Young Goodman Brown analysis

Young Goodman Brown”
The story, Young Goodman Brown” written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is about a young Puritan man’s faith in God and his religious conviction. The story takes place in a forest on the outskirts of a Salem village after the witch trials. Goodman Brown must leave his wife to venture on a journey into the forest. On this journey he will be tempted by the devil.

However, Goodman Brown will refuse to give into temptation and will return to his village a changed man. To understand Young Goodman Brown’s journey and what caused him to change, and its effect on him, we need to carefully analyzing the symbols in the story. The characters that Young Goodman Brown meets, his ultimate decision, and his life after he returns to the village.
Young Goodman Brown, he is about to venture off on a journey into the forest. This becomes evident when his wife, Faith, begs him, to put off his journey until sunrise. In the story the word Faith symbolizes, not only Young Goodman Brown’s wife name but also his religious conviction.

This becomes obvious when Young Goodman Brown makes the statement to the traveler, “Faith kept me back awhile”. It was not only his wife trying to get him not to go on his journey, but also his religious conviction or conscience about doing evil that had detained him awhile. The approximate time of his journey, at night, also exhibits darkness and danger.

The pink ribbon is a symbolic for loyalty and trust. At the beginning of the story, Faith, his wife always wears a pink ribbon in her hair. This indicates to me Faith is loyal and trustworthy. The next indication that Goodman Brown is going into the forest for some evil purpose is when he makes the statement, “We have been a race of honest men and good Christians, since the days of the martyrs; and shall I be the first of the name of Brown that ever took this path and kept, such company, thou wouldth say.”
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