I’ve gotta be honest. I’m struggling with this book. I love this project, but Hawthorne’s flowery language is slowing me down. Couple that with a week of absences due to an awesome TV convention and you get a blogger who is trapped in between a rock and a hard place. But in chapter 16 something just grabbed my attention: the description of Dimmesdale walking down the beaten path.
In the chapters leading up to 16, we see Dimmesdale suffer under the weight of his own sin, and the encouragement of Chillingworth. Chillingworth prodded Dimmesdale down the road of insanity to the point that the minister saw almost no point in living. He felt so guilty because of this, and because of the bright red A that was seared into his flesh. As the minister walks down the footpath in the forest, Hawthorne describes him in one paragraph, and it is quite vivid and chilling.
The paragraph begins on page 170 by stating that the “elf-child” has departed, and Hester settled herself into the “deep shadow of the trees.” As Hester stood, Dimmesdale came down the path with a “nervous despondency.” Hawthorne notes that his despondency was barely noticeable , but in the quiet and secluded forest, it was far more pronounced. He was “haggard and feeble”, meaning that we can infer that he was probably slumped over, his shoulders dipping one side to the other with each footfall. Dimmesdale also used a walking stick that “he had cut by the wayside” to aid him in his slow walk. Hawthorne then says that, “There was a listlessness in his gait; as if he saw no reason for taking one step farther, nor felt any desire to do so, but would have been glad, could he be glad of anything, to fling himself down at the root of the nearest tree, and lie there passive, for evermore.” I think that this line is the most telling part of Dimmesdale’s character at that time. He is just…existing. For no reason other than the fact that he was, and he wanted to give up on movement, to lie dormant forever. It wasn’t that Dimmesdale wanted to die, or to kill himself, but he just simply wanted to cease whatever he was doing in his life, but he cared too little to actually stop himself. Hawthorne continues this description by saying, “Death was too definite an object to be wished for or avoided.” Poor Dimmesdale is lost. Not in a literal sense, I am sure he was completely aware of his location whilst walking through the forest, but he was too confused and lost in his own depression and guilt to even make himself decide to want death. He just didn’t care.
And its not until the events of the next few chapters that he gets pulled out of this funk, and finds himself.
Works Cited
Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. New York: Bantam, 1986. Print. Reissue 2003.
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The Scarlet Reader 