A pearl is a round, smooth, lustrous, variously colored deposit, formed around a grain of sand in the shells of oysters that is extremely valuable. In Nathaniel Hawthorne's excerpt "Pearl" from The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynn had committed adultery while her husband was overseas. Out of this treacherous act, a beautiful daughter named Pearl was born. Hester paid an enormous price for her Pearl; she was ridiculed by the entire town and forced to wear the letter "A" for adultery. The community viewed Pearl as a monster and a thing. Hester thought of her child as a treasure and a blessing; "a lovely and immortal flower", paid for with everything she had (1295). The name "Pearl" has many different meanings for many people, both negative and positive.
Nathaniel Hawthorne, known for works such as The Scarlet Letter and The House of Seven Gables, lived in a puritan society in Salem, Massachusetts. Puritan society was very restrictive and socially constrictive. Any one who fell outside of their "role" in society was insulted, ridiculed, or tortured to death. Hawthorne's grandfather was one of the judges that participated in the Salem witchcraft trials. This greatly influenced Hawthorne's writings in many ways. The struggle between good and evil and the effects that sins have on community are the central idea of The Scarlet Letter. .
In his short essay called "What's in a Name", Henry Louis Gates talks about how the name "George" was demeaning and very offensive. Gates and his father were out for ice cream when Mr. Wilson came by. Mr. Wilson called Gates" father "George", even though that was not his name. When Gates asked his father why that was the case, he was given the explanation that "[Mr. Wilson] calls all colored people George." This immediately gave the name "George" a negative connotation. In the same way, Pearl has both a positive and a negative meaning. For Hester, the name Pearl stands for the biggest treasure she could ever ask for; "Purchased with all she had, --- her mother's only treasure!" (Hawthorne 1295).
