The exposition occurs at the beginning of a story or the first paragraph, this is where the author reveals the protagonist. The protagonist is Goodman Brown, a man trying to find his way through life. He makes a journey through the woods with an elderly man who is the antagonist. The journey is symbolic to the path that everyone must choose in life. This is evident when Goodman is at home he knows who he is and what kind of man he wants to be, but when he leaves the shelter of his home and family, he seems to struggle with decisions he must make in the forest

Goodman tries to cling to the idea that he may still save himself from the dark forces of his world. Goodman Brown attempts to pray, but stops when a cloud suddenly darkens the sky. A babble of voices seems to issue from the cloud, many recognizable to Brown as belonging to godly persons, among them his wife. After the cloud has passed, a pink ribbon just like the one Faith wears in her cap flutters to the ground. Once seeing it, Goodman Brown is plunged into despair and sadness about the witches' assembly. Once there, he is confronted with a congregation made up of the wicked and those whom Brown had always assumed to be righteous. As he is led to the altar to be received into this fellowship of the lost, he is joined by Faith. The climax of the story comes just before they receive the sacrament of communism: Brown cries to his wife to look heavenward and save herself. In the next moment he finds himself alone. Goodman Brown knows the error of his ways, Goodman had changed indefinitely he will always remember the evil decision that he made to go along with the old man and almost risk his life. With Goodman’s choose to follow the old man Brown’s life is eternally turned upside down.

The denouement (resolution, unraveling) and the conclusion of the plot come quickly. Returning the next morning to Salem,

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