essay titles for the scarlet letter

“The Scarlet Letter” Essay Titles

Introduction.

Great stories are full of complex emotions and convincing characters, but examination questions will require you to demonstrate your understanding of “The Scarlet Letter” by focusing on how Hawthorne presents one key aspect or theme throughout the text. All of your thoughts and ideas should only refer to the key term of the essay title.

• The experience of Hester Prynne, as presented in “The Scarlet Letter”, has no relevance to the twenty-first century reader.
• The twenty-first century reader is always on the side of Hester Prynne.
• In “The Scarlet Letter”, Hester Prynne’s actions do not shock us to the same extent that they shocked their first readers.
• Modern readers may consider Hester Prynne’s role in “The Scarlet Letter” as a statement about the status of women in society.
• In “The Scarlet Letter”, Hawthorne is clearly on the side of Hester Prynne.
• “The Scarlet Letter” is little more than a criticism of attitudes towards women.
• “The Scarlet Letter” can be viewed as a Feminist novel.
• Hester Prynne fails to live up to the responsibilities of seventeenth-century woman in New England.
• Hester Prynne can be seen as the first great modern heroine of American Literature.
• Hester Prynne’s silent suffering in “The Scarlet Letter” is not heroic.
• In many ways, Hawthorne condones the adultery of Hester Prynne.
• Arthur Dimmesdale is the only character in the novel who can be considered a hero.
• Arthur Dimmesdale is the central character of “The Scarlet Letter”.
• In many ways, Hawthorne condones the adultery of Arthur Dimmesdale.
• Hawthorne positions the reader to sympathise with Dimmesdale’s plight.

Chillingworth

• Roger Chillingworth is the character who undergoes the most change in “The Scarlet Letter”.
• In many ways, Hawthorne presents Roger Chillingworth as the moral degenerate in “The Scarlet Letter”.
• Roger Chillingworth is the true villain of “The Scarlet Letter”.
• In “The Scarlet Letter”, Chillingworth represents true evil.
• Pearl functions as a symbol in the novel and nothing else.
• “The Scarlet Letter” presents an entirely negative view of Puritan religion in New England.
• “The Scarlet Letter” is really a novel of religious criticism and protest.
• “The Scarlet Letter” is Hawthorne’s attempt to distance himself from his Puritan ancestors.
• “The Scarlet Letter” is a criticism of religion.
• In “The Scarlet Letter”, Hawthorne presents a clash between the Puritan faith and human nature.

Genre and Style

• Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter” is little more than an allegory.
• “The Scarlet Letter” is a symbolist novel.
• Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter” is nothing more than a Romance.
• “The Scarlet Letter” can be read as a psychological novel.
• Hawthorne uses a participating narrator to shape the reader’s response.
• In many ways, the scarlet letter is one of the most distinctive characters in the novel.
• Revenge is a central theme of “The Scarlet Letter”.
• Secrets are a central theme of “The Scarlet Letter”.
• Guilt is a central theme of “The Scarlet Letter”.
• Class plays an important role in “The Scarlet Letter”.
• The American Dream is an important theme to understanding “The Scarlet Letter”.
• “The Scarlet Letter” presents the failure of the American Dream.

Clothing Imagery in “The Scarlet Letter”

The American Dream

Chillingworth’s Malevolence

The Villainous Chillingworth

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99 Scarlet Letter Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

