Nathaniel Hawthorne
1850
1878 second edition,
James R. Osgood and Company, Boston
323, occasionally loquacious, pages of Puritan drama.
Overview:
A 17th century married woman has a baby while her husband is gone for two years. Oops.
The Lady in question.
Preface: We’ve all heard the story of The Scarlet Letter because sin and hypocrisy and prejudice are timeless. But I doubt there are many who have actually read the book, with good reason. Like Shakespeare, we really don’t want to suffer through reading it.
Spoiler alert: If you do want to read The Scarlet Letter, don't worry, it's not Shakespeare. But this review will ruin it for you.
Summary
In the mid seventeenth century, Hester Prynne came to Boston ahead of her husband to settle in and await his arrival. Over two years later - her husband never having arrived nor sending a word of his well-being - she finds herself with a three-month-old baby. Boston at the time being a primarily austere Puritan community and governed by strict Puritan law, Hester is condemned and punished for her crime. The leaders decide that Hester must forever announce herself as a sinner by a permanent adornment of her garment with the letter 'A', which she sews herself with great skill, creating a beautiful piece of art that serves not only to attract every eye, but perhaps also to stand against the gravity of the Puritan life.
Hester's punishment begins with a three hour public exhibition upon a scaffold to display her crime in front of the whole community, who readily come out and scornfully stare. Though the leaders of the community continue to implore her to name the father of her child, she steadfastly refuses and never confesses. While standing on the scaffold as a criminal, she sees in the crowd her long lost husband, who has just returned from being a captive of the native Americans. He visits her in jail, under an assumed name and in the guise of a doctor, and gets her to promise never to reveal his true identity to anyone - he doesn't want an association with her considering her current situation. He also vows to find out who the father of her child is. The doctor, as he is now known in the community, soon figures out that one popular young minister is the culprit. The overtly pious minister is in failing health and the doctor uses his position to befriend and provide medial treatment, though in actuality, exacting revenge by frequently finding subtle ways of reminding the minister of his crime with Hester.
Seven years pass and Hester and her daughter have lived a life in exile, save for her work as a seamstress. When she discovers that the minister's health is worse than ever, having lived these years under the doctor's care, she decides to reveal to the minister that the doctor is her husband and not the friend he pretends to be. Hester manages a secret meeting in the forest in which she tells the minister the truth. The minister, who has been in constant agony with sorrow and guilt, decides to run away with Hester and the child, and end his life of hypocrisy and deceit. The day before their planned escape on a ship headed to England, Hester learns that her husband knows their plans and has himself secured passage on the same ship. Also on this day, the minister gives his last sermon, and then upon leaving the church in the procession, sees Hester standing with her daughter next to the criminal platform where she stood alone seven years prior. He is inspired to call the child over to him, and with the help of Hester, step up to the scaffold and confess his crime of passion and sin to the whole town. He then dies in her arms. Shortly thereafter, Hester's husband also dies, and she and her daughter leave Boston. Many years later she returns alone to continue her life of piety and charity.
Review
From a 1850's point of view, this is a good read. The story jump starts as a compelling mystery - we all want to know right away who is the father??!! It's juicy gossip, but instead of a surprise reveal at the end, we are quietly lead to have our suspicions, then a more vocal certainty, and finally, we are given more or less proof. The story then becomes a bit of a thriller, and our questions are: Will he confess? How? When? Will they live happily ever after?? The book also serves as a little New England history lesson, taking place two hundred years in the past. The story line is well organized, nicely paced and cleverly written. Not surprisingly, it was an immediate best-seller.
For the modern audience, the book is somewhat tedious. The writing is ornate and drawn out. Sentences are long and complex, even confusing. I'll say it again: That was the style of the day. Detailed description adds a richness to the setting and a depth to the characters, but maybe it's a kind of fanfare that we don't need so much today (speaking in general terms). For example: But it is an error to suppose that our grave forefathers - though accustomed to speak and think of human existence as a state merely of trial and warfare, and though unfeignedly prepared to sacrifice goods and life at the behest of duty - made it a matter of conscience to reject such means of comfort, or even luxury, as lay fairly within their grasp.
Nevertheless, I enjoyed the experience of the book because I like old-style writing, I find it interesting and entertaining. But, like readers of Shakespeare, we are a select group.
One hundred and seventy plus years later, the Scarlet Letter is still with us in a myriad of movies and general references. But not because of a good storyline or superb writing, but for it's theme of hypocrisy and prejudice, and, of course, our obsession with forbidden love. Hawthorn directs his condemnation not only at the Puritan church as it was in 1650, but also at the public in general. Basically the author is saying 'We all have done wrong at some point, we all have secrets, and just because yours are not on public display does not give you cause to point your finger at another." It's a sermon he manages to give without preaching.
A child out of wedlock is not much of a scandal in modern America, but hypocrisy and prejudice, and the vanity and deceit that nurture them, can still be found wherever you look close enough.
Minor Themes and Symbolism:
The two wrong-doers in Hawthorn's book, Hester and the minister, are made out as the two most sympathetic characters in the story. We are lead to feel sorry for both of them. Hester has to live daily with the isolation and scorn of the community, yet has the strength of character to bear her shame with dignity, resolve and benevolence. In contrast, the minister suffers greatly in private, is weak to confess and even after his confession dies instead of facing the consequences. In short, she is brave and he is a coward.
