Hawthorne's Feminist Consciousness in The Scarlet Letter

Zhao Wei

Foreign Language Department of Anshan Normal University,Anshan,China

Email:1370937271@qq.com

[Abstract] Hawthorne was one of the most influential romantic writers in American literature in the 19th century.The novel The Scarlet Letter is Hawthorne's most well-known work.Set in Boston in the 17th century,through the portrayal of Hester Prynne as a female character,the novel vividly revealed the tradition,decadent thoughts and people's dark psychology of the Puritan society.From the perspective of feminism,Hawthorne comprehensively displayed the current situation of women's existence in the Puritan society and successfully depicted the inner world and destiny of the female characters represented by Hester,which reflected a rare feminist consciousness among male writers at that time.

[Keywords] Hawthorne;feminist consciousness

Interpretation of feminist consciousness

Hawthorne,a famous American writer,published his novelThe Scarlet Letterin 1850.On the surface,this novel tells a legend story about adultery and disastrous consequences,but it reveals the complex social problems of the United States in the 19th century.Hawthorne embodies his views on love,religious belief,female consciousness and other issues in the novel.Therefore,experts and scholars both at home and abroad generally believe that the novel has multiple themes and that meaningful interpretations can be generated no matter what methods people use to interpret it.Therefore,I intend to make another interpretation of the text from the perspective of feminism.

The so-called feminist consciousness refers to women's experience and awakening of their own value as human beings,especially women.For the male-dominated society,it is manifested in refusing to accept the traditional definition of women by the male society,and questioning and subverting the male power;at the same time,it is demonstrated in paying attention to women's living conditions,examining women's psychological feelings and expressing women's life experience.

Hawthorne,as a male writer,because of his unique family,political,religious and other backgrounds,shows a rare female consciousness in his works.Hawthorne wrote this novel during the upsurge of American feminist movement in the 19th century.In his career as a writer and diplomat,Hawthorne met many outstanding American women in the 19th century,who are directly or indirectly related to feminist movement,feminist struggle and abolitionist movement,through whom Hawthorne understood the most profound feminist ideas at that time.He had witnessed women's efforts to enter the public life which had always been forbidden for women.These activities were a challenge to the life style and powerless and dependent status of American women in the 19th century.

Formation background of Hawthorne's feminist consciousness

When people come into contact with a new idea or consciousness,they are always eager to read the idea or the clue of consciousness and its central idea,but they tended to neglect the author's personal experiences.It must be admitted that the forming process of Hawthorne's feminist consciousness is the process of his literary creation (Jiang,2010,p.56).In fact,the author's life and time background often have a great influence on the formation of this consciousness.

Hawthorne was born in Salem,Massachusetts,and his family was once famous there,having descended from generations of "fervent puritans" (Donaldson,1983).Afterwards,his father became a highly respected captain and died on the sea when Hawthorne was four years old.Accordingly,the mother of Hawthorne,a widow who relied on the meager bequest that the husband left and the aid of brothers and sisters,took Hawthorne and his brothers alone to live a hard life.Witnessing his mother put up with all kinds of hardships,Hawthorne felt great pain in the heart,therefore,he has great sympathy and gratitude for his mother.It is the mother's situation that causes Hawthorne to think about the status of women in the patriarchal society.We can get the verification from his novel.Hawthorne highly praised maternal love and a mother's love for children was written incisively and vividly.Hawthorne expressed his love and gratitude for his mother in his works,taking his mother's situation as the starting point,and reflected on the status of women living in patriarchy.ThusThe Scarlet Lettercame into being.

Hawthorne lived in an era when women began to seek their own rights and equal freedom politically.Women expected that they could have the same rights as men,so the feminist movement was prevalent during this period.This fresh element,as an author,he alertly felt about.At the same time,as far as he was concerned,his mother,who was on the very edge of his life,had given him more of a touch,and therefore the idea that women should have equal rights to freedom had stirred in his heart.However,as a man who was deeply influenced by Puritan religion,male power held an absolute position in his mind,so he was very contradictory in his heart.He wanted to support the feminist movement,but he could not break the shackles of male power completely.This novel is a typical example of Hawthorne's contradictory feminist viewpoint and a reflection of his real life situation.

