Symbols In Young Goodman Brown

“My Faith is gone!” cried he (1038). This is Goodman Brown, a young man who is into Puritanism and catechism in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story Young Goodman Brown. The character became skeptical about his religious belief when he listened to the voice of his wife Faith in the woods. When he came back from the woods, he shrank from Faith as well as people living in Salem village. Being reclusive from people, he died in the end, with no hopeful verse carved on his tombstone. As Hawthorne shows in his story, strict religious beliefs and morality might be more problematic than they seem to be. Also, they might rather backfire when they are rooted too deeply in people’s mind. There are three main symbols; the woods, Faith and her pink ribbon in Young Goodman Brown to make Goodman Brown realize how religious beliefs and morality
The color pink is the mixture of red and white. The color white normally represents innocence and purity; in contrast, the color red represents lust. In the first part of the story, with a pink ribbon on her cap, Faith said, “prithee put off your journey until sunrise and sleep in your own bed. Pray tarry with me this night, dear husband, of all nights in the year” (1033). Her words have sexual connotation. Also, Goodman Brown saw the pink ribbon flying in the woods, which suggested Faith also attended the decadent congregation in the forest. These two incidents fall into the realm of the color red. In contrast, Goodman Brown shouted in the forest, “With heaven above and Faith below, I will yet stand firm against the devil!” (1038). Like this, Faith is an ethereal being to Goodman Brown, which falls into the realm of the color white. As Hawthorne introduces the pink ribbon from the first part of the story, he makes an allusion to the fact that every person, even as pure as Faith is not always innocent; in other words, every person has a hidden side that subconsciousness and id take charge