Literary Motifs in “Young Goodman Brown” A literary motif “is a conspicuous element, such as a type of incident, device, reference, or formula, which occurs frequently in literary works" ( Abraham 169). Incredibly, this story, “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, contains a number of familiar literary motifs (Axelrod 337). Goodman Brown, at the beginning of the story, takes leave of his wife Faith to undertake a journey into the woods where he has an appointment with the devil: "My love and my faith", replied the young Goodman Brown, "of all the nights of the year , tonight I have to move away from you. My journey, as you call it, to and fro, must necessarily be accomplished between now and dawn. the forest ("He had taken a sad road, darkened by all the darkest trees of the forest, which scarcely stood aside to let the narrow path pass, and immediately closed behind.), involving encounters with the devil, Goody Cloyse , Deacon Gookin, the local minister, and his wife Faith, who have all undertaken a journey into the deepest part of the woods to attend the annual meeting of the coven or witches, Goodman arrives at the end of the excursion in the most remote and isolated part of the forest where he and Faith must be baptized into the group of devil worshipers and thus learn the evil secrets hidden in everyone's hearts: here the Form of Evil has dipped its hand and prepared to lay the sign of the baptism on their foreheads, that they might be partakers of the... middle of paper... such a thing was possible, that he would recognize the voices of the minister and Deacon Gookin, who were running and proceeding calmly, as they were wont to do, when they were linked to some ordination or ecclesiastical council. While I was still within earshot, one of the riders stopped to flip a switch. “Of the two, reverend sir,” said the deacon-like voice, I would rather miss an ordination dinner than tonight's meeting. In conclusion, it is obvious that there is a proliferation of familiar literary motifs in “Young Goodman Brown.” WORKS CITED Brams, MH A Glossary of Literary Terms, 7th ed. New York: Harcourt Brace College Publishers, 1999.Axelrod, Rise B. St. Martin's Guide to Writing, 2nd ed. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1988.Hawthorne, Nathaniel. "Young Goodman Brown." 1835. http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~daniel/amlit/goodman/goodmantext.html