Certain artistic laws must be faithfully executed so that the reader can follow the trail. There must be unity and structure, literary devices, and a subject kept ever in the reader's sight. In The Scarlet Letter, the scaffold scenes provide the unity and structure, and the literary devices include symbols, colors of light and darkness, irony, and the consistent subject of guilt to provide artistic wholeness. While Hawthorne can go beyond the probable and use the marvelous, he must also do so without chaos; hence, he must provide artistic balance.
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