Research on Hawthorne's feminism consciousness

When it comes to Hawthorne's feminist consciousness,we have to mention his family background,because the family background has a profound impact on Hawthorne's thoughts and his works.Hawthorne'family was once a wellknown family,with several generations of fanatical Puritans.Some of his ancestors participated in the persecution of heresy by Puritans,and he was one of the three judges in the famous case of Salem Exorcism in 1692.Hawthorne is a writer full of contradictions in his thoughts.The Puritan tradition has a deep influence on him.On the one hand,he rebelled against this tradition and attacked religious fanaticism and the religious creed that devastated human nature;on the other hand,he was bound by this tradition.Calvinism's concepts of "original sin" and "internal degeneration"had a strong impact on him.He understood the society and the whole world with Calvinism's concepts of good and evil(Donovan,2010).When reflected in the works,it is an extremely contradictory theme.Subjectively,he is full of sympathy and understanding for the characters in the works.Objectively,Puritanism makes him have to condemn the characters who commit religious crimes in the works morally.Therefore,Hawthorne's depiction of Hester's role reflects his feminist consciousness.

Hawthorne's feminist consciousness was not directly expressed,but with the help of the character Hester,endowed with the thought he wanted to express to the character he created.A female image that pursues beauty,love and personality liberation appears in people's sight in a novel way.This is not only a simple shaping of people and things,but also Hawthorne's use of Hester to attack the formalism and pedantry of Puritan doctrines,so as to conform to and appeal to the spread of feminist consciousness.

As a woman living at the bottom of a patriarchal society,Hester dared to protect her rights according to her own ideas,realize her own value and fight bravely.In this era,Hester's female consciousness was reflected.I will explain Hester's feminist views from two aspects:

The theme of The Scarlet Letter

The Scarlet Letteris the representative work of American romantic writer,Hawthorne,who fully demonstrated her feminist thoughts by portraying Hester as a persistent female who dared to challenge religious authority and pursue equal rights.There are 24 chapters inThe Scarlet Letter,18 of which are used to describe the female image of Hester.This arrangement without doubt puts Hester in the main position of the novel.The main male characters Dimmesdale and Chillingworth are in a relatively minor position.Hawthorne changed the traditional idea that men should be regarded as the main characters in the patriarchal society.Hester had won an unprecedented "subject" position,which revealed the author's potential feminist consciousness.

Taking the heroine Hester as the central character of the story,with her adultery discovered and punished as the clue,Hawthorne explores the inner world and destiny of the female characters represented by Hester.The Scarlet Lettersucceeds in portraying Hester,who,in her own way,defends her rights as a woman.She changes from a woman who has been humiliated and victimized to a free thinker who never gives up pursuing happiness,and even a woman activist.Through the portrayal of Hester as a female character,it reflects Hawthorne's feminist consciousness,and also provides people with another interpretation mode ofThe Scarlet Letter.

As a matter of fact,Hawthorne's basic view of feminism had already been formed before he wroteThe Scarlet Letter.Since Hawthorne was brought up by his mother when he was a child,He was deeply conscious that women's status in society was incredibly low,and his mother's rights were unreasonably deprived,which brought him and his family a very embarrassing situation.He reflected upon the social status of women without rights and discourse power,which laid the foundation for him to create the image of Hester.

The scene of waiting for trial,with Hester holding a baby and standing on the guillotine,leaves the reader wondering what happened to the woman and the baby,and what their fate would be.How could Hester bear such a fate?A series of questions have touched the readers' hearts and sympathy for Hester.Hawthorne,in the process of writing this novel,was playing the role of a psychologist.He described the characters in the various scenarios,showed the ideas in the patriarchal society and foiled trial and punishment of Hester by onlookers.And he portrayed Hester as a heroine's image,which is not only Hawthorne's an expression of feminism,but also by the protagonist Hester,the theme of the novel on the effectiveness of crime punishment is well explained.He expressed in a unique tone the condemnation of the patriarchal society and voiced the feminist consciousness.

