Persuasive essay of "scarlet letter"
Simply, the reason why we should all read “Scarlet Letter” is the fact that it’s a historical fiction. The novel is situated in the New World, the 17th century American continent where incoming British established a Puritan society. The novel gives a perspective closed up on individuals, detailed and real, compared to ordinal history text books.
The protagonist of the book is a lady named Hester Prynne, who committed adultery when she had a husband. The books starts from where she is accused of the crime, given the sin-signification scarlet letter on her breast, an A of adultery. Hester has to live for seven years under her sin, with Pearl, her child of adultery. To tell the truth, (skip this paragraph and the 4th one if you want no spoiler), the father of Pearl is a good clergyman of the village, whom also suffers of his secret sin.
The two sinful characters each reacts differently to their crimes, and the society. The New England village is a Puritan society. They take adultery as one of the heaviest sin. However, Hester is rather strong and positive about her sin. During the seven years she raise Pearl, she is determined to not admit the crime as a shame, by accepting what she did. She is soon recognized by the surrounding villagers as a symbol of stable independence, which makes some kind of admiration toward her.
Contrary, the sinful clergyman feels an extremely heavy guilt to himself. Especially when Hester’s former husband appears, he feels himself as a miserable liar, acting so nicely in front of every villagers. As a clergyman who foremost believes in the teachings of Puritans, that sin is way too heavy for him. Compared to Hester who stands strongly with her scarlet letter, the clergyman is mashed under the guilt. In the end, he chooses to accept his sin by kissing Pearl in front of the public, however, also choosing death because he could not live with it.
In history classes, we can learn when Puritans came up, or how it developed, how the New World prospered with trade. However, there are more detailed reality to history. There are not just facts but also reality, such as the conflicts of each man and woman who lived in that age, under those historical cultures. Historical fictions can teach the reality behind history, which a history text book can not teach.
401 words
The protagonist of the book is a lady named Hester Prynne, who committed adultery when she had a husband. The books starts from where she is accused of the crime, given the sin-signification scarlet letter on her breast, an A of adultery. Hester has to live for seven years under her sin, with Pearl, her child of adultery. To tell the truth, (skip this paragraph and the 4th one if you want no spoiler), the father of Pearl is a good clergyman of the village, whom also suffers of his secret sin.
The two sinful characters each reacts differently to their crimes, and the society. The New England village is a Puritan society. They take adultery as one of the heaviest sin. However, Hester is rather strong and positive about her sin. During the seven years she raise Pearl, she is determined to not admit the crime as a shame, by accepting what she did. She is soon recognized by the surrounding villagers as a symbol of stable independence, which makes some kind of admiration toward her.
Contrary, the sinful clergyman feels an extremely heavy guilt to himself. Especially when Hester’s former husband appears, he feels himself as a miserable liar, acting so nicely in front of every villagers. As a clergyman who foremost believes in the teachings of Puritans, that sin is way too heavy for him. Compared to Hester who stands strongly with her scarlet letter, the clergyman is mashed under the guilt. In the end, he chooses to accept his sin by kissing Pearl in front of the public, however, also choosing death because he could not live with it.
In history classes, we can learn when Puritans came up, or how it developed, how the New World prospered with trade. However, there are more detailed reality to history. There are not just facts but also reality, such as the conflicts of each man and woman who lived in that age, under those historical cultures. Historical fictions can teach the reality behind history, which a history text book can not teach.
401 words
change of perspective by "the old man and the sea"
One of the books I read over summer was “The Old Man and the Sea”. It’s theme is basically the life cycle in sea, eat and get eaten relationship, with an old man as the protagonist. This story that the old man has to get his own food by his own hands, seems to be something unrelated to us. We are students that lives in Japan, going to an expensive international school, feeding ourselves usually with convenience stores and fast foods. However, during the same summer, I found one very similar example that relates us and this book. The book changed my perspective of this modern age.
The universal theme of “The Old Man and the Sea” is very simple. An old man who hasn’t had a good profit over 84 days finally gets an enormous fish trapped on his line. The old man first feeds himself with small fishes and dolphins he caught, uses that to get bigger fishes, and when he gets one, that big fish is eaten by even bigger sharks. The main theme here is the eat and get eaten relationship, a simple life cycle in the nature.
During summer this year, a newly released game “Pokemon GO” made a big hit. Literally everyone was playing it on the streets. It is indeed an awesome game, but there are risks to everything. One day, an incident occurred in US that a bunch of skilled, and villain-minded men hacked in Pokemon GO and created some false poke-stops. Those poke-stops are usually made to give out free items for players, however, when innocent players approached to this false poke-stops, the villain-minded men came out and caught them. Those players were stolen valuables, maybe punched, and had a bad time. Sad incident.
I live in a developed country. I live in a world that I don’t have to catch food with my own hands, a world that I don’t have much direct contact with nature and don’t have to fear death so much. However, reading the relationship of eat and get eaten in the book “The Old Man and the Sea” reminded me of this sad incident. As this association shows, the book let me notice that there are always a severe eat and get eaten relationship in any kind of society.
388 words
The universal theme of “The Old Man and the Sea” is very simple. An old man who hasn’t had a good profit over 84 days finally gets an enormous fish trapped on his line. The old man first feeds himself with small fishes and dolphins he caught, uses that to get bigger fishes, and when he gets one, that big fish is eaten by even bigger sharks. The main theme here is the eat and get eaten relationship, a simple life cycle in the nature.
During summer this year, a newly released game “Pokemon GO” made a big hit. Literally everyone was playing it on the streets. It is indeed an awesome game, but there are risks to everything. One day, an incident occurred in US that a bunch of skilled, and villain-minded men hacked in Pokemon GO and created some false poke-stops. Those poke-stops are usually made to give out free items for players, however, when innocent players approached to this false poke-stops, the villain-minded men came out and caught them. Those players were stolen valuables, maybe punched, and had a bad time. Sad incident.
I live in a developed country. I live in a world that I don’t have to catch food with my own hands, a world that I don’t have much direct contact with nature and don’t have to fear death so much. However, reading the relationship of eat and get eaten in the book “The Old Man and the Sea” reminded me of this sad incident. As this association shows, the book let me notice that there are always a severe eat and get eaten relationship in any kind of society.
388 words