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• Book Report on The Scarlet Letter Though the development of these themes is also a subject of other characters such as Chillingworth and Dimmesdale, Hester is outstandingly the central character since she makes the latter two behave in the manner they […]
• A Study of Guilt and Repentance in “The Scarlet Letter” by Hawthorne Thus, it is essential to determine how the author used the symbol of the scarlet letter to highlight the sinful person and identify whether it is possible to atone for the guilt or conceal it.
• Critical Approach Analysis of “The Scarlet Letter” Generally, such important themes as legalism, guilt, immorality, and sin related in the novel may be discussed through the prism of historicism, and even the very title of the novel featuring the word “scarlet” or […]
• Critical Analysis of The Scarlet Letter Hester gives birth to a child after having an affair while waiting for the arrival of the husband and conceals the identity of the child’s father.
• Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter” Novel The theme of sin is depicted through emotional sufferings and experience of the main heroes of the novel: Hester Prynne, her husband Roger Chillingworth and Hester’s lover, Dimmesdale.
• “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne This begs the question, whether a human or the whole society has a right to take the function of God and to punish the sin.
• ‘The Minister’s Black Veil’ and ‘The Scarlet Letter’ by Hawthrone The Scarlet Letter depicts the supposed sin committed by Hester Prynne as an act against the social and religious standards of the time.
• The Scarlet Letter by Hawthorne Despite the many pieces of evidence of virtue, they look paltry compared to the description of weaknesses in the main character of the story, Dimmesdale.
• Nathaniel Hawthorne “The Scarlet Letter” These lines are from the ‘Forest Walk’ chapter of the novel where Hester scolds her daughter, Pearl for questioning the burned “A” on the minister’s chest.
• US History in The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne The book by Nathaniel Hawthorne titled The Scarlet Letter is considered the best work of his not in vain the contents and the topics touched upon in it raise much profound thinking and reveal the […]
• Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter” From Several Perspectives The story was written in the nineteenth century, but there is a great deal of information provided within the text about the earlier lives of the author’s ancestors, making it a somewhat historical novel in […]
• Hawthorne’s Concept of Evil in “Rappaccini’s Daughter” and “The Scarlet Letter” The way that the community dealt with this transgression of marital bonds comprises the bulk of the story, in which it is finally revealed that the highly respected Reverend Dimmesdale was the father of the […]
• “The Scarlet Letter”: A Darkened End For both Hester and for the townspeople, the mere presence of this letter appearing this one time on her dress is enough to mark her as something different from the rest of them and secluded.
• The History Behind The Scarlet Letter: Way of Life of Early Colonists in Puritan-Influenced New England Once Hester’s secret was out, it was obvious to the entire village that Hester was not provided with the same degree of faith as the rest of the villagers and was therefore a greater sinner.
• Characters in “The Scarlet Letter” and “Hamlet” Film Hester returns to Boston just before her death, in order to be buried in the same grave as Dimmesdale, with ‘A’ inscribed on their tombstone. Much to her son’s anger and disgust, she marries Claudius […]
• Revenge & Shame in Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter” The main goal of this paper is to analyze The Scarlet Letter to reveal the author’s idea of the frustration of revenge and victory over shame.
• Puritans in “The Scarlet Letter” by Hawthorne As I read through the introductory part of the novel, the statements made by the narrator reinforced the idea that the Puritans were bad people. I was surprised at the obsession they had when it […]
• “The Scarlet Letter” a Novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne This essay asserts that the role of the narrator in The Scarlet Letter functions more as social critic of the Puritanical values that founded the United States; the narrator of The Scarlet Letter represents Hawthorne’s […]
• Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter: Resilience and Redemption The plot of the novel immerses the readers into the 17th century to demonstrate the environment of the Puritan era in America.
• “The Scarlet Letter” and “The Young Goodman” by Hawthorne The application of imagery and symbolism in this piece of work begins with symbolization of the Old general depicts the reawakening of the characters upon being motivated by the actions of the other person.
• Rev. Arthur Dimmesdale in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter” Another man had returned out of the forest; a wiser one-” Dimmesdale finds it wise and peaceful to confess his sin. After giving his sermon, Dimmesdale stands on the scaffold and he tells the congregation […]
• Nathaniel Hawthorne: Pearl and “The Scarlet Letter” The following is an analysis of the character Pearl in the story The Scarlet Letter where more focus is put on her character and what she represents/ symbolizes in the story.
• Literature Aspects in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne Second, the Bay Colony of Massachusetts is likened to an island in the midst of wilderness, indicating that the place is undeveloped First, the market place is described.
• Willingness to Judge: A Deconstructive Approach to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter The truth is founded by a reading of the root of the reality in question where in every case the ensuing fact is an occulted form of the reading.
• Throwing Stones at the Sinful Ones: The Two Stories Intertwined Though this can be explained by the cruel and uncompromising spirit of the ear, it is still hard to believe that the false morals and the environment created by the church influenced people so hard […]
• The Scarlet Letter When examining the novel, it becomes clear that the writing style and the way in which the author delves into the Puritan way of life seemingly shows the double standards that existed at the time.
• The Three Mental State of Hester Prynne in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• A History and Symbolism in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Use of Body Language and Facial Expressions in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• The Value of Pearl in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Symbols of Romanticism in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• “The Scarlet Letter” as a Commentary on the American History
• The Theme of Good Versus Evil in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Use of Motifs in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• Appearance and Reality in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• The Symbol of the Rosebush in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• A Passionate Heart in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• The Struggles of Pearl in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Symbol of Pearl for the Character Hester Prynne in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• The Unchanged Character of Hester in Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• The Use of Irony in “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller and “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Use of Symbolism in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• A Tale of Human Frailty and Sorrow in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Functions of Physical Settings in “The Scarlet Letter”
• The Sin of Adultery Portrayed in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Transformation of the Reverend Master Dimmesdale in Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• The Sufferings of Reverend Dimmesdale in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Ways of the Puritans in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• A Criticism of the Puritan Tradition in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Arthur Dimmesdale’s Self-Inflicted Torture in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Theme of Innocence in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Comparing “Young Goodman Brown” and “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Victims of Slavery in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Use of Literary Devices, Imagery, and Symbolic Elements in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• True Love in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Alienation of Hester Prynne in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• An Analysis of Light and Darkness in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Use of Color to Express Emotion in Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• An Analysis of Chillingworth’s Ideas of Revenge in “The Scarlet Letter”
• Hypocrisy and Conformity in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Symbolic Use of Nature in Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”
• The Themes Punishment vs. Forgiveness Present in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• An Overview of the Concept of Sin in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Romantic Heroine in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Themes of Guilt and Adultery in “The Scarlet Letter” by Hawthorne
• An Overview of the Concept of Tragic Hero in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Role of Romanticism in the Development of Characters in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The Tragedy of Dimmesdale in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• What Influenced Nathaniel Hawthorne to Write “The Scarlet Letter”?
• How Was Guilt Handled in “The Scarlet Letter,” “Red Badge of Courage,” and “The Crucible”?
• Who Was the Protagonist in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• How Has One Sin Affected the Lives of Four Individuals in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• Is “The Scarlet Letter” a Protofeminist Novel?
• How Did Hester Prynne Exhibit Feminism in “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne?
• Is Hester Truly Penitent for Her Crime in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• How Does Sin Cause Characters to Act Differently in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• How Does “The Scarlet Letter” Comment on Religion in America?
• What Are the Roles of Chillingworth and Wilson Characters in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• Why Does Dimmesdale Intervene on Pearl’s Behalf When Governor Bellingham Orders Her Removed From Hester’s Care in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• How Do the Characters Live and Deal With the Effects of Sin in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• How Does Transcendentalism Affect “The Scarlet Letter”?
• What Is the Difference Between How Adultery Is Viewed Now and How It Was Viewed by Puritan Society in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• How Is “The Scarlet Letter” Relevant to Today’s Teens?
• Why Does Dimmesdale Keep Putting His Hand Over His Heart in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• How Is “The Scarlet Letter” Embodied by Pearl?
• Do People in the Community Believe Hester’s Punishment for Adultery Is Too Light or Too Strict in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• What’s the Role of the Sets in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• What Are the Motifs of Dimmesdale and Chillingworth’s Friendship in “The Scarlet Letter”??
• Does Chillingworth Ever Forgive Hester in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• What Is the Long-Term Effect of Sin in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• Should Readers Pity Hester as a Character in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• What Is the Role of Puritan Ethic in the Events of “The Scarlet Letter”?
• Who Is More Racked by Guilt in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• Should Dimmesdale Have Said Something When Governor Bellingham Took Pearl From Hester in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• What Does the Prison Door Symbolize in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• Does the Puritan Community See Hester’s Punishment as Too Strict or Too Lenient in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• Is Pearl a Curse or a Blessing in “The Scarlet Letter”?
• Does Hester’s True Identity Differ From What Society Attributes Her in “The Scarlet Letter”?
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Themes and Analysis

