Roger is portrayed as someone who lacks emotion and the connection to others and even his appearance makes his character more pronounced. He is described to be stooped, twisted, and has deformed shoulders. Hi marriage life is also portrayed as difficult and unsuccessful where he was not a good husband and companion to Hester. Roger constantly ignored his wife, but instead expected that Hester to show her love and affection. Roger fails to uphold his house, manage it, and even be efficient in establishing a good social connection with people around him. His ignorance and assumption that people around him were towards his downfall created the character of an unstable man.
In the story, Roger is the representation of evil and the negatives within the society. Roger is associated with the secular elements within the story. Most of the experiments that he starts end up with murder and even some are seen to represent a form of witchcraft. At the same time, Roger is vindictive, which he considers to be the ultimate score for any wrongdoing. He considers justice as not deserving to someone who commits a crime knowingly and would rather pay the same wrong with an equal measure. This makes him see others negatively, which is a drive towards hurting others rather than being a source of hope.
From his character, roger is used in the story to depict some of the issues within the community that continue to affect the way the community functions. There are the good people within the community and there also are those who rather than focus on the positive are striving for the downfall of others. Roger even gets Hester, a wife who has totally different characters from him. This is a symbol of a form of balance within the community that seeks to define the way people get to relate to one another.