Their love-child, Pearl, is the embodiment of purity and innocence. She sees what is true and understands the scarlet letter on her mother's breast without knowing what it means. She is also the free spirit rebelling against the constraints of Puritan society.
The doctor, the rejected husband, embodies the torment of guilt. If only we can forget, then we shall be in peace. But we are sometimes reminded of that thing that brings us guilt and shame, and our fragile peace is broken.
The minister never actually says "I am the father of this child". He begins by calling the child and Hester to him. This public gesture was enough to raise eyebrows. He then proceeds to ascend to the criminal scaffold with Hester and the child, an action which, for the majority of the townsfolk, was enough for them to 'get it'. All the while he is speaking about himself in the third person. For his finale, he exposes his bear chest upon which is embossed (somehow, we're not sure) the letter 'A'. He never utters the words "I am the father", but his confession is loud and clear.
After the minister confesses and dies, the authorities - that would be those in power in the church - contrive to reinterpret the 'confession' as only a general warning to the public; No, he didn't mean to say that he was the actual father of the baby. Imagine the church trying to cover up a sex scandal, ha-ha.
There are other minor themes and ideas in Hawthorn's book, but I don't want to pick it apart endlessly. If this review carries on, you might just as well read the book.
Did you ever stop to think what the scarlet letter 'A' stands for? It's our obvious assumption that it stands for 'adultery', Hester's sin and crime. But interestingly enough, the word 'adultery', or any variation, is not once mentioned in the entire book. The closest the author gets to uttering that one word is 'unadulterated', describing the sunshine on page 74. I'm sure it's intentional, but I don't know why. My best guess is that there was a kind of taboo associated with the word, and its use in public would be in poor taste.
The Introduction
What only people know who have a proper copy of The Scarlet Letter is that there is a very interesting and entertaining introduction to the story, called The Custom-House. Hawthorne writes 48 pages to relate his insight and experience as a public official in an aging customs office in Salem, Massachusetts, and incidentally, that's where he found the authentic 'scarlet letter'.
But what only people know who have a 1878 second-edition copy of the book, like myself, is that Hawthorne wrote a rebuttal to criticism of his essay on the Custom-House. He titled it Preface to the Second Edition. Apparently, a significant amount of people vehemently condemned 'The Custom-House' introduction as overly severe and even untrue. Basically he replied that, No, I looked it over, it's fine, I'm not changing a word.
To the Author's credit:
Hawthorne achieved with great success to accomplish what he set out to do: Write a historical novel, a good story, with means to expose religious and public hypocrisy and prejudice.
To the Author's discredit:
Hawthorn relates the true story of how he found an actual 'scarlet letter' in the archives of the Custom-House where he was a public official. It was accompanied by a "reasonably complete explanation of the whole affair." From this he weaved his tale of how it came about, how it played out, and how it ended...But... he did not explain, or make up an explanation, as to how the beautifully embroidered scarlet letter traveled from Hester Prynne's bosom to the archives of one bygone surveyor of the Custom-House. He should have, darn it, it would have completed the circle.
Best Lines:
A man burdened with a secret should especially avoid the intimacy of his physician.
He had spoken the very truth, and transformed it into the veriest falsehood.
...the agony of heaven-defying guilt and vain repentance.
Love, whether newly born, or aroused from a death-like slumber, must always create a sunshine...
...- unable to receive the explanation which most readily presented itself, or to imagine any other, -...
It is a curious subject of observation and inquiry, whether hatred and love be not the same thing at bottom.
From the Introduction:
...with his bible and his sword...
...where, with little to disturb them, except for the periodical terrors of a Presidential election,...
...awakening, however, once or twice in a forenoon, to bore one another with the several thousandth repetition of old sea-stories, and mouldy jokes, that had grown to be passwords and countersigns among them.
...there was never in his heart so much cruelty as would have brushed the down off a butterfly's wing.
...to step aside out of the narrow circle in which his claims are recognized, and to find how utterly devoid of significance, beyond that circle, is all that he achieves, and all he aims at.
...to bring his mouldy and moth-eaten lucubrations before the public.
...when, at every moment, the impalpable beauty of my soap-bubble was broken by the rude contact of some actual circumstance.
Vocabulary
I underlined more than 50 words over the course of the book that I wasn't familiar with. Here I have picked out a few to share.
cogitating - thinking, or pondering intently
hang-dog look - having a dejected or guilty appearance.
potentate - ruler, or one who wields great power
beadle - a minor parish official
mien - demeanor
somniferous - causing sleepiness or lethargy
machination - a scheme intended to accomplish some usually evil end
peal - a loud sound
betimes - early or speedily
ignominy - a deep personal humiliation and disgrace
panoply - ceremonial attire
iniquity - wickedness, sin
inimical - hostile
prolix - unduly prolonged, marked by excessive words
besom - broom made of twigs
eventide - evening
grandsire - grandfather
sere - dried and withered
fourscore - eighty
maw - stomach
The minister dying in Hester's arms after confessing his sin. How convenient for him.
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