NEWCRITICISM YOUNG GOODMAN BROWN
New Criticism is known for being “’…uninterested in the human meaning
the social function and the effect of literature’ and of isolating ‘the work of
art from its past and its context.’” (Armstrong et al. 90). With this isolation, the
reader can see the text for what it is rather than how the environment around its
development influenced the piece. The theory and its principles can be used to
determine the underlying connections within the piece, the presence of imagery
and emergence of symbols, and how the structure of the text reflects its content.
Each of these principles of the theory can be used in the interpretation of my
chosen text.
There are principles of the New Critical theory that can be used in the
interpretation of “Young Goodman Brown”. Imagery is used throughout the text in
developing its own symbols, as the main character is even one of these symbols,
starting as one and ending as another (Purdue OWL). The secondary characters
were also strongly associated with symbols to further explain their role in the story.
The various parts of the work are connected through the dark undertone of
solidarity, of Goodman Brown slowly descending into a darkness due to being led
astray from faith. While Brown started off as an innocent man who trusted in his
faith, he became tainted by evil, and lost his faith of religion, in his wife, in
himself, and in those around him. The end of the story concludes that everything
he thought he knew was wrong, all tainted with evil, and had all been connected to
this evil all along.
The piece almost immediately establishes that Goodman Brown’s wife was a
symbol of his own faith in an unsubtle way: “And Faith, as the wife was aptly
named, thrust her own pretty head into the street, letting the wind play with the
pink ribbons of her cap while she called to Goodman Brown.” (Hawthorne).
Faith’s pink ribbons were strongly associated with her, and therefore with faith
early in the story, as they were mentioned three times in the first ten sentences.
From this point on, the reader can understand that both Faith and her ribbons are
representations of faith, Faith being Goodman’s faith, and the ribbons being her
faith, or even a combination of their faith.
Brown was expected to run an errand that night, but Faith tried to convince
him to stay with her instead. After he refused, Brown insisted to himself that after
this errand, he’d never part with her again, despite knowing what he was doing
wasn’t right: “With this excellent resolve for the future, Goodman Brown felt
himself justified in making more haste on his present evil purpose.” (Hawthorne).
Despite Brown being an obvious representation of an innocent man from his name
alone, he still chose to go along with this errand he knew was wrong. As Brown
began his journey, the dark path unnerved him, and he even tried to comfort
himself by talking out loud, which served as foreshadowing, stating: “‘What if the
devil himself should be at my very elbow!’” (Hawthorne). Immediately after
stating this, another man joins Brown on the path. This traveler accused Brown of
being late, to which Brown replied that Faith had held him back, implying that he
meant both his wife and his literal faith. His wife had attempted to keep him from
going, but his faith had also expressed doubts in pursuing this evil journey. The
traveler carried a staff with him that very much resembled a serpent, only
furthering the idea that he represented either the devil or evil. Serpents are often
associated with evil, which explains why Brown described the staff as such: “…
[the staff] bore the likeness of a great black snake, so curiously wrought that it
might almost be seen to twist and wriggle itself like a living serpent.”
(Hawthorne).
Brown encountered three familiar faces while running this errand, all of
which supposedly shared the same faith as him, and he firmly believed that they
could not be swayed from faith, yet there they were on the very same path as
Brown. He was shaken from seeing these three on such a dark path, and doubted
his own faith more than before: “…could these holy men be journeying so deep
into the heathen wilderness? Young Goodman Brown caught hold of a tree for
support . . . faint and overburdened with the heavy sickness of his heart. He looked
up to the sky, doubting whether there really was a heaven above him.”
(Hawthorne). The moment Brown loses his hold on his faith was symbolized by
the pink ribbon falling from the sky, as if it were falling from heaven, from faith:
“But something fluttered lightly down through the air and caught on the branch of
a tree. The young man seized it, and beheld a pink ribbon. ‘My Faith is gone!’
cried he…” (Hawthorne). At this point, the reader can understand that Brown lost
his wife, his faith, and even his sanity. After becoming disconnected from these
things, Brown became a different symbol, one of isolation rather than that of an
innocence oblivious to the evils around him.
Once he witnessed the “witch-meeting” in the forest of the townspeople, he
returned to the village the next day wary of everyone, having lost faith in them and
their religion (Hawthorne). He isolated himself from everyone around him,
including his wife, and pushed himself further and further into solitude over time.
After his experience in the forest, Brown became “a stern, a sad, a darkly
meditative, a distrustful, if not desperate man” (Hawthorne). Brown was forever
tainted by the evil he had seen in those around him and could never fully enjoy his
life and he died a lonely, bitter man.
