Beginning of Essay
Hester Prynne is as ripe a protagonist as any for learning and changing throughout the course of a novel. She is a new mother and a publicly condemned and ostracized woman in a highly moral and tight knit Puritan community. Her very position in life, first chil ....

Middle of Essay
.... her thoughts and changes of perspective in regard to women in society, love, sexuality, and relationships between men and women. These are particularly illustrated in her thoughts and feelings toward her husband, known in the time frame of the novel as Roger Chillingworth, and to her lover, Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale. Early on, Hester recognizes that the scarlet letter has and will continue to impart lessons to her: "I can teach my little Pearl what I have learned from this...this badge hath taught me, - it daily teaches me, - it is teaching me at this moment,- lessons whereof my child may be the wiser and the better, albeit they can profit nothing ....