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Study Guide by Irene Lape and Michael Gilleland,
for the novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne

Born on the 4th of July, 1804, Nathaniel Hawthorne grew up in Salem, Massachusetts with his widowed mother and two sisters. Puritan pride, an inheritance from his proud New England seafaring father and grandfather surrounded him. He lived as a struggling, would-be writer from college graduation in 1825 until he published his Twice Told Tales in 1837. The Scarlet Letter (1850) brought him recognition, and he followed it with The House of the Seven Gables (1851). He served four years as the American Consul in Liverpool, England. In 1860, he returned home in failing health. Nathaniel Hawthorne died at the age of 59, in 1864.

In The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne travels alone to America to prepare a home for herself and her husband. In her husband's long absence Hester commits adultery and gives birth to a child. In accordance with the town's strict biblical law, Hester is punished, though leniently for that time in history. She is sentenced to stand for several hours on the town's scaffold exposed to publish shame and to wear a scarlet "A" for the rest of her life. Hester's partner in sin, a prominent member of the community, remains silent about his own guilt, and Hester refuses to reveal his identity.

Meanwhile, Hester's long-absent husband, Roger Chillingworth, returns on the very day Hester must endure her public humiliation. He decides to remain silent concerning his own identity but determines to seek revenge on Hester's lover. He discovers the guilt-ridden man's identity, and by posing as a physician draws close to his victim and undermines the man's health and will to live. In The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne mixes Puritanism with the birth of Romanticism as he examines sin, guilt, vengeance, and redemption.

Grade Level: 9-12
Setting: Massachusetts, 1640s
Pgs: 43
9 sections including pre-reading, The Custom House, and final essay section.

Also recommended for further reading about the human condition, sin, our need for forgiveness, our need to forgive and love others, and the consequences when we don't.
Shadow Spinner
Jane Eyre
The Bronze Bow
The Witch of Blackbird Pond
A Christmas Carol
Hamlet
Uncle Tom's Cabin