Comparisons between Hawthorne's characters

[freespiritjill]

Hi. I'm writing an essay for my honors class and i need new incite on the topic which is as follows:

Compare and contrast Hester Prynne to the following characters as a whole:
-Faith from Young Goodman Brown
-Georgiana from The Birthmark
-Beatrice from Rappaccini's Daughter
-Robin from My Kinsman Major Molineux
-Esther, Old Humphrey's Daughter who runs away to join the circus, from Ethan Brand
-The old people longing to be young from Dr. Heidegger's Experiment.

Any help I can get would be great!!

[Jean-Baptiste]

Is this a topic that you chose yourself, or was it preset? Do you have to find a place for each of these seven characters, or will you choose several of the more intriquing ones? I could only comment on the first four, not having read the last three works. (Allow me to answer with more questions.) Do you feel that Hawthorne's heroines hold similar positions in their respective stories. Do you find any common traits amongst them? I would think that they all hold in common a certain ability for allurement, but also carry a somewhat opposing attribute, which casts them all in a less becoming light.

That's all I'll say. It should give you a starting place. Welcome to the forums, freespiritjill! I hope you won't think of it as merely a place for help with essays. ;)

[trismegistus]

I would think that they all hold in common a certain ability for allurement, but also carry a somewhat opposing attribute, which casts them all in a less becoming light.
Faith??? I don't see it at all.

[Jean-Baptiste]

Young Goodman Brown could never look at her the same after the ceremony in the woods. He felt that she had caved in, had somehow betrayed him. That is what I'm considering her opposing attribute. No?

[freespiritjill]

Thank you for your help. I'm doing okay at writing it, but my teacher extended the length that it has to be. So I need to find more information. Yes this was a preset topic. I am psychoanalyzing and overanalyzing this story and my teacher says the ideas are easy to see. But I do not see any. One thing I have noticed is that the characters downfall is caused by another character, ie Faith due to Young Goodman Brown and Georgiana's death is due to Aylmer's experiments. Other ideas are appreciated still!

[trismegistus]

Young Goodman Brown could never look at her the same after the ceremony in the woods. He felt that she had caved in, had somehow betrayed him. That is what I'm considering her opposing attribute. No?
But his thoughts on her character don't shape her character especially since he (and we) have no clue whether or not she accepted the "communion" or even if the ceremony existed in the first place.

On your first post, I don't see how she's alluring; she's essentially innocence embodied. Also she's an allegorical figure so I'm not sure what opposing idea she might contain. She's faith.


One thing I have noticed is that the characters downfall is caused by another character, ie Faith due to Young Goodman Brown
What makes you think Faith suffers a downfall?

If I were to do something with her and Hester, I'd argue that both are unjustly persecuted (Faith by Brown, Hester by the community). Of course one could make the argument that Hester deserves her fate by the standards of the day. Faith, on the other hand, is entirely undeserving of Brown's treatment at the end of the story. Both witness their husbands' (Hester's spiritual husband that is) destruction by their own hypocrisy.

[freespiritjill]

Thanks for all your help. It didnt matter. I got my paper back and I got a 76%. Favoritist teachers are horrible. Tennis players (he's our schools tennis coach) who didn't even write a paper got a higher grade than many of us who deserved higher grades.