The Scarlet Letter By Nathaniel Hawthorne 1804

– 1864) Essay, Research Paper

The Scarlet Letter, as one of the first

and finest “psychological gothics,” may bewilder modern, TV readers,” who

keep waiting for something to happen. The book contains very little dramatic

action. The bulk of the novel is occupied by the narrator’s uniquely penetrating

descriptions of his characters’ thoughts, feelings and relationships. This

narrator also breaks other literary ground: Not content to slip into the

background and let the storyline flow, he constantly interrupts the plot,

speculating on motives, offering his opinions, and suggesting alternative

views. Sometimes he even takes part in the interactions, as when, in the

first chapter, he plucks a rose froi-n a bush outside the town prison and

offers it to you, the reader. Furthermore, he claims to be guiding the

story through its many macabre twis . ts based on various sources (manuscripts,

gossip, rumors and legends) that may or may not be reliable. The reader

is often left to chose one or another version of the tale, or to reject

them all.

Hester Prynne is one of the great heroines

of literature. Though Hawthorne never condones her crime, he is, as described

in Harry Levin’s introduction, “concerned to show that fundamental morality

is not so much a series of rigorous laws to be enforced by a meddling community

as it is an insight to be attained through continuous exertion on the part

of the individual conscience.”

An ambiguous blend of sin and virtue, pride

and humility, severity and gentleness, justice and mercy, the novel’s true

message may lie in what Hawthorne describes as its true genre: The Scarlet

Letter, says its author, is not so much a novel as a romance,” filled with

details that disclose the “truth of the human heart.”