How would you describe Hawthornes tone in “Young Goodman Brown”?
Hawthorne’s a hard read, so I can see this being a question. In academia there are three primary views of Brown in the book. Either he’s crazy and seeing things, he’s misled by the devil to be evil, or he’s evil to begin with and just fulfills his destiny. Hawthorne is making you think, and the last lines of that story prove it. As a whole things are dark and disturbing, always soaked in shadow and darkness; even during the day when he returns to the town things have a shade over them. I think the point he is trying to make most with the tone is how one experience- real or not- can utterly change a person. From the point that Brown enters the forest he is under a dark pall, and even before that, the manner in which he leaves Faith (such a name, eh?) is pregnant with possible turmoil. Consider that when you read, and how the description of the environs contributes to Brown’s mood, reactions, and vision.
