Ida and Hester
In the richly textured novel A Yellow Raft in Blue Water, author Michael Dorris splendidly weaves a narrative in which the meaningful stories of three generations of women are told. Each story is incomplete without the other, and the reader is not fully able to understand the beginning narratives until they reach the narrative of the grandmother, Aunt Ida. As Aunt Ida explains, “She doesn’t realize that I am the story.” (page 297) Upon closer examination of Aunt Ida it becomes very obvious that she is not unlike many other characters of American literature. Most notably, Aunt Ida can be successfully compared to that of Hester Prynne from Nathaniel Hawthorne’s A Scarlet Letter. It is only when readers compare and contrast different characters from seemingly diverse books that they are able to firmly grasp the character’s true personality, assessing their ultimate success or failure. Thus in order to decide the ultimate success or failure of Aunt Ida and Hester Prynne, it is crucial to closely examine each character, comparing and contrasting woman’s struggles in life. Aunt and Ida and Hester Prynne essentially share the same shame, humiliation, and resentment stemming from one profound event in their life. Thi
Just as Ida, Hester Prynne as well must deal with many daily struggles resulting from one act that has made her into the woman she is. Hester came to the colonies without her husband. Living in a very self-righteous, rigid Puritan community, she made the mistake of having an affair with the esteemed town priest, Arthur Dimmesdale. When the town elders found out that she was pregnant, they demanded to know her partner in sin, though she declined to name him. She was sentenced to wear a scarlet letter “A” that was to be embroidered on all of her garments as a reminder of this event. Just like Ida, her daughter Pearl was threatened to be taken away from her, but she manages to keep her and become a compassionate, maternal figure. She too must struggle with her own code of ethics and her own identity versus what society and law designate for her, thus explaining why she doesn’t take off the scarlet letter when the town elders say that she may do so. Hester is reminded of her experience daily just by a glance at Pearl, and she then has to struggle with not belonging, being an outcast of society left to sew garments for a living and tend to the sick. She is bombarded with feelings of shame and resentment just like Ida from one profound event in her life. It is apparent that both characters, Aunt Ida and Hester Prynne, both share the same struggles. While the character’s situations are different, they are both women who had to struggle with shame, resentment, guilt, identity, and a sense of not belonging. Both women manage to rise above it and continue on with their life which, in the opinions of many, is the definition of a success. Both women certainly didn’t fail in any area because they didn’t give up. Though both characters do not connect on time, ethnicity, age, or physical appearance
Some topics in this essay:
Hester Prynne,
Dog Clara,
Arthur Dimmesdale,
Aunt Ida,
Scarlet Letter,
Michael Dorris,
Clara Lecon,
Aunt Clara,
aunt ida,
hester prynne,
Lecon Ida’s,
ida hester,
Ida Hester,
page 297,
ida hester prynne,
shame resentment,
aunt ida hester,
ida explains,
scarlet letter,
feelings shame resentment,
event ida,
no” page,
success failure,
profound event life,
ultimate success failure,
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Approximate Word count = 1229
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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