Scarlet Essay

Essay Topic 4

The forest is seen as a nesting ground for the black man as he roams around looking for his next victim to take with him to the underworld. It is a dark and shady region, with its tall and dense trees. It seems to eclipse the part of the sun that would have given the forest some life. As this primeval region is believed to be the Devil’s land, no one can feel safe trotting though it. The forest symbolizes evil; it is the physical representation of the fear of sin the villagers have. Since it is the place where many sins occur, it is well-concealed, and is away from the watchful eye of society. Yet, in the books The Scarlet Letter and in The Crucible the forest seems to play the role of a safe haven for those that have sinned, contradicting the accepted understanding of the village as a safe haven for villagers.
In The Crucible the forest was seen as dangerous and a home for the Devil. So much so that it was a sin for anyone to enter the forest. With the harsh teachings of the Puritan lifestyle, many people were becoming so agitated that people were accusing others of being witches. With accusations flying all over, many villages suffered because of the pandemonium witchcraft created. As for Salem, the people were on edge because so many people were already accused of witchcraft. So to escape this wild village, Abigail Williams found the forest as a place of safety, to escape the turmoil.
From the uproar in her village, Abigail decided to bring some of her friends and Tituba to dance in the forest and perform many of Tituba’s native rituals. They danced under the night of the forest shade where it would be difficult to see, partaking in acts which would be considered witchcraft if they were caught. These sinners felt free from the establishment of their Puritan society. They could not be judged, they could not be undermined, and all they felt was the bliss of pure happiness in a place were only evil took place.
As a result, when these ladies returned to the village they were targeted as being witches because they were caught. People believed they were selling their souls in the forest because that is where the devil is located. Abigail wants to hide the fact that she was in the forest. She tells the other girls, “Now look you. All of you. We danced. And Tituba conjured Ruth Putnam's dead sisters. . . I will come to you in the black of some terrible night and I will bring a pointy reckoning that will shudder you” (Miller 20). Abigail starts to threaten the other girls and forces them to never speak a word of what happened in the forest, because people will assume that the only reason anyone should have been there is to meet with the devil; they wanted to escape and be free. When Tituba was blamed she blamed Abigail, and likewise, Abigail placed the blame on someone else. This lead to people being falsely accused, and many deaths within the village.
In The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne was forced to wear the scarlet letter. She builds her home, on the outskirts of town, in the forest; far from the village where no one can see her. For if no one can see her, then they can put her adulterous ways out of the villagers hands. The forest’s “Comparative remoteness put it out of the sphere of that special activity which already marked the habits of the emigrants” (Hawthorne 75).
From this quote, Hester chooses to live in this remote area to seclude herself from the village and have a peaceful haven to return to. She chooses the forest instead of the town because when she enters the village there is a bubble of seclusion around her. The villagers only see the scarlet letter upon her bosom; and because of it they want nothing to do with this sinner. They will only judge and observe Hester from a distance.
Certain outcasts also turn to the demonic forest because they have indirectly sinned and need a way out. In The Scarlet Letter, little Pearl is an outcast in her home of Boston. Even though she has yet to commit a sin, she is the physical manifestation of her mother’s sin. When Pearl entered into the forest, she would play around and look like a forest sprite jumping from place to place. As she is in this forest the author points out, “Pearl resembled the brook, inasmuch of her life gushed from a well-spring as mysterious [. . .] But, unlike the little stream, she danced and sparkled, and prattled airily along her course” (168- 169). According to this quote a little brook in a dark forest is the best way to describe an elfish seven year old girl as opposed to the city. It is clear here that Pearl is one with nature, meaning that she does not fit in the town. She is a sinner, and a sinner’s place is the forest. That is where Pearl is safe; that is where she belongs.
In The Scarlet Letter, there is an interaction between Hester Prynne and Dimmesdale that further enhances the theme of the forest being a safe haven. They are both sinners; therefore, they know that they do not belong in the village. In the village Hester Prynne was judged by everyone’s reaction to the scarlet letter. She was called a harlot by some while others thought she should be put to death. She publicly bore her sin and is suffering each day in the town. She is not as beautiful as she once was, her beauty is diminishing, her hair has been rolled up, and the richness in her cheeks has started to fade. Arthur Dimmesdale bore his sin privately with God. He can not atone for his sin because he believes it will ruin the entire Christian faith in his colony; to him that faith is the most important thing because everybody believes he has not sinned, which keeps the people’s faith alive. Dimmesdale “well knew—subtle, but remorseful hypocrite the he was! [. . .] he loved the truth and loathed the lie, as few men ever did. Therefore, above all things else, he loathed his miserable self!” (131). Everyday he must preach about how wretched he is and how he is a hypocrite. It is up to him to bear the weight of all the sins by himself, and is the reason he has become so weak and feeble.
Contrasting with how their lives were in the village, in the forest, there is a difference. In the forest these two can actually interact and show their true feelings toward one another. It is here that a complete shift happens in these characters. Dimmesdale believed that, “The germ of it was dead in me! O Hester, thou art my better angel! . . . This is already the better life!” Why did we not find it sooner?” (182). This shift in Dimmesdale’s character is from feeling burdened with his own sin and getting weaker as an after effect; a stronger man without a care in the world. By changing locations to this haven Dimmesdale has become better, and is willing to do all the things he could not do before while in the village. When Hester sees that her lover has changed, she removes her scarlet letter. As she throws away the scarlet letter she also removes the “burden of shame” (182), that was on her soul: “She had not known the shame until she felt the weight . . . her sex, her youth, and the whole richness of her beauty came back from what men call the irrevocable past” (182- 183). This shift in Hester’s character has brought back her beauty and her freedom. These two lovers can now love each other and their daughter Pearl.
To many people the forest has been seen as a dark and scary region. Many people would relate the forest to evil because it is away from their town; it is an uncharted area.
It can block out the sunlight; so light will not be able to penetrate the gangling trees of the forest. And to the people the only thing the rejects light is darkness. Hence meaning the forest is evil. There are times in the forest when noises occur and it cannot be explained why it happens. Other times while in the forest, strange, black figures can be seen roaming around the forest, but it is to dark to see who the person might be. The legend of the Black Man may have originated from a misconception like this.
In the books The Scarlet Letter and The Crucible the forest seems to play the role of a safe haven for those that have sinned, contradicting the accepted understanding of the village as a safe haven for villagers. To sinners the forest seems to provide certain shifts in the characters and seems to rejuvenate them from their lives in the village. The villagers could not understand how safe the forest might be because they were not being looked down upon in their village. To a sinner the forest provided everything a village could not; a sense of security and freedom.