The scarlet letter, by nathaniel hawthorne.

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s ‘The Scarlet Letter’ is stuffed with themes that border around aspects of religion and human morality such as sinning, confessing, and being penalized for such sin - much to the author’s intention of sending some strong moral lessons to his readership.

Article written by Victor Onuorah

Degree in Journalism from University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

Hawthorne’s move to go by such name as ‘ The Scarlet Letter ’ for the book’s title is symbolic in itself and already hints at the themes of penitence and punishment for the crime of adultery committed by two of the book’s major characters in Hester Prynne and the priest – Arthur Dimmesdale. There are some foundational themes as there are other subsets that still carry a vital message in them. The most important ones will be analyzed in this article.

Sin and Punishment

These are probably the two most obvious themes of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s ‘ The Scarlet Letter ’ and they are very clearly executed throughout the pages of the book – beginning from the first chapter. 

Hester Prynne, who is the heroine of the book, is one of the characters who bear such guilts of sin and punishment. The sin for which she is being punished is that of adultery – which she commits with a Christian preacher, Arthur Dimmesdale.

Being she lives in the era of a Christian-inspired puritan society, her punishment becomes one of massive social shaming and disgrace – whereby she has to wear a dress with a large inscription of the letter ‘A’ appearing on her chest in blood red color. 

Contrition and Penitence

Hester and Dimmesdale – two prominent characters harboring the most damnable sin of their era – appear to have had a contrite heart after the act, particularly with Hester, who is publicly announced and disgraced. 

Readers could feel the genuineness of Hester’s contrite heart, having been legally married to Roger Chillingworth, her long lost husband – even though she would never regret the love she feels for Dimmesdale and the product of such love being her child, Pearl. 

Gender and Status Inequality Before the Law

Nathaniel Hawthorne, through ‘ The Scarlet Letter ,’ may have tried to point out the sheer inequality of the purity society before the rule of law. Hawthorne’s time is critical of several aspects of Puritanism, and here questions why preacher Arthur Dimmesdale doesn’t get served the same amount of humiliation as Hester gets. 

Though an argument can be raised that the executors of the puritan laws don’t punish Dimmesdale because they do not know for sure if he committed the crime – especially with Hester refusing to give that information out. Still, one can easily sense that they don’t do enough to get the man who’s responsible. 

Two hypotheses here are one; their interest in not punishing men but the women in such crimes. Two, Dimmesdale’s religious status makes him a very important person, so the executors would be tricky with handling a case of such a class. 

