The Scarlet Letter - Scaffol Scenes

Section: Book Reports

In this powerful scene, Dimmesdale regains his soul, Pearl gains her humanity, Chillingworth loses his victim, and Hester loses her dreams. Here again, the main characters come together, and Dimmesdale reveals his "scarlet letter". After Dimmesdale delivered his Election Day sermon, he stood on the scaffold with his lover and his child and confessed his sin to everyone. Suddenly the minister sinks down on the scaffold and dies. Right before Dimmesdale died Pearl leaned down and kissed the minister, then she started to cry. This shows that Pearl finally showed love for Dimmesdale and she now realizes and understands that he is her father. Since Dimmesdale died, Chillingworth no longer has a victim to terrorize. This gives him so much sorrow he ends up dying also. In this final scene, all the symbols and characters are once again present: the Church, State, and the World of Evil, the scarlet letter, the punishing scaffold, a symbolic kiss, and of course, death. Hawthorne ties together all the important themes, plots, and symbols of The Scarlet Letter, into three scaffold scenes. These scenes provide the basic structure for the novel because everything else revolves around what happens during these scenes. During the first scaffold scene we meet all the principal characters in Hawthorne's masterpiece. In the second scene again all the main characters are brought together again. During this scene a dramatic vision of the scarlet A takes place. The final scene begins with the triumph of Dimmesdale's sermon and ends with his death. Once again all the main characters are present.

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