Hamlet en11
True redemption of sin comes from suffering. When a person goes against what they judge as wrong, the only way to be freed of the guilt that their actions have caused is to feel the pain emotionally from the guilt of their sin. The guilt they feel on the inside and the shame they have to face others is their atonement. Feeling that guilt shows that the person has recognized their sin as wrong and the constant reminder from the pain of guilt and shame of the sin forces the person to change their ways. Recognizing the sin and changing the ways that are inside the person that could possibly justify the sin, is the definition of true atonement and redemption. Others find that emotional suffering is insubstantial, and they need something more tangible to truly suffer from. Therefore, they turn their manifested emotional pain into physical pain by means of self injury, to have the physical pain serve as the atonement instead of the emotional suffering since the person cannot relate to their emotional pain and by not relating to the emotional pain they cannot use it as an atonement because they don't experience it as the real pain that it is. Nathaniel Hawthorne's 1850 novel The Scarlet Letter shows how each type of suffering (emotio
Dimmesdale and Hester both couldn't have been redeemed without suffering. In Dimmesdale's case he needed to suffer internally to atone to himself and then confessing was easy for him and even brought a smile to his face. In Hester's case she needed to suffer physically to atone emotionally and by suffering on the outside she would relive her internal pain of regret. nal and physical) redeems the person and how the person is affected by his/her suffering. Set in a New England town in the 1640's, two characters with the same sin of adultery atone and redeem themselves differently but both are redeemed in the end. Hester atones physically while Dimmesdale, her lover and reverend of the community, atones emotionally but both are only redeemed when they each atone in both ways of atonement, and only through suffering. Hester must atone for her sin physically for everyone to see but also for herself because she can't handle the manifestation of the guilt inside her. It overwhelms her to have an illegitimate child to raise on her own, to be the symbol of evil in the community and to know that she has sinned not only according to society's laws but her own morals of right and wrong. She transforms her emotional, undealable burden into deliberate physical pain by wearing her scarlet A. Hester never cries throughout the story, she lets the A cry for her. Crying would relieve her of some of her burden and she's physically punishing herself by not letting herself have this relief. The A serves as a symbol of her path of atonement, by showing others that she has sinned and by reminding herself of her sin. She knows that the A will eventually give her the relief of her burden of guilt and regret inside of her so she lets the A cry. Hester's emotional guilt is not just from committing adultery but it started building up inside her when she married Chillingworth. She sought out this love that she was denied from Chillingworth and found it in Dimmesdale. Dimmesdale gave her the love that she was missing but in th
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Approximate Word count = 1362
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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