Hester's self-consciousness

In Hawthorne's novel,Hester was the embodiment of beauty.The beauty of Hester was embodied in definiteness,firmness and richness.Although Hester strongly pursued freedom,from the perspective of feminism,she did not completely challenge against Puritan rule but chose to suffer silently,which was caused by the previous social morality.

Hawthorne,through the shaping of Hester's perfect image and good quality,showed his female consciousness incisively and vividly.In the novel,Hester maintained a simple life with her meager income,and moved the people around with her strong willpower and kind nature.In addition to the lack of material,what Hester suffered more stemmed from the public contempt and marginalization.In that strange land,where she had no family or friends,the poor she had given alms to often abused her whereas the ladies teased and embarrassed her for no reason,even the children following her from a distance and screaming.But through Hester's persistence and efforts,many people no longer understood the scarlet"A"engraved on her clothes in the original meaning.In their eyes,"A"had already become "able" and "angel",the "adulteress" had become the angel of the town (Chopin,1989).Dimmesdale,another key character in the novel,was a pious priest,a true believer.Compared with Hester,he was superior in status and fame,representing the talents,morals and erudition of the men of his time.In Hawthorne's novel,he did not have the courage of Hester,and the courage to choose his own life.In a patriarchal society,he should have shown his subjectivity,but he didn't,he relied on Hester to make choices.After that,Dimmesdale confessed in secret.At this moment,Dimmesdale's weakness formed a sharp contrast with Hester's courage.In order to save Dimmesdale,Hester exposed the true identity of Chillingworth.She showed her true feelings completely and did what she wanted to do.This revealed that Hester did not blindly rely on her husband in the patriarchal society.In the face of true love,she dared to expose false things.She dared to be different from others and express herself authentically,which is the embodiment of Hester's self-consciousness.In short,under the profound influence of American feminism and specific background of the society at that time,Hester bravely survived even though she was rejected by the society and looked strange by the world.Through the female image of Hester,Hawthorne fully expresses his feminism consciousness.

Although the story ended in tragedy,Hester's rebellion ignited a glimmer of hope for women's pursuit of their own rights.Hester,who had always been submissive,turned from a silent struggle to an active struggle for happiness and put it into practice.This change was undoubtedly the climax of the development of feminism,and it was also the most direct way for women to fight against the patriarchal society.

Conclusion

Through the study of Hawthorne's feminism in the novelThe Scarlet Letter,it can be seen that feminism had a profound influence in the United States at that time.As a writer,he had the ability and obligation to be the advocate of social consciousness.His feminism was not only reflected in his appreciation of the quality of the heroine,but also in his appreciation of the heroine's self-reliance(Freire,1970).Hawthorne's feminist consciousness was generated in the atmosphere of strong religious atmosphere and the fresh element of feminist movement.Therefore,Hawthorne's feminist consciousness also reflects this complicated atmosphere.

In the novel,Hawthorne praised this kind of female consciousness and expressed support and sympathy for Hester's experience.This novel has an important influence on the awakening and development of feminist consciousness.It makes increasing women re-examine their life and social status,and begin to pursue independent personality.The heroine Hester struggled with the cruel social reality and pursued her own love,which demonstrated the gradual awakening of American women's consciousness during the colonial period.At the end of the novel,the heroine achieved economic status and independent personality through continuous efforts,which reflected Hawthorne's sincere support and appreciation for feminism.

The Scarlet Letterpresents the readers with a vivid image of an indomitable female warrior.As a pioneer in the pursuit of women's freedom,Hester has undoubtedly opened a precedent for the later literary works in the exploration of the feminist road.However,due to the limitations of the times and the author,Hester has not been able to show us a path to the complete emancipation of women.