Saturday, August 13, 2016

Hester Prynne and Shug Avery - Dickens

Throughout our lives, we will come across all sorts of people: big, small, short, tall, smart, athletic, weird, the list goes on. However, we will also come across people that we find many similarities with and with whom we are able to connect with on all levels. These people tend to become some of our greatest friends. However, despite the deep connections you can form with other people through staggering similarities and equal beliefs, there will always be the few differences you find in personality and appearance and beliefs that separate you from your friends. We are all unique in our own special ways no matter how many similarities two people may have. When I read The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne and The Color Purple by Alice Walker, I could sense and feel a connection between Hester Prynne and Shug Avery. However, I believe the reason why I felt the connection between these two empowered, beautiful, strong-headed women, is because I felt I also was able to relate to them and their personalities.

In The Color Purple, Shug Avery is represented as an oddball of sorts in the society she lives in and is amongst. She faces many obstacles but never seems to let any of these obstacles phase her. An example of such obstacles would be how Shug strives to be an independent woman as a black female, in a time where being a African-American and a female basically automatically puts you at the bottom of the social pyramid where you are frowned upon or seen as worse than those “superior” to you. Yet, despite theses great odds, she fights back anyways and expresses herself in ways against the standards of society. Similar to which, in The Scarlet Letter, Hester is ridiculed and scoffed at by the Puritan society where she lives with her (previous) husband, despite how she feels isolated amongst them. Against the obstacle she is faced with when she is forced to wear a cap with the letter “A” on it as her punishment for committing adultery, having an affair with a man for whom she cared for while married to her husband who she does not love. Instead of subjecting herself to the humiliation however, not long after being granted this punishment, she speaks out to the Puritans and rips the “A” off that hat. Both women find ways to combat society in extraordinary ways.

The previous point made that pointed out their similarities focused on their personalities, specifically their desire to stand up for what they believe in, and their driven nature to do so. However, their similarities don’t only lie in their personalities, but in their physical appearance as well. Both women, Hester Prynne and Shug Avery, were known by their surrounding communities for being some of the most beautiful and gorgeous women in the land. Hester is physically described in the book at the beginning as a tall young woman with a "figure of perfect elegance on a large scale." Additionally noted as her most impressive feature, is her "dark and abundant hair, so glossy that it threw off the sunshine with a gleam, and her beauty shone out, and made a halo of the misfortune and ignominy in which she was enveloped." Shug is described as beautiful with the most gorgeous hair and most perfect body. Another character in The Color Purple, Celie, often finds herself gawking with jealousy of Shug because she considers herself to be ugly. Both women stand as figures in their community by their looks, because they are seen as beautiful on the outside.

In the midst of all of these seemingly astounding similarities, there are a variety of differences as well. First off, in The Color Purple, Shug Avery’s personality is seen as “self-centered” and “superficial” to most, unlike the warmth and kindness evident to many in Hester Prynne’s that is shown through the affection and love she gives to her daughter. Also, a blatant difference is that Hester is white, while Shug is black. While their situations and experiences are similar, the obstacles the African-American people faced, versus those that white people faced is blaringly different, especially given the time each of their stories were set in.

In conclusion, Hester Prynne and Shug Avery, while both come from very different stories and times, their experiences and similarities in personality and appearance are obvious and inevitable to notice, despite their few, assorted differences.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The reason I decided to read your post was because I saw that I had interacted with the characters in your title in my reading. When I read it however, I discovered that our understandings of the characters, specifically Hester Prynne, were very different. While neither one of our interpretations are “correct” I was very intrigued that you compared Hester’s and Shug’s personalities with such likeness when I found them different enough to be considered foils in many cases.
Before I get into the differences, a majority of your thoughts were in line with mine. Aside from my obvious agreement with her physical characteristics, I was reassured that our understanding of Shug Avery was as similar as it was. When I read The Color Purple I got the same sense of Shug’s independence and outspoken personality that you did. When reading, this really shocked me as Celie, who had similar socioeconomic circumstances, was so quiet and submissive. Moreover, your comment about Shug seeming self centered stood out to me. As I was reading the book, I did not get this feeling however, after reading your post, I can see how she would appear selfish to others.
With so much of our thoughts in line, the differences stand out. While I was reading, The Scarlet Letter, I did not get the feeling that Hester was strong-headed or empowered. While I agree that she was very charitable and kind, she seemed content to accept her place in society. Even after she temporarily broke free of the letter in the forest, she later put it back on because that was what the town expected of her. While I concede that I may have had this impression of her in the beginning of the book when she was put before the town, I stopped thinking this after she became content living her entire life at the bottom without challenging society.

Anonymous said...

Hello Maddie ! I immediately decided that I wanted to read your post because of the two characters I saw that you were comparing. When reading both of those books, I too made an immediate connection between Hester and Shug Avery. I really liked how you pointed out that even though they are from completely different times and places, there are many surface level and inner similarities between them.I also like how you used the juxtaposition of Shug Avery and Celie to show that opposites can attract and form a strong bond of friendship. However, you also addressed how sometimes people that are very similar can have a strong bond as well, which I completely agree with. The commonality of being outsiders in their respective communities, although for some different reasons, is a base for them having incredibly similar character traits and motives. The quotes and references to the text that you chose really added a great deal of evidence to your post. The eloquent diction that both authors used to describe the characters shows just how alike they are in certain ways. Being the center of attention everywhere they go brings out certain behaviors that make them a lot alike. These are all things that it seems we both noticed in the readings. The way you described it in your post made it really relatable to real life and I enjoyed reading it. Keep up the good work Dickens!