¶ … Quality of Evil in Young Goodman Brown and Ethan Brand
When examining the works of Nathaniel Hawthorne, it is interesting to note the role of evil or indeed perceived evil. Evil appears to distort lives and destroy egoistical souls. One such egoistical soul was Young Goodman Brown (Hawthorne 1937). He leaves his wife Faith in complete trust that her name adequately describes her nature. The end of the story however results in delusion and a confirmation of what Brown has suspected of himself (Leavis 36): all people are inherently evil.
Brown's egoism lies in the fact that he separates himself from the "sinful" and attempts to befriend only those he perceives as pious. He is however shown that the most pious are in reality the most sinful. Even his own family is shown to be composed of people committing evil in the name of good. In this way evil is used under the guise of good to destroy those who believe themselves untouchable by the devil.
It is also interesting to consider Brown's name: "Goodman." It appears that, like Faith who is not particularly faithful, Goodman is not...
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