The Scarlet Letter (1850) is a novel written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It is considered his magnum opus.

Set in 17th-century Puritan Boston, it tells the story of Hester Prynne, who gives birth after committing adultery and struggles to create a new life of repentance and dignity. Throughout the novel, Hawthorne explores themes of legalism, sin, and guilt.

Film, TV, theatrical adaptations, and music:

• 1917: A black-and-white silent film directed by Carl Harbaugh with Mary G. Martin as Hester Prynne
• 926: A silent movie directed by Victor Sjostrom and starring Lillian Gish and Lars Hanson
• 1934: A film directed by Robert G. Vignola and starring Colleen Moore
• 1957: In The Music Man, Professor Harold Hill sings "hope, and I pray, for a Hester to win just one more 'A'" in the song The Sadder But Wiser Girl For Me
• 1958-59: An opera by Robin Milford
• 1973: Der Scharlachrote Buchstabe, a film in German directed by Wim Wenders
• 1979: PBS version starring Meg Foster and John Heard
• 1990: Namechecked in TV series Twin Peaks, after a character is rumbled for using the pseudonym 'Hester Prynne'
• 1994: A rock musical, "The Scarlet Letter," written by Mark Governor, is produced in Los Angeles.
• 1995: The Scarlet Letter, a film directed by Roland Joffé and starring Demi Moore as Hester and Gary Oldman as Arthur Dimmesdale. This version is "freely adapted" from Hawthorne according to the opening credits and takes liberties with the original story.
• 1996: The film Primal Fear references The Scarlet Letter.
• 1996: The Marilyn Manson promotional video for the song 'Man That You Fear' obliquely references the novel.
• The Red Letter Plays (In The Blood produced in 1999, and F--ing A, produced in 2000) by playwright Suzan-Lori Parks, adapts elements and themes from the novel as the basis for the two contemporary plays.
• 2001: A musical stage adaptation which premiered at the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh, Scotland, by Stacey Mancine, Daniel Koloski, and Simon Gray
• 2001: The band Tool alludes to the novel in the song "The Grudge" on their album Lateralus with the line "unable to forgive your scarlet letterman."
• 2004: The Scarlet Letter, a Korean noir-thriller featuring an adulteress's monologue that mentions a plan to raise her unborn child as Pearl in America in a desperate plea to exit her obsessive affair
• 2005: The Christian band Casting Crowns released a song titled "Does Anybody Hear Her," which mentions the Scarlet Letter and matches up with the story of Hester Prynne almost perfectly.
• 2007: The deathcore band As Blood Runs Black made a song entitled "Hester Prynne."
• 2007: The Terpsicorps Ballet Company of Asheville, NC interprets The Scarlet Letter.
• The Winston Salem, NC band Swift depicts the Scarlet Letter in various forms in their song "Charger" which is featured on the album "The Absolute Uncontrolable".
• 2008: Taylor Swift alludes to "The Scarlet Letter" in the song "Love Story".
• 2008: "shAme"[1], a rock opera by Mark Governor based on "The Scarlet Letter" premieres in Los Angeles. It is a major reworking of his 1994 stage musical that was also produced in Boston in 2000 and as a radio production in Berlin in 2005. The 2000 version was endorsed and presented by the Nathaniel Hawthorne Society.
• 2008: University of Central Arkansas in Conway, Arkansas writes and performs the first regular opera adaptation of The Scarlet Letter.
• 2008: Mudvayne released a song called "Scarlet Letters" in the album "The New Game" which was released November 18, 2008.
• 2009: Mystery Dope wrote a song called "The Ballad Of Hester Prynne", they play the song at their shows most of the time.
• 2009: Deathcore band Hester Prynne, releases album 'the goswell divorce'.
• 2010: Easy A a film adapted from the book, directed by Will Gluck and starring Emma Stone. A high school girl sees her life reflecting Hester Prynne. (Wikipedia.org)

Download The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne

PDF format, 471KB, 228Pages.

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the Pennsylvania State University, Electronic Classics Series, Jim
Manis, Faculty Editor, Hazleton, PA 18202-1291 is a Portable Document File produced as part of an ongoing
student publication project to bring classical works of literature, in English, to free and easy access of those wishing to make use of them.

Cover Design: Jim Manis
Copyright © 2008 The Pennsylvania State University
The Pennsylvania State University is an equal opportunity university.

INTRODUCTORY TO
THE SCARLET LETTER
IT IS A LITTLE REMARKABLE, that—though disinclined to talk overmuch of myself and my affairs at the fireside, and to my personal friends—an autobiographical impulse should twice in my life have taken possession of me, in addressing the public.

The first time was three or four years since, when I favoured the reader—inexcusably, and for no earthly reason that either the indulgent reader or the intrusive author could imagine—with a description of my way of life in the deep quietude of an Old Manse. And now—because, beyond my deserts, I was happy enough to find a listener or two on the former occasion—I again seize the public by the button, and talk of my three years’ experience in a Custom-House.

The example of the famous “P. P. , Clerk of this Parish,” was never more faithfully followed. The truth seems to be, however, that when he casts his leaves forth upon the wind, the author addresses, not the many who will fling aside his volume, or never take it up, but the few who will understand him better than most of his schoolmates or lifemates.

Some authors, indeed, do far more than this, and indulge themselves in such confidential depths of revelation as could fittingly be addressed only and exclusively to the one heart and mind of perfect sympathy; as if the printed book, thrown at large on the wide world, were certain to find out the divided segment of the writer’s own nature, and complete his circle of existence by bringing him into communion with it.

It is scarcely decorous, however, to speak all, even where we speak impersonally. But, as thoughts are frozen and utterance benumbed, unless the speaker stand in some true relation with his audience, it may be pardonable to imagine that a friend, a kind and apprehensive, though not the closest friend, is listening to our talk; and then, a native reserve being thawed by this genial consciousness, we may prate of the circumstances that lie around us, and even of ourself, but still keep the inmost Me behind its veil.

To this extent, and within these limits, an author, methinks, may be autobiographical, without violating either the reader’s rights or his own. ...

Comments (0)

Name

Email

Comment

smaller | bigger

Add Comment