The Scarlet Letter Chapters 3-5

The more I read, the more concerned I become with what the unknown narrator thinks of Hester. It has yet to be said how they feel about the situation. For some reason I keep picturing the narrator to be a woman in town who is just observing everything. I am curious as to whom the Native American was and why he was even there in the first place. I am also wondering about his savage like companion. I think the Native American is going to have a pretty important role in the upcoming chapters because Hester looks at him with familiarity. I really don't get what the book is talking about when the gesture the Native American made with his hand is mentioned. I think he was trying to tell Hester something.

When chapter four starts, Hester seems to be in a hysterical panic like she is suffering from bad anxiety. Master Brackett calls a physician to look at her because it is thought that Hester might harm herself or the baby. When Master comes in with the doctor, "Hester Prynne had immediately become as still as death". (Hawthorne 68) At first I was curious as to why Hester reacted the way she did, but as the chapter continued I found out that Rodger Chillingworth, the doctor, was Hester’s husband. She kept asking him if he was going to poison the baby out of revenge and I was shocked when he said he wouldn’t do such a thing just out of revenge just because it wasn’t his baby.

I’m really starting to sympathize with Hester as the novel goes on. I felt bad for her when she told her husband that she thinks of death and wishes to be dead. I am also proud of her for continuing with dignity, but I wonder what else is going through her head. It’s driving me crazy that we don’t know who the father is yet. I’m also wondering where her husband has been and why he all of a sudden appears in the book as her doctor.

In chapter 5, Hester seems a lot more depressed. It seems like now that her jail time is done and she is settling down on her own, she can finally think about herself and her feelings. She is reflecting back on her sins in this chapter. There are a lot of parts in this chapter that point out the pain Hester is feeling. She is changed person now and she is not sure how she feels about it.

I’m interested in the line in the chapter that says, “What she compelled herself to believe—what, finally, she reasoned upon as her motive for continuing a resident of New England—was half a truth, and half a self-delusion. Here, she said to herself, had been the scene of her guilt, and here should be the scene of her earthly punishment; and so perchance, the torture of her daily shame would at length purge her soul and work out another purity than that which she had lost; more saintlike, because the result of martyrdom.” (Hawthorne 77) This quote intrigued me because it says a lot about Hester’s character. She chose not to run from her punishment; she’s going to deal with it, maybe because she believes she deserves to be punished. Either way she wanted to stay in New England because it was the place where her sins were committed, her sins changed her and I don’t think she is necessarily ashamed of them. Hester is going on with life and isn’t going to let her sins drive her away from her home. She is accepting her punishment and she is accepting that fact that she did wrong. She deals with a lot of internal conflict in this chapter, too. I applaud Hester on her decision to stay in New England and face the world. I think another reason she chose to stay in the place where she sinned was because this is probably where her fellow sinner is, maybe Hester doesn’t want to leave him.