Currently Reading: A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
Before I dive into this long overdue post, I’d like to apologize once again for how long it’s been. I never really imaged that I’d have a procrastination problem with a hobby, but I guess I underestimated my extensive procrastination skills. However, in this case, I believe a large part of the problem stemmed from a lack of inspiration. I wasn’t really moved one way or the other to write about The Scarlet Letter yet I felt obligated to write a post about it before moving on to anything else. But I’ve decided to bite the bullet and just write it!
Secondly, for those who don’t know (i.e. those who don’t
write or have writer-friends), November is National Novel Writing Month. In
case it isn’t obvious from the title, NaNoWiMo is, according to the all-mighty
Wikipedia, “an annual internet-based creative writing project which challenges
participants to write 50,000 words of a new novel between November 1 and 30.”
Apparently, I’m not the only writer who needs a fire lit under her butt to get
work done.
The reason I bring this up is not because I intend to write
a novel – if I could come up with a remotely original idea, maybe I would – but
because I’d like to use it as an opportunity to similarly motivate myself. Thus
do I embark on my own personal project for the month:
Nine New November Novel
‘Ntries 2012.
Believe me, I hate myself for the “ ‘ntries,” but I really
wanted to keep up the alliteration. But that’s right! I have been bad and lazy
enough! And now I’m setting a very modest goal for myself of completing nine
new posts (including this one) by the end of the month beginning today!
Don’t be surprised if I post eight more entries on November
30th…
Anyways, ambition and apologies aside, time to finally share my thoughts about The Scarlet Letter. Here’s hoping they
aren’t a let down given the wait.
First, I have to say that this is one of the top novels that
I was always stunned I didn’t read in secondary school. It seems like such
classic high school reading. After all, pregnancy out of wedlock and forbidden
love that’s punished; social groups ostracizing one or two individuals; and an
intense message of abstinence all seem like exactly
the kind of book high school officials would want in the hands of
hormone-crazed teenagers. But apparently not.
Initially, I was relieved I didn’t have to read this book
because man! Does Nathaniel Hawthorne enjoy his descriptions! I mean, was it
really necessary to describe the “ghosts of bygone meals” (pg. 19) of the
patriarch of the Custom-House in such crazy details? Did I need to know about the “tenderloin of
beef, hind-quarter of veal, a spare-rib of pork, a particular chicken or a
remarkably praiseworthy turkey” (pg. 19)? Or about how “the chief tragic
event of [his] life… was his mishap with a certain goose… which, at the table,
proved so inveterately tough that the carving-knife would make no impression on
its carcass” (pg. 19)? This isn’t even that prominent a character and he gets
three solid pages of description, one of which is just about the feasts he has
enjoyed! Seriously Hawthorne?? Why??
Don’t get me wrong! I’m all for a well-crafted descriptive
paragraph! Sometimes I find they are the best part of the novel – like in Their Eyes Were Watching God. In fact,
when people tell me they often skip over the descriptions in books, it bugs me quite a bit. After all, the author deliberately put in those descriptions and I like to
believe they serve some purpose beyond allowing the author to self-indulge. The only exception I can
come up with for this is Steinbeck. Read The
Pearl and try to argue with me that all those descriptions serve a purpose
other than putting the reader into a comatose state.
But I massively digress! My point is that the more I read The Scarlet Letter,
the more I realized just how telling Hawthorne’s descriptions often are –
extensive/excessive as they may be. In particular, I found the passages about
Hester Prynne’s daughter, Pearl, the most fascinating. Perhaps this is because
Hawthorne seems to develop a theme that has Nature and civilization somewhat at
odds with each other and Pearl is the embodiment of the cross-over: a child naturally born from love, but born into a strict society that instantly makes her an outcast.
Nature is free and untamed as “that wild, heathen… never subjugated by human law, nor illumined by higher truth” (pg. 203), making it both wonderful and dangerous. Meanwhile, Hester's story shows how civilization is the opposite: it is organized and comforting, yet restrictive and miserable. Thus Hawthorne explores one of the most complicated puzzles of humanity: is it better to be dangerously wild, but free in Nature or miserably restricted, but safe in society?
It’s a fact that humans are social
beings and therefore have a biological need to be part of a group. However, humans also need
structure and hierarchies once the group reaches a certain size or all will fall into
chaos. The latter world of structure and rules is the one in which Hester Prynne and her lover the Reverend
Dimmesdale reside, miserable out of the group and miserable within it. However, their daughter Pearl appears to reside more in the former world. Ostracized from the womb, she’s never known what it is to
belong and feels “gentler [in the forest] than in the grassy-margined streets
of the settlement, or in her mother’s cottage” (pg. 205); she aligns more with
Nature. She is repeatedly described as “elfish” (pg. 154), “an airy sprite”
(pg. 92), and a “nymph-child” (pg. 205). Yet Hawthorne also depicts her as
somewhat devilish in her elfishness. She is both natural and completely
unnatural since she is free from society. It makes her somewhat wild and
dangerous like the forest, but it interestingly, makes her the happiest of all
the characters.
It seems that Pearl embodies the human free from
civilization and her mother and father are the humans completely imprisoned by
civilization. While the parents seem more noble and admirable characters, the
daughter appears much happier. So which is the more desirable situation?
Personally, I’d rather not live in a puritanical society,
but it’s hard to say whether Hawthorne agrees.
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