Ultimately in life each person goes through the process of the demise of innocence, because evil is omnipresent. Everyone has a shadow side to himself. Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story "Young Goodman Brown" displays a protagonist's archetypal journey to the discovery of evil in mankind. Hawthorne's use of the threshold motif depicts the archetypal struggle between good and evil and the inevitable loss of innocence. Set in the Puritan age, Goodman Brown embarks on a voyage into the dark forest where he uncovers the evil in everyday society. Prophetically, Goodman Brown begins his trip at sunset in the streets of Salem, Massachusetts. …
