A brand…
A lot of people who've read The Scarlet Letter would find this sort of opinion obvious. However, I feel that there is something worth repeating here. The idea of Hawthorne experiencing a burning feeling upon placing the cloth letter on his chest is a pretty interesting. He makes the letter feel like a brand, giving the wearer a label of belonging to the Devil and to sin. That little piece of red fabric, in a sense, is the same as the contract that Young Goodman Brown signed to meet the Devil in the forest at night.
How funny that so many authors have ideas that stretch across their works...
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