toggle menu
menu
vocabulary
1000+ books
Go to Book

dwell
used in The Scarlet Letter

3 meanings, 22 uses
(click/touch triangles for details)
1  —3 uses as in:
Don't dwell on it.
Definition
to think, communicate, or let attention stay on (or return to) something for a prolonged period
  • So forcibly did he dwell upon this symbol ... that it assumed new terrors in their imagination, and seemed to derive its scarlet hue from the flames of the infernal pit.
    Chapter 3 — The Recognition (94% in)
dwell = keep talking about
Other Uses (with this meaning)
  • But it is time to quit this sketch; on which, however, I should be glad to dwell at considerably more length, because of all men whom I have ever known, this individual was fittest to be a Custom-House officer.
    Introductory (39% in)
    • dwell = keep talking about
  • He has felt an influence dwelling always upon him like a curse.
    Chapter 14 — Hester and the Physician (55% in)
dwelling = lingering
There are no more uses of "dwell" flagged with this meaning in The Scarlet Letter.

Typical Usage  (best examples)
Dictionary / pronunciation — Google®Dictionary list — Onelook.com®
2  —13 uses as in:
It dwells in the forest.
Definition
make one's home in; or to live in; or to stay (in a place)
  • ...the woman has been a dweller here in Boston.
    Chapter 3 — The Recognition (23% in)
dweller = one who lives in a place
Other Uses (with this meaning)
  • This old town of Salem—my native place, though I have dwelt much away from it both in boyhood and maturer years—possesses, or did possess, a hold on my affection, the force of which I have never realized during my seasons of actual residence here.
    Introductory (12% in)
    • dwelt = lived
  • Yonder woman, Sir, you must know, was the wife of a certain learned man, English by birth, but who had long ago dwelt in Amsterdam, whence some good time agone he was minded to cross over and cast in his lot with us of the Massachusetts.
    Chapter 3 — The Recognition (22% in)
    • dwelt = lived
  • There dwelt, there trode, the feet of one with whom she deemed herself connected in a union that, unrecognised on earth, would bring them together before the bar of final judgment, and make that their marriage-altar, for a joint futurity of endless retribution.
    Chapter 5 — Hester at her Needle (22% in)
    • dwelt = lived
  • The new abode of the two friends was with a pious widow, of good social rank, who dwelt in a house covering pretty nearly the site on which the venerable structure of King's Chapel has since been built.
    Chapter 9 — The Leech (76% in)
    • dwelt = lived
  • A large number—and many of these were persons of such sober sense and practical observation that their opinions would have been valuable in other matters—affirmed that Roger Chillingworth's aspect had undergone a remarkable change while he had dwelt in town, and especially since his abode with Mr. Dimmesdale.
    Chapter 9 — The Leech (93% in)
    • dwelt = lived
  • Their voices came down, afar and indistinctly, from the upper heights where they habitually dwelt.
    Chapter 11 — The Interior of a Heart (42% in)
    • dwelt = lived
  • It was due in part to all these causes, but still more to something else, that there seemed to be no longer anything in Hester's face for Love to dwell upon; nothing in Hester's form, though majestic and statue like, that Passion would ever dream of clasping in its embrace; nothing in Hester's bosom to make it ever again the pillow of Affection.
    Chapter 13 — Another View of Hester (53% in)
    • dwell = live
  • "Thou must dwell no longer with this man," said Hester, slowly and firmly.
    Chapter 17 — The Pastor and his Parishioner (75% in)
    • dwell = live
  • Be the foregone evil what it might, how could they doubt that their earthly lives and future destinies were conjoined when they beheld at once the material union, and the spiritual idea, in whom they met, and were to dwell immortally together; thoughts like these—and perhaps other thoughts, which they did not acknowledge or define—threw an awe about the child as she came onward.
    Chapter 19 — The Child at the Brookside (13% in)
    • dwell = live
  • Hester felt herself, in some indistinct and tantalizing manner, estranged from Pearl, as if the child, in her lonely ramble through the forest, had strayed out of the sphere in which she and her mother dwelt together, and was now vainly seeking to return to it.
    Chapter 19 — The Child at the Brookside (31% in)
    • dwelt = lived
  • They have long dwelt together.
    Chapter 21 — The New England Holiday (98% in)
    • dwelt = lived
  • Its spell, however, was still potent, and kept the scaffold awful where the poor minister had died, and likewise the cottage by the sea-shore where Hester Prynne had dwelt.
    Chapter 24 — Conclusion (57% in)
dwelt = lived
There are no more uses of "dwell" flagged with this meaning in The Scarlet Letter.

Typical Usage  (best examples)
Dictionary / pronunciation — Google®Dictionary list — Onelook.com®
3  —5 uses as in:
a modest dwelling
Definition
a house or shelter in which someone lives
  • ...they reached the dwelling of Governor Bellingham.
    Chapter 7 — The Governor's Hall (40% in)
dwelling = home
Other Uses (with this meaning)
  • In this little lonesome dwelling, with some slender means that she possessed, and by the licence of the magistrates, who still kept an inquisitorial watch over her, Hester established herself, with her infant child.
    Chapter 5 — Hester at her Needle (31% in)
    • dwelling = home
  • "I have been watching at a death-bed," answered Hester Prynne "at Governor Winthrop's death-bed, and have taken his measure for a robe, and am now going homeward to my dwelling."
    Chapter 12 — The Minister's Vigil (50% in)
    • dwelling = home
  • In her lonesome cottage, by the seashore, thoughts visited her such as dared to enter no other dwelling in New England; shadowy guests, that would have been as perilous as demons to their entertainer, could they have been seen so much as knocking at her door.
    Chapter 13 — Another View of Hester (67% in)
    • dwelling = home
  • He had by this time reached his dwelling on the edge of the burial ground, and, hastening up the stairs, took refuge in his study.
    Chapter 20 — The Minister in a Maze (74% in)
dwelling = home
There are no more uses of "dwelling" flagged with this meaning in The Scarlet Letter.

Typical Usage  (best examples)
Dictionary / pronunciation — Google®Dictionary list — Onelook.com®
?  —1 use
exact meaning not specified
  • —"Thou hast long had such an enemy, and dwellest with him, under the same roof!"
    Chapter 17 — The Pastor and his Parishioner (35% in)

There are no more uses of "dwell" in The Scarlet Letter.

Typical Usage  (best examples)
Dictionary / pronunciation — Google®Dictionary list — Onelook.com®