Analysis Essay of Young Goodman Brown

Analysis Essay of Young Goodman Brown

Has anyone ever questioned or wondered what people do behind close doors? In "Young Goodman Brown," the main character Goodman Brown, gets to see a full glimpse of how people "really" interact in everyday life. In this story, setting, symbolism, and figurative language plays an important role to convey the exploration of human capacity for evil, supernatural events, and the close examination of the interior life in this Gothic piece. Sometimes, the most trusting people may turn out to be a completely different person then who that individual thought they were.

People may not always claim or symbolize who they actually, as shown in "Young Goodman Brown." This story shows a close examination of the interior life of people in Salem community. They may put up fronts to hide their true self for a number of reasons: Embarrassed from being different than everyone else, or do not want to stand out in the crowd. In "Young Goodman Brown," the Puritan community in Salem Village, puts on an act of "religious" entitlement."By the sympathy of your human hearts for sin ye shall scent out all the places--whether in church, bedchamber, street, field, or forest--where crime has been committed, and shall exult to behold the whole earth one stain of guilt, one mighty blood spot."(7) This quote in the story shows that at the beginning of the story, Goodman thought of his family and surrounding Puritan community as Godly. Then when the devil shows Goodman another side of those people, he can not help but see evil in every human. As displayed in this story, people can not always trust everyone. Duplicity and the way nothing is as it seems is a major theme in "Young Goodman Brown."

Near the end of the story, the devil promises Goodman Brown and Faith that they'll have a new outlook on life, one that emphasizes the sinning nature of all humanity, and condemns Goodman Brown to a life of fear and outrage at the doings of his fellow man. The devil symbolizes a super natural event, or a bizarre situation in this story. His dark view of life is a complete turnaround from the ideas that Goodman Brown had held at the beginning of the story. Then, he thought of his family as godly; Faith as perfectly pure; and the Reverend, Deacon, and Goody Cloyse as models of morality. The devil ultimately shows him that his views are naive and gives him the ability to see the dark side in any human context. When Goodman Brown returns to the village, he trusts no one. As the devil's speech suggests, Goodman Brown has seen the evil in every human, and once he has started seeing it, he cannot stop. This story shows the exploration of human capacity for evil, and that anyone has the power to turn bad.