Near the end of Chapter Six of The Scarlet
Letter, Pearl and Hester spend time outdoors during a pretty and Pearl throws
handfuls of flowers at the "A" sewn onto her mother's dress. When she is done, Pearl
stands looking at her mother with mischievous eyes that seem, to Hester, fiendish.
Hester is half joking and half serious when she begins a conversation with her daughter
questioning who the child is and where she comes
from.
When Pearl becomes serious and wants her mother to
truly tell her where she came from, or who her father is, Hester replies that God sent
her. Pearl is very observant, as most children are, and notices the hestitation in her
mother's answer and does not believe her. Hester attempts to convince her daughter that
she did, indeed, come from the Heavenly Father and basically asks Pearl where she could
have come from if it was not from God. At this point, Pearl is once again amused and
cheerful and, basically, tells Hester that she does not know. Because Hester is
overanalytical regarding some things, which is a result of her guilty conscience, she
finds herself wondering whether Pearl's origins are good or the
alternative.
No comments:
Post a Comment