Necromancy and witchcraft

There is a massive dose of talks and meetings about and with witches, and even the devil – who is referred to in the book as ‘ The Black Man .’ These subjects are part of what gives the book its dark, spooky ambiance characteristic of gothic fiction. 

Mistress Hibbins is a high-profile suspect whose behavior is, by a puritan society’s standards, termed diabolic and hellish. Hibbins goes about negatively influencing people – like Hester and Pearl – instilling strange, anti puritan mentality in them, conducting and attending meetings and conventions where they invoke and commune with ‘The Black Man’ or devil himself. 

Key Moments in The Scarlet Letter

• After losing his job with the Salem Custom House, a man puts together a piece of the manuscript that he had discovered littering in the attic of his former job. On the cover is an inscription, ‘Scarlet Letter A .’ 
• The story which he has assembled from it narratives the story of a young woman called Hester Prynne who lives in a 1600s puritan society. 
• She appears to have been imprisoned for a heinous crime and is processioned out and made to stand over a public platform wearing a dress with the scarlet letter ‘A’ written boldly on her breast, on which she also carries her baby. 
• The crime for which she is paraded is adultery, and under a typical puritan leadership, social shaming and scorning are the repercussions for such acts. 
• While she faces the worse moment of her life, a man stands a stone’s throw away in the crowd observing the whole event. His name is Roger Chillingworth, the long-lost husband of the woman being punished at the platform. 
• On the platform with Hester is a popular preacher of the town, rev. Arthur Dimmesdale publicly pressures her to say who’s responsible for her baby, but Hester wouldn’t tell and is thrust back into her cell.
• With a keen interest in the matter, Chillingworth lies that he is a doctor to get access to his wife, and when he gets past security into the cell, he threatens her not to let anyone know she is married to him and that if she does, he would search out the man responsible and hurt him very badly.
• Following her release, Hester moves away from town and tries to survive as a dressmaker with young Pearl. Chillingworth is still in town posing as a doctor as he tries to unearth the father of his wife’s baby. And by now, Dimmesdale, the popular town people’s preacher, has failing health and is being tended to by Chillingworth. 
• Pearl grows fond of the scarlet ‘A’ on her mother’s breast, but Hester wouldn’t tell her the truth about it. 
• With Chillingworth now spending so much time with Dimmesdale, he starts to notice an unusually strange correlation between Hester’s case and the preacher’s health history. 
• One faithful day during Dimmesdale’s medical examination, Chillingworth finds that his patient has a similar scarlet letter ‘A’ etched inside his chest. He is convinced Dimmesdale is Hester’s lover and father of the illegitimate child, Pearl. 
• With this knowledge, Chillingworth decides to exert revenge on Dimmesdale by giving him the wrong meds and treating him so much so that his health deteriorates further by the day. 
• For Dimmesdale, it seems that his inability to confess publicly is eating him up and causing him constant emotional trauma and heartache. And on several occasions, he doesn’t eat and chastises and whips himself for his mistake. 
• On a faithful day, just after twilight, troubled by his guilt, Dimmesdale climbs up the platform and is joined by Hester and her daughter shortly, while Chillingworth skulks by the shadows observing them before a shooting star shimmers through the night sky to reveal his presence. 
• What follows next is an exchange of emotions. Hester begs Chillingworth to stop torturing Dimmesdale, but he argues he’s lenient to him. 
• Hester then plans a rendezvous with Dimmesdale in the wilderness, where she exposes Chillingworth’s real identity and begs Dimmesdale to elope with her across the Atlantic to start afresh in a new, distant town. He agrees to go with her after he has delivered a scheduled sermon. 
• On the day of the sermon, Dimmesdale is moved by his preaching that he decides to confess publicly that he is Hester’s lover and the father to Pearl (both of who had joined him on the platform). Opening his chest, he exposes a scarlet cut he had been carrying in his chest and dies as soon as Pearl kisses him.
• Chillingworth’s revenge is taken from him, and he dies a few months later. Hester leaves town with her daughter – explores Europe and marries a wealthy home, and seldom writes her mother. 
• When Hester dies, she is laid to rest beside Dimmesdale, and the later ‘A’ is erected in their resting place.

Style and Tone 

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s writing style is typically one that deploys a lot of metaphors and symbolism to execute his works – with the end goal often having a ton of morals to impact on the reader.

Hawthorne’s works are mostly mysterious, somber, and morose in terms of their themes and storylines. ‘ The Scarlet Letter ’ is no different from his typical style and follows his trademark standard for novel writing. 

The tone in ‘ The Scarlet Letter ’ is mostly sad and contrite, but also critical and disenchantment about puritan cultures, their leaders, and their tendency for being highly hypocritical.

Figurative Languages

Hawthorne brings the pages of ‘The Scarlet Letter’ to life with his heavy use of figurative expressions. Among the figurative language used include metaphor – which seems to appear pervasively throughout the book.

The author also uses tools like irony and personification to highlight his critiques of the purity legacy and traditions. 

