My poor dad.
My poor father was outside for literally HOURS today snow blowing the side walks, backyard, drive way, alley way, EVEN THE STREET IN FRONT OF OUR HOUSE.
Day 04 -- Your Favourite Book
If you don't count Harry Potter, my favorite book is The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. I've always loved Hester's strength. Dimmesdale is my favorite character and I've always felt so terrible about his anguish over allowing Hester to take on their sin alone. I guess it also didn't help that Chillingworth was thriving off his pain. I think Dimmesdale is my favorite because I've never been able to fully understand him. Why was it Hester's sole responsibility to endure the ridicule of being a pariah? Yeah, you can say that it was Hester's decision to take this on herself, but he could have spoken up at anytime. But he was too concerned about his place in Puritan society and how much the townspeople idolized him for his eloquent sermons. And Pearl is right to refuse him until he stops refusing her. But at the same time, I can't help but feel bad for him for literally killing himself over the secret he keeps. Constantly in pain, constantly covering his heart so that no one will be able to look inside to see what it is he can never reveal to anyone, constantly punishing himself for "sinning" which was really just falling in love with a woman and having a child with her. I first read this book for my junior year English class. Every class, I'd go in raving about how good this chapter or that chapter was and every single person absolutely hated the book. I made the mistake of telling my class that I cried at the end, so every time we read a new book, they'd always say to me "no crying this time, ok?" That was such a great class.
BTW -- even though my dad Gary Oldman has a knack for playing my favorite characters in movies (i.e. Sirius Black, Arthur Dimmesdale, etc) the movie based on this book is without a doubt the worst book interpretation I have ever had the misfortune of seeing. He played the part well I thought, but the movie would have been WAY better if they had just kept it the same as the book. The movie was a mere suggestion of what the book was. It really took all the beauty and symbolism out of it by putting in a fight between the Native Americans and the Puritans and witch hunts and just a bunch of shit that never happened in the book. Chillingworth was not at all what he was in the book. I can't remember him interacting with Dimmesdale at all and they lived together and were best friends in the book. (Granted, I haven't seen that movie in years.) It was nice to see Hester and Dimmesdale fall in love, but them falling in love wasn't what the book was about. It was an exploration of sin and guilt. And the end of the movie was just horrendous. Yeah, it would have been great if it could have been happily ever after and they run away to be together. But they didn't. Dimmesdale succumbed to his pain and he died on the scaffold where Hester was persecuted. And poor Hester endured her punishment until she died. She wore the scarlet letter for the rest of her life and never loved another man. Wearing the A even when society didn't require it of her anymore was a testament to her strength and conviction; it became her identification as a town matron, the one the other women turned to for help. For Hester to take it off and throw it away in the movie really insults her wearing it for the rest of her life in the book. In short, see the movie only once so that you can see my dad be incredible with a Scottish accent and to make fun of how terrible it is.