In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, life is centered around a rigid, Puritanistic-structured society in which one is unable to divulge his or her innermost thoughts and secrets. We get the honor of feeling those right along with the characters. Every human being needs the opportunity to express how they truly feel, or the emotion is bottled up until it becomes volatile. Beings our puzzle is placed in a puritanical setting the author gives us an inside ear to all of the "naughty" conversations and doings that we wouldn't see if we were in the era along with the characters. A secret hiding place, if you will, for them to divulge the enter most wrongdoings in the novel. Luckily, for the four main characters, and us Hawthorne gives us a forest much like something out of one of Poe's great gruesome poems. A dark and mysterious dwelling, and symbol, for the charact

"Whither leads yonder forest-track? Backward to the settlement, thou sayest! Yea; but onward, too! Deeper it goes, and deeper into the wilderness... until, some few miles hence, the yellow leave will show no vestige of the white man's tread." (p. 187)

It is here in the forest that all of the "meat" of the story takes place. Everything that is accept the cruelties of the outside hypocrites and haters. In the forest they can be with one another's true self without stones and burnings.

Where could man and woman unmarried carry on such unspeakable acts. Where could man and illegitimate child meet and feel no remorse. What would the characters do if there were no refuge to seek with one another? Where to escape to? Nowhere else but in the forest could such events occur.

In the forest, we see care for one another and not care for laws, "Be thou strong for me," Dimmesdale pleads. "Advise me what to do."(p. 187) When he asks her to help him we see Hester take on a new role in the story. She becomes the strong one and he then is weak. This goes back too, to the article where we are shown Hawthorns love for a lady that weakened him and gave him an upper hand within the relationship between man and woman. When Dimmesdale asks for help, he is silently admitting that she is an equal and is strong in her convictions. She then uplifts him in words much like his own in sermons. "Begin all anew! ... Preach! Write! Act!"(p. 188) She is taking a stand!

ers to fins sanctuary from the harshness of the society in which they live. From one of the scho!

Here Dimmesdale tells Hester of his would be persecuted love, if the world were to know about it, for her. Hester in the tree's protection can do the same for Dimmesdale. It's here too that man and woman can hold one another's words and actions as honesty. In the great majickal surroundings none have to worry about society and it's strictness or hate. Freedom is held in this place, there are no sheriffs or noblemen to attack or persecute anyone, just the open air to take truth

Some common words found in the essay are:
Write Actp, Scarlet Letter, Pearl Dimmesdale, Dimmesdale It's, Author Symbols, God Hawthorne, ATQ June, Hester Prinn, scarlet letter, medicines healing, characters refuge, tells hester, main characters,
Approximate Word count = 1388
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)