Analysis of Symbols in The Scarlet Letter 

This is perhaps the foremost symbolism in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s book and represents a variety of things. One such thing is that it serves as an identity for the transgressor or sinner of adultery – as is the case with the protagonist, Hester Prynne. 

Hester’s daughter’s character also has an allegorical attachment to its overall essence. Pearl is a direct repercussion of Hester’s son of adultery, but also a symbol of hope for a better life, in the latter part of the book.

Chillingworth

In the book’s reality, he is the husband of Hester, but in terms of the motif to which he represents, Chillingworth proves to be as his name appears; cold. He’s a cold and means man towards the people around him, and this is perhaps one of the reasons Hester could never find love with him. 

What is the main theme in ‘The Scarlet Letter’ by Nathaniel Hawthorne?

Sin and punishment are probably the two most discussed themes in ‘ The Scarlet Letter ,’ and these subjects are pervasive and heavily indulged in by the author throughout the book. 

What does the color red represent in ‘The Scarlet Letter’?

The color red represents sin, and in the book’s case, the sin of adultery – which Hester, the protagonist, is indicted of from the onset of the book. 

What narrative style is deployed by Nathaniel Hawthorne in ‘The Scarlet Letter’?

Nathaniel Hawthorne utilizes the third person narrative technique in his book, ‘ The Scarlet Letter, ’ as this allows the narrator to tell his story subjectively – but from a rounded, three-dimensional standpoint on the characters. 

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The Scarlet Letter Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Scarlet Letter essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

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The Scarlet Letter Essays

The little human a incarnate anonymous, the scarlet letter.

In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, many of the characters suffer from the tolls of sin, but none as horribly as Hester's daughter Pearl. She alone suffers from sin that is not her own, but rather that of her mother. From the day she is...

Perception Blanketed by Passion William Kyunghyun

In the Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester and Dimmesdale are entangled in self-delusion because they are both caught up in a false interpretation of their respective sins and in an opaque vision of a better life. Hester is confused by...

Original Sin Helen Huggins

In Hawthorne's intricately woven tale The Scarlet Letter, his characters create a parallel theme with the Biblical story of Original Sin. By examining the characters and their interactions and insights about each other, one can examine the...

Hawthorne's "Witch-Baby" in The Scarlet Letter Frances G. Tilney

A few moments before Reverend Dimmsdale professes his sin to the crowd of onlookers, Hester's hopes of escape are dashed by the knowledge that Roger Chillingworth also booked a passage on the departing shipa ship that she prayed would give her and...

Hester's Role as Both the Sinner and Saint Marielle Macher

"What lies behind us and what lies before us are small matters compared to what lies within us," stated Oliver Wendell Holmes. This eventually proves to be especially true for Hester Prynne, the main character in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet...

The Immense Effect of Symbolism in The Scarlet Letter Megan Leach

Hawthorne wrote his great, psychological novel, The Scarlet Letter, not only in the literal sense, but also symbolically to thoroughly instill his strong ideas into the minds of readers. He uses sunshine, the forest, roses, the scarlet letter,...

Sin: Hawthorne's Biblical Truth Joshua Prophett

In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne writes the consequences of one sinful act in a Puritan community. This sinful act involves three main characters, Hester, Dimmesdale, and Chillingsworth. As The Scarlet Letter progresses, each...

Sin's Evolution in The Scarlet Letter Zachary Anderson

Evolution is defined as "a process of change"(Webster's Dictionary), and it has been proved many times in the past that sin is a direct process that leads to change in one's spiritual as well as fleshly life. The three main characters, Hester,...

A Natural Mirror of Impurity Meagan Bass

The entity of Nature acts as a double-edged sword in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter. In the novel, Nature shows its ability to both harm and heal through its effects on the characters. The novel highlights Nature's complexity by showing...

Religious Oppression in The Scarlet Letter Daniel Tvert

In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne has committed adultery, and her subsequent bearing of an illegitimate child has cast her beyond the pale of polite society. It is difficult for us, in the late twentieth century, to...

Pearl Prynne - A Blessing And A Curse Sugato De

"This child hath come from the hand of the almighty, to work in many ways upon her heart. It was meant for a blessing, for the one blessing of her life! It was meant, doubtless, for a retribution too, a torture to be felt at many an unthought of...

The Garden of Eden in America: Dichotomies in The Scarlet Letter Adam Weissman

The story of Adam and Eve illustrates the sinful nature of man. A common theory about the story of Adam and Eve is that God intended Adam and Eve to eat the fruit from the tree of knowledge. The argument is, if God had not intended Adam to eat the...

Criticism of Puritan Society: Nature in Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter" Anonymous

Throughout the late 18th century and 19th century, Romanticism was a highly popular literary style adopted by many novelists. Nature, a prominent element of Romanticism, is used in these authors' writings not just for descriptions and images, but...

Threads Anonymous

Threads are rather insignificant by themselves. It is when a weaver connects them together that they form a beautiful tapestry. Each thread now contributes to the quality of the tapestry and are bound together by the common picture that form. In a...

