YGB essay

P.S. This has got to be one of the worst essays I have ever written.

Young Goodman Brown is a devout man who cannot imagine leaving his Faith (literally). As Young Goodman Brown takes his journey into the forest, he starts to question his faith and the society he lives in. When his journey brings him to find a satanic communion of sorts, YGB is dragged into a world of uncertainty. He returns to Salem living a life conformed to the society he has always known while he is consumed by the gloom and distrust of this community. YGB returns to what appears to be a perfect Puritan world, but his knowledge of the community’s lies causes him to lead a life of confusement and suffering.

YGB begins as an intensely pious man. His wife is incoincidently named Faith and she is very precious to him. Hawthorne foreshadows that he will meet something evil when he describes the feeling of someone following YGB. When he meets the man along the path, the mood of the story turns dark. The skies are filled with clouds and the man is characterized as somewhat devilish. The first moment when YGB begins to question the faith of the community is when he discovers that Goody Cloyson, one of the most devout women in Salem, is actually a witch. YGB wants to turn back so the traveler he met with gives him his evil staff. The staff is symbolic of snake who when touched, bites and infects with poison. He began to hear voices from clouds of darkness and saw every churchgoer with every Satan worshiper participating in a devilish event. This poison caused YGB to lose his unwavering trust that Salem was a place of Puritan values. His once perfect image of Salem had now been tainted by what he saw. When YGB returns to Salem he questions who the people of his town were. Yet, he dared not say anything or else risk being burned at the steak like a typical devil worshiper.

YGB’s conformity to a false society was a means of protection. But he could not forget what he saw in the forest. He lost all trust as to who these people were. Through his questioning and conformity, YGB learns that the perfect pious world he thought he lived in was a built on a pile of lies.