Young Goodman Brown

Dream or Reality? In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown,” the reader can interpret the events of the story in more than one way. Brown’s journey can be seen as either a dream or a reality. I view the story as a dream – an invention of Brown’s own imagination to symbolize his loss of faith in religion and God. The dream presented is extremely beneficial to the development of the story, as it …

…everyone else. He disassociates himself from all those in the town as he judges them as being sinners. He becomes "a stern, a sad, a darkly meditative, a distrustful, if not a desperate man…" after his journey when he commits the ultimate sin of judging and condemning others without looking at one's own sinfulness. In the end, whether dream or reality, "they carved no hopeful verse upon his tombstone; for his dying hour was gloom” (1345).