"The rust on the ponderous ironwork of its oaken door looked more antique than any thing else in the new world. Like all that pertains to crime, it seemed never to have known a youthful era. Before this ugly edifice, and between it and the wheel-track of the street, was a grass-plot, much over-grown with burdock, pig-weed, apple-peru, and such unsightly vegetation, which evidently found something congenial in the soil that had so early borne the black flower of civilized society, a prison. But, on one side of the portal, and rooted almost at the threshold, was a wild rose-bush, covered, in this month of June, with its delicate gems, which might be imagined to offer their fragrance and fragile beauty to the prisoner as he went in, and to the condemned criminal as he came forth to his doom, in token that the deep heart of Nature could pity and be kind to him."
I think the symbol between the rose-bush and the black flower is that rose-bush is where you are when you are one of the riches, you believe in the right religion, and do as the government tell you. People who stands out, believe in an other religion, commit a crime in the governments eyes are sent on the other side which is the black flower. The rose-bush represents pureness and wealthiness.
Chapter 1
9 years ago
Amanda - okay, good. But the rose bush has a direct connection with Anne Hutchinson. She stood out and disobey the community leaders and was therefore exiled into the wilderness. In this connection the rose bush can't symbolize people who do what the government wants. Actually, Hawthorne's purpose in this novel is to show the corruption of the Puritan Society. You might think about flipping your ideas about "black flower" / "red rose" unless you can back them up further with evidence from the text.
ReplyDeleteGood start - keep with it.