Law of Nature Versus Man in The Scarlet Letter Anonymous

In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne demonstrates the need for humans to abide by the laws of nature and conscience, rather than the laws of man, to achieve happiness.

The laws of nature, enforced only by the human conscience, govern every...

A Scarlet I: The Use of Irony Within The Scarlet Letter Robin Bates

"Irony is the gaiety of reflection and the joy of wisdom." Through this statement, Anatole France, a 1921 Nobel Prize recipient, states his belief that irony is only lighthearted reflection. However, Nathaniel Hawthorne employs irony to reveal...

The Fear of Miscegenation in Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter Cole DeLaune

By the middle of the nineteenth century, the young American establishment appeared to have surmounted the instability of its formative stages. The citizens of what had originated as a disorganized and inefficient alliance of thirteen diverse...

The Destruction of an Unconfessed Soul Travis Hodges

In the first chapter of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, a solitary rosebush stands in front of a gloomy prison to symbolize "some sweet moral blossom, that may be found along the track, or relieve the darkening close of a tale of human...

More Than Meets The Eye Igor Petrovich Reznik

"Don't judge a book by its cover." Everyone knows this hackneyed quote, but people still judge others based on outer appearance. By doing so, these people ignore the possible inner greatness of those they so quickly set aside. The character Hester...

Rosebush and Black Weeds: Botanical Metaphors in The Scarlet Letter Anonymous

Nature. It is a word that seems so expansive and all-inclusive. Within a novel, elements of nature and setting often become so expected and mundane that they are easily glossed over in order to get to the "more important" elements of a story-the...

The Influence of British Literature on the Birth of American Artistry Colter Ross Brown

The idea that our American literary culture has been influenced since its inception by Britain's is not a new one; after all, the two countries are rather like two branches of the same tree. Even though the mindsets are of distinctly different...

Puritan Influence in Contemporary American Society J. Andres Gannon

Puritans are often mischaracterized as overly strict and moral persons whose lives revolve around killjoy attitudes and laws against all innocent social pleasures. Qualities of sympathy, charity, and compassion are rarely tied to Puritanism or...

Sinners at the Hands of an Oppressive Society Livia Antonina Romano

In The Scarlet Letter , author Nathaniel Hawthorne uses Hester Prynne, an unhappily married seamstress, and Arthur Dimmesdale, the local Puritan clergyman, to prove that a community that forcefully suppresses the natural desires of an individual...

Significance of Names in The Scarlet Letter Anonymous

Why does Hawthorne give Hester Prynne the name Hester? Hawthorne himself, as is well known, changed his family name from Hathorne, to distance himself from those Puritan ancestors whose achievements and excesses haunted his fiction. The Scarlet...

Home — Essay Samples — Literature — The Scarlet Letter — Literary Analysis of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Book, The Scarlet Letter

Literary Analysis of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Book, The Scarlet Letter

• Categories: Hester Prynne Nathaniel Hawthorne The Scarlet Letter

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Published: Feb 12, 2019

Words: 706 | Pages: 2 | 4 min read

Works Cited:

• Child Labour in India. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.cry.org/issues-views/child-labour-in-india
• India's glass industry: The brutal truth about child labour. (2019, November 22). BBC News.
• International Labour Organization. (2017). Ending child labour by 2025: A review of policies and programmes. Geneva: International Labour Organization.
• Khalid, U. (2019, May 7). Apple, Samsung and Sony face child labour claims. BBC News.
• Rajaraman, I., & Ravallion, M. (2013). Early life mortality in India. Journal of Human Resources, 48(2), 437-484.
• Schmitz, A. (2015). Child labour and competition in developing countries. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• UNICEF. (2021). Child labour. Retrieved from https://www.unicef.org/protection/child-labour
• UNICEF India. (2022). Education. Retrieved from https://www.unicef.org/india/what-we-do/education
• World Bank. (2019). Poverty and shared prosperity 2018: Piecing together the poverty puzzle. Washington, DC: World Bank.
• World Vision. (n.d.). Child labor facts and statistics.

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Related Essays on The Scarlet Letter

Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter" is a classic novel that delves into the complexities of Puritan society in early America. The novel not only explores themes of sin, guilt, and redemption but also touches upon feminist [...]

The Scarlet Letter tells the story of Hester Prynne, a woman who is publicly shamed for committing adultery and forced to wear a scarlet letter "A" on her clothing as a mark of her sin. One of the central characters in the novel [...]

Nathaniel Hawthorne, one of the most renowned American authors of the 19th century, is best known for his novel The Scarlet Letter. This masterpiece delves into themes of sin, guilt, and redemption, drawing upon Hawthorne's [...]

"The Minister's Black Veil" is a short story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne in 1836. The story takes place in a small Puritan town in New England and revolves around the town's minister, Reverend Hooper. The story begins with [...]

Love and hate require intimacy and heart-knowledge. Both emotions leave the individual subservient to the emotion and become compulsory for survival. If an emotion develops into a discernible obsession, it may eventually abandon [...]

