Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, a romantic work of historical fiction published in 1860, explores the costs of duplicity and disguised guilt among the lives of individuals who struggle to embrace their self-awareness within a stern society. Set in the mid-seventeenth century in Puritan Boston, Massachusetts, the protagonist Hester Prynne bears the scarlet letter upon her chest. The letter A serves as an unceasing public shaming for her adulterous actions with the highly regarded Reverend
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”, Hester Prynne, living in the extremely strict Puritan society of Massachusetts, is forced to wear a red “A”, the mark of an adulterer, after having a child with a man who is not her husband, believing him to be dead after his two-year absence. Hawthorne’s commentary on early Puritan society in the New World is highlighted throughout the novel in the ways in which different events that transpire in the town are perceived by the townspeople versus what
The Scarlet Letter, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, portrays the shameful life the main character, Hester Prynne, because of a sinful encounter that resulted in her daughter Pearl. Throughout the novel it is evident that she grows close with a minister, Arthur Dimmesdale, who later is revealed as the father of Pearl. However, Hester’s public shame of adultery is never shared with Reverend Dimmesdale. Because of this, many may infer that Hester’s ignominy caused her greater suffering than the self-shame