THE SCARLET LETTER is an 1850 work of fiction in a historical setting,
written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, and is considered to be his best work.
Set in 17th-century Puritan Boston, Massachusetts, during the years 1642
to 1649, it tells the story of Hester Prynne, who conceives a daughter
through an affair and struggles to create a new life of repentance and
dignity. Throughout the book, Hawthorne explores themes of legalism,
sin, and guilt.
20th-century writer D. H. Lawrence said that there could not be a more
perfect work of the American imagination than The Scarlet Letter. Henry
James once said of the novel, "It is beautiful, admirable,
extraordinary; it has in the highest degree that merit which I have
spoken of as the mark of Hawthorne's best things-an indefinable purity
and lightness of conception...One can often return to it; it supports
familiarity and has the inexhaustible charm and mystery of great works
of art."
The book's immediate and lasting success are due to the way it addresses
spiritual and moral issues from a uniquely American standpoint. In 1850,
adultery was an extremely risqué subject, but because Hawthorne had the
support of the New England literary establishment, it passed easily into
the realm of appropriate reading. It has been said that this work
represents the height of Hawthorne's literary genius, dense with terse
descriptions. It remains relevant for its philosophical and
psychological depth, and continues to be read as a classic tale on a
universal theme.
