Setting and Its Effect on Understanding Young Goodman Brown Essay

Setting and its Effect on Understanding Young Goodman Brown   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Every tale ever told shares similar formal elements. All of these formal elements have equally important consequence on a story. The setting of a story has direct correlations to the way that the reader consumes the meaning of the story. The setting in Young Goodman Brown allows its author, Nathaniel Hawthorne, to leave the ending ambiguous, without closure. The reader is constantly expected to decide for themselves truth. Literal interpretation, widely accepted after its initial publication, respected the story as a puritan fable. The message of which: Without faith in God you are defenseless against the evils of the world. This paper is written with the understanding that Young Goodman Brown left his faith at home and ventured to meet the devil in the godless wild. The devil has earned a reputation of being the worst of all tricksters. On the worst night of the year, along the scariest path outside of the birthplace of American witches, Young Goodman Brown met the devil and the devil played a terrible trick on him, or did he? Whether this apparition was a dream or a reality, the devil cursed Young Goodman Brown with a life long distrust of all those around him for his troubles. The setting of Young Goodman Brown is essential in achieving the uncertainty of actual events regarding the end of the story.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  If we believe that God above is the all powerful goo...