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Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND...

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Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM www.walden.org/documents/file/CU%20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf Guelcher, William: THE SCARLET LETTER: STRATEGIES IN TEACHING: Idea Works Inc., Eagan Minnesota, 1989. Van Kirk, Susan: HAWTHORNE’S THE SCARLET LETTER: CliffsNotes. IDG Books Worldwide Inc., Forest City, California., 2000. THE SCARLET LETTER
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Page 1: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

Concepts:Archetypes and

Transcendentalism

ADAPTED FROM:

Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISMwww.walden.org/documents/file/CU%20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf

Guelcher, William: THE SCARLET LETTER: STRATEGIES IN TEACHING: Idea Works Inc., Eagan Minnesota, 1989.

Van Kirk, Susan: HAWTHORNE’S THE SCARLET LETTER: CliffsNotes. IDG Books Worldwide Inc., Forest City, California., 2000.

THE SCARLET LETTER

Page 2: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

An archetype is a generic, idealized model of a person, object, or concept from which similar

instances are derived, copied,

patterned, or emulated.

ARCHETYPES

Page 3: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

• Example: the star-crossed lovers (almost) all of you have

studied.• This is the young couple

joined by love but unexpectedly parted by fate.• Romeo and Juliet from

William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.

• Romeo and Juliet have been immortalized as the

archetypes of true love because they are willing to

sacrifice everything —including themselves —for

their love.

ARCHETYPES

Page 4: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

Archetypes can also be places or seasons

Wasteland: Little or no water. No harmony (man vs. man or man vs. nature). Dominant colors: red, black, gray, or brown. Extreme temperatures.

Insufficient food, shelter, and clothing. Hate, distrust, and evil.

Country vs. City: simplicity vs. complexity; purity vs. corruption.

Spring: birth, childhood, a new beginning.

River or stream: crossing, transformation.

Fountains: purification, baptism.

Islands: isolation, magical wilderness.

Forest: wild place; those who enter often lose their direction.

Garden: Perfect society. Harmony between nature and mankind. Dominant colors of green and gold. Freedom from evil and suffering. Abundance of

water, food, clothes, and shelter.

 

ARCHETYPES

Page 5: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

The Garden Archetype is characterized by paradise;

innocence; unspoiled beauty (especially feminine); fertility.

In the garden archetype it is forever spring because spring is the time of

love and beauty and birth.

The “New World” became a new version of the garden archetype.

This archetype is most often represented by the Garden of Eden from the book of Genesis, in which humanity lives in perfect peace and harmony with nature in a tranquil

and nonviolent environment created by a higher being.

ARCHETYPES

Page 6: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

• The Scarlet Letter could be seen as the reverse of the Garden of Eden story.

• In that story, Adam and Eve begin in a state of primal innocence and

through their own volition, fall from the state of grace by their

sin and thereby condemn the world to Satan.

GARDEN OF EDEN

Page 7: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

“Much like Adam and Eve, Reverend Arthur

Dimmesdale and Hester Prynne are

symbolically cast out of Paradise for their sin, forced to suffer, toil,

and confront their guilt at their transgression of society's norms.”

GARDEN OF EDEN

Page 8: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

The Puritans believed that Eve’s corruption extended to

all women, which justified making women lesser citizens within the church hierarchy.

However, women were looked upon as critical to the success of the Puritan

colonies in North America (in terms of contributing to

harmonious marriage and godly children).

GARDEN OF EDEN

Page 9: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

The Scarlet Letter begins with a serious sin having been

committed, and Hester, the new “Eve,” rises from the evil

of sin to the grace of God.

The message is that we can re-enter Paradise in this life

through our efforts.

This is Hawthorne’s way of dealing with the universal

problems of good and evil, and the dilemmas humankind

encounters in sorting between them.

GARDEN OF EDEN

Page 10: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

In this “new Eve” metaphor, Hawthorne reverses the

traditional literary role of woman from the seductress who profanes man to the prophetess

who delivers man.

In Chapter 17, Dimmesdale acknowledges that his salvation

is bound up with Hester’s strength.

Hawthorne hints the future redemption of humankind will come through the strength of

womanhood.

GARDEN OF EDEN

Page 11: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

Hawthorne has constructed a parable in which the

lesson is that a person is not condemned for having sinned; rather one is

condemned for the way in which the sin imperils the

personality.

Guelcher: “In the final analysis of religious thinking, we are not

condemned by God or Satan.

We condemn ourselves.”

A PARABLE

Page 12: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

Transcendentalism

Took form in New England, mainly Concord, MA around

1836 when Ralph Waldo Emerson published Nature.

Major thinkers include Emerson, Henry David

Thoreau, Bronson Alcott.

Part of a larger literary movement called

Romanticism, which emphasized the importance

of nature, emotions and individualism.

TRANSCENDENTALISM: AN INTRODUCTION

Page 13: Concepts: Archetypes and Transcendentalism ADAPTED FROM: Clayton, Katy. THE SCARLET LETTER AND TRANSCENDENTALISM 20-%20Katy%20Clayton.pdf.

Ideals

The individual is important; inherently good; has free

will

Conscience, morality and intuition are present at birth

Intuition is what one must use to perceive basic truths

Each individual is connected to God

God is omnipresent

One of the best ways to connect to God is through

nature.

TRANSCENDENTALISM: AN INTRODUCTION


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