In Chapters 20-22, Dimmesdale undergoes a major change in his life, for he is now living a new life in his mind. He starts out very happy early in Chapter 20. Dimmesdale has a family, a new life waiting for him in Europe, and an opportunity to end in ministerial career in the New World with a bang. This gives him great joy and so as he walks back into town, his newfound emotions flow through his soul, ready to break through the walls he created in his mind to keep his real emotional life from bursting out. This contributes to what I think is a major motif in the novel, emotional restraint/control. He is barely able to contain his emotions now, as shown when he was attempting to converse with a deacon from his church:
“Now, during a conversation of some two or three moments between the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale and this excellent and hoary-bearded deacon, it was only by the most careful self-control that the former could refrain from uttering certain blasphemous suggestions that rose into his mind, respecting the communion-supper. He absolutely trembled and turned pale as ashes, lest his tongue should wag itself, in utterance of these horrible matters, and plead his own consent for so doing, without his having fairly given it.” (Hawthorne 195-6)
Dimmesdale clearly is not able to control his inner feelings like a proud, emotionally withholding graduate of Oxford University would. He goes on to almost blurt blasphemous words to an elderly women, to ignore a young convert, and to almost teaching a group of young children some very bad words.
However, as Dimmesdale himself remarks, he is no longer that person:
“‘I am not the man for whom you take me! I left him yonder in the forest, withdrawn into a secret dell, by a mossy tree-trunk, and near a melancholy brook! Go, seek your minister, and see if his emaciated figure, his thin cheek, his white, heavy, pain-wrinkled brow, be not flung down there like a cast-off garment!” (Hawthorne 195)
I personally think that this new Dimmesdale is not going to be permanent. Everything seems too good to be true, and because this chapter and the two others after are building up to Dimmesdale’s Election Sermon, all of this foreshadows that something unfortunate will happen to Dimmesdale during his Sermon. Dimmesdale rips up the Sermon he had already written because it was written by the old Dimmesdale. He creates a new Sermon written by the new Dimmesdale, one that had “an impulsive flow of thought and emotion”. His encounters with the townspeople show that he is on the verge of revealing his inner mind, and so we can assume that his Sermon will reveal all of these things. The punishment of Dimmesdale’s failure to restrain his emotion will be revealed in his Sermon.
Hester and Pearl both contributed to the motif of emotional restraint in Chapters 20-22. The pompous and flamboyant Puritan procession, which may be Hawthorne’s social criticism, can also be interpreted as part of the motif of emotional restraint. Hester, like Dimmesdale in the previous chapter, is happy during the start of the procession, for her emotions are flowing yet again:
“It might be, on this one day, that there was an expression unseen before, nor, indeed, vivid enough to be detected now; unless some preternaturally gifted observer should have first read the heart, and have afterwards sought a corresponding development in the countenance and mien. Such a spiritual seer might have conceived, that, after sustaining the gaze of the multitude through seven miserable years as a necessity, a penance, and something which it was a stern religion to endure, she now, for one last time more, encountered it freely and voluntarily, in order to convert what had so long been agony into a kind of triumph.” (Hawthorne 203)
Hester just can not wait for her move to England. She has the same hopes as Dimmesdale, once she leaves New England, she will be liberated. These are her last few hours with the Scarlet Letter. She believes she has triumphed through years of agony, and soon, “the deep, mysterious ocean will quench and hide forever the symbol [The Scarlet Letter]”. Hester, who is not in the same mental state as Dimmesdale, is able to contain her emotions more properly, but a “preternaturally gifted observer” can tell that she also is having trouble restraining her happy emotions.
Emotional restraint can be a requirement for some jobs, perhaps most important for spies. Hester and Dimmesdale wanting a future together reminded me of the spy comedy-drama Chuck. In this TV show, the nerdy, Stanford dropout main character Chuck Bartowski accidentally downloads all government secrets into his head. The NSA and CIA both send their agent to make sure the information stays safe. The CIA agent, Sarah Walker, develops feelings for him. However, since her job is to protect the information in his head, she has to restrain her feelings for him. Chuck obviously develops feelings for her as well, but he knows that she will be reassigned if her superiors find out. At the end of the second season, both Chuck and Sarah decide that they should just run away from the CIA and live with each other traveling across Europe.
This is very similar to Hester and Dimmesdale, although Chuck and Sarah are much more romantically involved. The professions of both Dimmesdale and Sarah require them to restrain their own personal emotions. Dimmesdale does this for the good of religion, while Sarah does this to protect her country. Hester and Chuck are harder to compare with each other, but both characters have been punished for a seemingly innocent crime, but still have great potential. Hester is a master embroider who gets publicly shamed for adultery. Chuck is a master hacker/computer specialist who gets kicked out of Stanford (and also publicly shamed for he was forced to walk out of Stanford with a crowd watching him) for something that was not his fault. Hester causes Dimmesdale to have trouble restraining his emotions, which changes Dimmesdale entirely. Both of them want to break with their culture after this. The same thing almost happens in Chuck. Both Sarah changes Chuck from a harmless nerd in the first season to a superspy in the final season. The same way Hester changes Dimmesdale, Chuck causes Sarah to change from a coldhearted spy to a happily married wife.
No comments:
Post a Comment