Beginning of Essay
The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is characterized by three major events that occur on the town scaffold. What takes place on this platform will determine the path which the three main characters, Hester Prynne, Mr. Dimmsdale, and their daughter Pearl ....

Middle of Essay
.... scarlet letter off [her] breast” if she were to “speak out his name”(64). Had she relented and revealed his name she might never have had to endure the humiliation of the scarlet letter. But she refused, and so her path was set. The second time at the scaffold was a turning point for Hester. She, Pearl, and Dimmsdale are together for the first time, “...the three formed an electric chain” as if they were always meant to be together if something, or someone, had not gotten in their way (140). But it is here that Hester finally realizes the damage which hiding Chillingworth's identity has caused Dimmsdale. Chillingworth was “a secret ....