The Ideas in Young Goodman Brown
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Hawthorne brought profound moral and psychological insight into his fiction as he explains the complexities of human motivation and action. Hawthorne was convinced that most American literature of his time was too imitative of British models, so he devoted himself to the creation of an authentic American voice. He saw the conventional novel, with its concern for verisimilitude, as incapable of capturing the moral and social climate of America. He wrote a different sort of work, romances in which the "real" and the "marvelous," the actual and the imaginary, could mingle more freely so that the author could render through allegory and symbolism what he saw as the heightened drama of life in America. "Young Goodman Brown" follows this course precisely, but at the same time, its reliance on allegory may leave the reader with more ambiguity concerning the meaning of the tale than clear understanding. An allegory is the representation of some abstract or spiritual meaning through concrete or material forms which represent them. The story of Good Brown serves as a representation of certain spiritual and societal ideas, with what happens to Brown serving to show what Hawthorne believes happens in the Puritan community. Individuals, objects, and events in the story are symbolic in direct ways, though the underlying meaning may not be so direct. Goodman Brown's name is representative of his character, for he is a "good man" in the community and is the one clearly "good man" in
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there is always a sense that the young man is facing an evil to be met and fought.
On this night, the vision that the devil offers to Young Goodman Brown is a vision showing the mixture of good and evil in the world. The journey undertaken by Young Goodman Brown into the woods is a symbolic journey into his own soul, and his progress reflects ideas about the Fall and its aftermath and thus about the human condition. In the beginning, Young Goodman Brown understands his place in society. At the end, he no longer is so assured and sees evil everywhere. His life has been changed forever by his exposure to evil and hypocrisy, perhaps in the real world, perhaps in a dream.
Hawthorne is deliberately ambiguous about whether this was dream or reality:
Had Goodman Brown fallen asleep in the forest, and only dreamed a wild dream of a witch-meeting?
Be it so, if you will (24).
He is more explicit about the allegorical nature of his story, as he makes clear in the opening lines:
Young Goodman Brown came forth at sunset, into the street of Salem village, but put his head back, after crossing the threshold, to exchange a parting kiss with his young wife. And Faith, as the wife was aptly named, thrust her own pretty head int
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Approximate Word count = 1339
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page)
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