Hester Prynne is considered to be both one of the first heroines and feminist icons in American Literature. This is despite Nathaniel Hawthorne, born on July 4, 1804 in Salem, Massachusetts, being labelled as a misogynist, [...]

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Introduction summary: “the custom-house”.

Hawthorne discusses the merits of sharing autobiographical information with his readers and then describes the circumstances he says inspired The Scarlet Letter .

Hawthorne explains that he has always felt drawn to Salem—his birthplace, and the town where his ancestors lived for centuries. When he decided to take a break from writing in 1846, he therefore took a job overseeing the Salem Custom House. He found the work deadening and his colleagues unimaginative and incompetent. He draws particular attention to the “Inspector” and the “Collector”: the former is an elderly but vigorous and cheerful man Hawthorne describes as having “no soul, no heart, no mind; nothing […] but instincts” (20), while the latter is a retired military officer who spends most of his time staring into space. Hawthorne’s account of these and other coworkers is generally good-humored, but he notes that their complacency and amorality might have worn off on him if he had remained at the Custom House.

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The Scarlet Letter. New Critical Essays

• eBook for 45.- € Download immediately. Incl. VAT Format: PDF and ePUB – for all devices
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Table Of Contents

• About the author(s)/editor(s)
• About the book
• This eBook can be cited
• The children of Pearl: The Scarlet Letter in the criticism and fiction of Henry James (Joseph Kuhn)
• Resettlement, mobility and modernity in The Scarlet Letter (Marek Paryż)
• From the Spanish Main to the Book of Revelation; or, Another View of Hester (Janusz Semrau)
• “The Custom-House” as a Biedermeier text (Paweł Stachura)
• The artist as adulterer in The Scarlet Letter (Jørgen Veisland)
• Notes on contributors
• Series index

The letter is alive and well. (Coale 2011: 19)

Anecdotally, The Scarlet Letter (1850) saw the light of day almost immediately upon completion only because its existence in the author’s private escritoire at 14 Mall Street in Salem was first intuited and then insistently assumed by a keen junior partner of a Boston publisher. However wary Hawthorne may have been to relinquish the original manuscript, soon after it appeared in print he would spare but a single leaf from the flames, the title page with the table of contents on the reverse. Alluding to the cumbersome logistics of an unplanned and in the end rushed publication – specifically to the distance between Salem and Boston – the writer quipped that his tightly contained narrative became gracelessly at least fourteen miles long in the process. Uncertain whether his ripeness and fullness of time as a novelist had already come, he could not be sure whether The Scarlet Letter was any good at all to begin with: “I don’t make any such calculation”, he wrote unenthusiastically to a friend (Nathaniel Hawthorne quoted in James [1879: 38]). Indeed, contrary to the later persistent and still current historiographic legend, the book did not become exactly a proverbial overnight success. It was much rather a succès d’estime . It established the author as a full-fledged professional man of letters, but it sold in his lifetime according to various sources just around ten thousand copies, with total royalties amounting to no more than just over a thousand dollars. 1

Given the benefit of hindsight, what is especially striking about the novel’s stretch and range today is not only its array and elasticity of polysemic meanings – and these extend from the historiographic to the theoretical to the philosophical as well as from the allegorical to the ambivalent to the aporetic – but also its ongoing poignant topicality, i.e., its (a)temporal reach, the idealized Poundian condition of news that stays news. The Scarlet Letter is a rare case of a text that has remained in print, cultural circulation, and public awareness for over a century and a half now. It ranks among the top best remembered, most widely discussed, most closely studied, and most profoundly influential American works of fiction ever written. By common consent, it is one of a few select tales that continually ← 7 | 8 → help define as well as refine not only American literature but also American culture at large. In the words of two contemporary commentators of rather different ideological persuasions, Hawthorne’s work is appreciable as “[A] foundation epic of American literacy” (Crain 2000: 209) and “[A] national master text” (Buell 2014: 90). As Paul Auster (quoted in Coale 2011: 16) has pithily identified the standing of The Scarlet Letter : “This is where American literature begins”. As far as structural properties and aesthetic qualities go, the novel in its clarity of conception, exquisiteness of execution and lightness of expression satisfies the definition of a literary tour de force as an inimitable sort of work that both cannot and need not be written again. It is perfectly safe to assume that for all kinds of, more or less, nuanced reasons The Scarlet Letter will continue to be viewed, and actually read, as an indispensable and irreplaceable American classic.

In accordance, as it were, with the well-known Romantic dictum that notwithstanding classics each age must need write its own books, The Scarlet Letter. New Critical Essays finds itself emulating in scope and length Michael Colacurcio’s anthology of 1985 New Essays on the Scarlet Letter , as well as supplementing and opening up a dialogue with that book. In its own right, the present publication may be seen as (un)intentional or serendipitous testimony to Oscar Wilde’s claim that the essence of true art is the capacity to make one pause, look at and ponder over a thing “a second time” (Wilde 2007 : 41). Also, the essays collected here validate Nina Baym’s recognition of The Scarlet Letter as a unique kind of tale and a unique kind of narrative that we are not only likely to approach and enter in our own individual way but we are very likely to approach and enter “in different ways at different points in our lives” (Baym 1986: xxix). This kind of second time and these kinds of different ways are demonstrated here by Joseph Kuhn (Poznań), Marek Paryż (Warsaw), Janusz Semrau (Warsaw), Paweł Stachura (Poznań), and Jørgen Veisland (Gdańsk).

