The original papers, together with the scarlet letter itself, – a most curious relic, – are still in my possession, and shall be freely exhibited to whomsoever, induced by the great interest of the narrative, may desire a sight of them. …it should be borne carefully in mind, that the main facts of that story are authorized and authenticated by the document of Mr. In short, he claims The Scarlet Letter is a true story: The document contains the story of Hester Prynne and her scarlet letter, and Hawthorne claims his novel is merely an expanded version of this document. Hawthorne learns the letter was placed there by a previous employee, Surveyor Pue, who had died suddenly before the Revolution. I wonder what he might have done with a third edition… Anyway, the main and first introduction ends with Hawthorne describing how he found an embroidered letter “A” wrapped in an old document in the Customs House where he was working. One can make some fairly spot on assumptions about Nathaniel Hawthorne based on this, and I mean no disrespect but he makes me chuckle a bit. In the second edition, which I have, he has also written an introduction to his previous introduction. There is an introduction to this novel, written by Hawthorne himself in the style of what we commonly see nowadays under the title of ‘Author Note’, however it goes on for about 35 pages and is fairly dry reading. So if you truly still don’t know what this novel is about, even after all of the various forms of adaptation, don’t read any further. Now, given that this is a classic, I’m going to freely discuss it without a care for spoilers. The language would have put her off immediately. I love the language within this novel, but it’s definitely more complex reading than what some other classics may contain, and I can’t imagine my daughter, who is also in Year 12, coping with this novel. The dialogue is rather Shakespearean, in keeping with the era in which it’s set. Quite a slog for a school read, if you ask me. It was put back onto my radar by my niece who had to read it for one of her Year 12 English units. I’ve read it before, many years ago, but decided on a re-read as part of my Classics Eight challenge. It was one of the first mass-produced books in America. Originally published in 1850, The Scarlet Letter is a novel of historical fiction set in the puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony during the years 1642 to 1649. Adapted to numerous plays, films, and operas. The story of Hester Prynne, who bears a scarlet “A” upon her breast as a symbol of her adultery, and that of her pious lover who atones in tormented silence, is one that has captivated readers since its publication in 1850. In The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne takes readers back to the puritan days of the American colonies, into a society as unforgiving as its harsh New England winters.
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