Thinking Activity - Otherness in The Scarlet Letter

Hello Readers !

The Scarlet Letter, a novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne, not only narrates the tale of a rebellious woman, whom the society blames to  but also covers many branches of philosophy and thoughts, such as feminism, existentialism etc. 

Jean Paul Sartre has given the concept of otherness. In his play "No Exit" he has mentioned one dialogue that, "Hell is the other people".

Let's take an imaginary case of Stefan.

Stefan likes perfection in all the things. He thinks. . . My working desk should be perfect, because People (others) like everything neat and tidy. My boss will put me in a good-book! If I wear decent clothes I will be liked by everyone. . . (and the story goes endlessly)

You will see that how others are deeply involved in Stefan's thinking of perfection.

But, (Stefan thinks) Why am I doing this accountant's job? What did I do for myself? What if I don't do things in its normal ways. . . In fact what if I question 'What is normal?'. Is it a set of norms accepted by people and society at large ? Standards which set by others ? (gets annoyed with the idea of otherness and...) Who the hell are these others ? And I get answer, yes, others are hell.

Let's watch a video for better understanding of Sartre's quote, "Hell is the Other People."

to curb this at some level we have quotes like this...

Be you, the world will adjust.

These quotes takes us to individualistic approach of looking at the world. But its not the world which changes, its us who change in accordance of time. We make our advantageous creed to work and create facilities 

જયારે પણ ક્યાંક કોઈ સગવડતા ઉભી કરવામાં આવે છે ત્યારે ક્યાંક ને ક્યાંક કોઈ અગવડતા પણ સાથે પડછાયા ની જેમ ઉભી થતી હોય છે.

We want to write - we manufactured paper. We want to have flat surface for writing - we made tables, we want to sit near the table while writing - we made chair. We want to have fast transportation - we widened the roads. We want to be billionaire in the business of  All these at cost of losing the green covers,

When it comes to individual, the mind thinks differently.

Let's take an example of eating actions.

You want to eat an apple, how will you eat ?

This way ???

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Or this way ???

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Second example of otherness...