In “The children of Pearl: The Scarlet Letter in the criticism and fiction of Henry James”, Joseph Kuhn focuses at first on the study Hawthorne of 1879 to show how the author was keen to present himself as the American inheritor of the French realists. Although this made James portray Hawthorne as a Salem provincial and a somewhat vague romancer The Scarlet Letter had quite clearly a formative influence on some of his own later fiction, especially through the character of Pearl. Kuhn argues that James elaborates on the Hawthornian figure of the child as a paradoxical transmitter of sin and a new-born anima. According to Kuhn, James takes his discourse ultimately in the direction of the modern Blanchotian themes of the death of the infans and the nekyia or return to the dead. While Hawthorne finds a conservative principle redux for the New World in the child, with James it ← 8 | 9 → turns into an intimation of disaster in the British imperial fabric of late Victorian culture.

In “Resettlement, mobility and modernity in The Scarlet Letter ”, Marek Paryż pays special attention to how the novel sketches the difficult and awkward emergence of modernizing impulses in Puritan New England. First of all, he points out that the story gets under way with a double movement and a double resettlement, semi-independently that of Roger Chillingworth and that of Hester Prynne. Paryż argues that the two central characters embody two tendencies and challenges Hawthorne’s 19 th -century readers could relate to, namely, the professionalization of social life and the emancipation of women. Even if Roger and Hester appear to respect the rules of the social system in which they find themselves embedded, they develop personal systems of values at odds with the official one. In contradistinction, the third central character, Arthur Dimmesdale, comes across as a figure of immobility and indecision, which is a subplot that ends up perpetuating the mid-17 th -century Puritan status quo.

In “From the Spanish Main to the Book of Revelation; or, Another View of Hester”, Janusz Semrau approaches Hawthorne’s text as a kind of post-Reformation morality play. The essay takes its initial cue from the hitherto critically neglected brief performative appearance of Spanish sailors, comparable in their general plot function to that of the troupe of travelling actors in Hamlet . Fundamentally, Semrau recognizes Hawthorne as an unchurched Calvinist and promotes a quasi-Calvinist reading into the Book of Revelation as a re-interpretive tool to The Scarlet Letter . The idea is to map out and explore Hester Prynne’s allegorical capacity as a Babylonian meretrix Augusta and throw thereby a new light on the immediate story as well as on the much-discussed ending of the book, where there can be detected a graphic apocalyptic eschaton rather than a proud or sentimental escutcheon.

In “The Custom-House as a Biedermeier text”, Paweł Stachura reviews some of the most representative readings of Hawthorne’s introductory sketch and proposes a radically new one. He structures his interpretation as an original comparative analysis of “The Custom-House” (along with The Scarlet Letter as a whole) and Adalbert Stifter’s programmatic introduction to his Bunte Steine [Colorful Stones] of 1853. Adalbert Stifter was an Austrian novelist and a short story writer who was one of the most energetic and dedicated advocates of the 19 th -century Biedermeier aesthetics. This middle-class cultural phenomenon in German-speaking countries is best remembered for its use of plenitude, tropes of collection, moralizing stance, and its generally conservative ideology. The ultimate objective of Stachura’s ← 9 | 10 → reading of Hawthorne is to show the applicability of the Biedermeier aesthetics to the study of American literature at large.

In “The artist as adulterer”, Jørgen Veisland highlights at first the letter on Hester Prynne’s dress. He sees the letter A as writing and knowledge, repressed in the author’s mind and manifesting itself as a renewal of the imaginative and creative potential as such. According to Veisland, it becomes evident that Hester herself serves as a mediator for the elusive heterogeneous object of the author’s desire, one that contains both artistic and erotic impulses. With Pearl as embodiment of the work of Art, Hawthorne’s project becomes a quest for the excavation of knowledge, the liberation of womanhood, and the transformation of the letter into an episteme that ends up signifying the integration of nature, being, and artwork. In contradistinction, Veisland argues that Roger Chillingworth represents the futility of the “chill” intellect, while Arthur Dimmesdale personifies the obfuscations of the “dim” soul.

This book is dedicated to the continued memory of Andrzej Kopcewicz (1934–2007), the first professor ordinarius of American literature in the history of English studies in Poland, on the tenth anniversary of his death.

Janusz Semrau

October 9, 2017

Biographical notes

Janusz Semrau (Volume editor)

Janusz Semrau is Associate Professor of American literature at the University of Social Sciences (SAN) in Warsaw. He has authored several books and numerous papers on 19th- and 20th-century American literature.

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