Many traditional explanations of conflict include things
like Man vs. Man, Man vs. Nature, but these don't seem appropriate for "Young Goodman
Brown." The conflict in this story is between man (Brown) and his unreasonable demands
on other people to be what he wants/needs them to be.
You
always have to remember that we have no solid evidence that ANYTHING happened in this
story; the end seems to suggest that it was all a dream, our "common sense" seems to
suggest that it's a dream, but it doesn't make any difference. Brown comes back to town
unable to accept what he perceives to be the "evil" in the people he once admired---but
there is no evidence that any of them are evil, just not
perfect.
So the best conflict may be Man vs.
Illusions.
The Enemy of the Good is the
Perfect.
(I guess I should use "Person" in all of these :)
)
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