsider gives the reader something to compare the situation that is being looked at with another perspective or view, and an outsider also gives a new perspective on things in that he or she is not expected to be the same or conform to society. An outsider in a Puritan community, such as Chillingworth, was not expected to conform and was accepted as being different and adhering to different values than those that were upheld in the community. Someone who already lives in the community, such as Hester, on the other hand, is not allowed to be different from everyone else, and if they display non-conformist behavior, they can be punished. Chillingworth’s purpose in the novel is to give the reader a comparison between him and the Puritan characters in the book, and also to point out that, although Chillingworth was very different from the community, he was accepted as being different because of the fact that he was an outsider.
4. How does an individual’s self-imposed isolation from the community help to provide him with a sense of identity? Is the development of an internal world beneficial or healthy? Is it harmful or destructive? Explore your response to this issue by developing an argument about Dimmesdale.
midnight vigils: Dimmesdale is able to look within himself and evaluate and examine himself and his thoughts. Essentially, the process of looking within himself, although it has negative effects on Dimmesdale, living in isolation does give him a certain sense of identity because he spends a lot of time with himself, or reading, or thinking, which help him to evaluate himself an find out who he really is. The development of an internal world can be helpful for a character or person to examine themselves and see themselves for who they really are, but for Dimmesdale, this is very unhealthy and destructive because Dimmesdale punishes himself and breaks himself down. He has such a negative attitude about himself and he feels so guilty about committing adultery with Hester that analyzing himself further only points out more flaws and more things that are wrong with him. Dimmesdale is so guilty already and the “midnight vigils” seem to be his own punishment to himself for what he has done. They break him down and make him sicker and weaker, but he feels that at least he is punishing himself and in his eyes, he deserves it.
5. In moments of tension and conflict within a community, anything goes–chaos can follow–what can emerge (eventually) out of chaos? What of value, if anything, can emerge out of tension and conflict? How can a community redefine itself, if it can at all? Explore your response to this issue by developing an argument about the community.
Radical ideas can emerge out of chaos, but simple ideas that are based on the past can also emerge from chaos. This is because, anything goes, people just want order, they want a structure in their lives, and they will accept ideas that seem good to them quickly so as to create a sense of some sense of established order. Positive things can emerge out of tension and conflict. When people disagree with each other, or disagree with the community or the way things are done, they are forced to make some kind of change or compromise in order to satisfy both sides of an argument, so that chaos doesn’t break out. Chaos and tension/conflict can bring about change. If this is a change for the better, it can be seen as a value, but if it is a bad change, it is not a value, but rather something that stops the community or society from progressing. A community can redefine itself by keeping many of the old ways or things in place, but changing minor things, or just making everything less severe (like in the case of the Puritans-over the years) and eventually, as time goes on, more and more will change about the community, which will cause it to be redefined.
