Young Goodman Brown

ALam

"Young Goodman Brown" is one of Hawthorne’s most profound tales. In the manner of its concern with guilt and evil, it exemplifies what Melville called the “power of blackness” in Hawthorne’s work. Its hero, a naive young man who accepts both society in general and his fellow men as an individual worth his regard, are confronted with the vision of human evil in one terrible night, and becomes thereafter distrustful and doubtful. Allegorically, our protagonist becomes an Everyman named Brown, a “young” man, who will be aged in one night by an adventure that makes everyone in this world a fallen idol.