Chapter Sixteen
Entry Thirty-One
"So Pearl, who had enough of shadow in her own little life [...] She set herself, therefore, to gathering violets and wood-anemones, and some scarlet columbines that she found growing in the crevices of a high rock."Pearl, being sent away from Hester because she wants to talk to Dimmesdale in privacy, walks away to pick some flowers. Noticeable is that all three flowers are red. Again is it mentioned that her life is surrounded of blackness. To escape from it she turns to red flowers, an image symbolizing vitality, energy, passion and generally activity. This is what she longs for: A life in which she pulls the strings. She doesn't want to live in a society that has the power to determine over her future. Neither does she want to end up like her mother who accepted the Puritan rules. But it is hard for her to get to this status because "it is growing in the crevices of a high rock." The high rock could stand for the situation she is stuck in at the moment. She is not allowed to be happy or to live in freedom as she wants to, but she has to behave appropriately (how Boston expects an Adulterer's child to live). It is a severe, strict and dreary life which she is not able to change (-> a big rock). Only her mother (she in turn needs Dimmesdale) is able to help her out of her miserable life.
No comments:
Post a Comment