Scarlet Letter

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Description

In the puritanical Boston of the 17th Century, a woman gives birth after committing adultery. That woman, Hester Prynne, choses to create a new life for herself in the face of adversity rather than succumb to what is expected of her. She will not name the father. Her decision opens up the tension between religious life and the true grace of God, and between personal guilt, religious sin and legal guilt. The novel is prefaced by a "real" account of the author finding notes on a case similar to Hestor's in a Custom House, from which he fashioned the story. The preface is to be read as fictional.

Informations

• Publié par: The Floating Press
• Date de parution: 01 janvier 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781775411918
• Langue: English

Extrait

THE SCARLET LETTER
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NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE
 
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The Scarlet Letter First published in 1850.
ISBN 978-1-775411-91-8
© 2008 THE FLOATING PRESS.
While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike.
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Contents
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Editor's Note Introductory to "The Scarlet Letter" I. The Prison Door II. The Market-Place III. The Recognition IV. The Interview V. Hester at Her Needle VI. Pearl VII. The Governor's Hall VIII. The Elf-Child and the Minister IX. The Leech X. The Leech and His Patient XI. The Interior of a Heart XII. The Minister's Vigil XIII. Another View of Hester XIV. Hester and the Physician XV. Hester and Pearl XVI. A Forest Walk XVII. The Pastor and His Parishioner XVIII. A Flood of Sunshine XIX. The Child at the Brookside XX. The Minister in a Maze XXI. The New England Holiday XXII. The Procession XXIII. The Revelation of the Scarlet Letter XXIV. Conclusion
Editor's Note
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Nathaniel Hawthorne was already a man of forty-six, and a talewriter of some twenty-four years' standing, when "The ScarletLetter" appeared. He was born at Salem, Mass., on July 4th, 1804,son of a sea-captain. He led there a shy and rather sombre life;of few artistic encouragements, yet not wholly uncongenial, hismoody, intensely meditative temperament being considered. Itscolours and shadows are marvelously reflected in his "Twice-ToldTales" and other short stories, the product of his first literaryperiod. Even his college days at Bowdoin did not quite breakthrough his acquired and inherited reserve; but beneath it all,his faculty of divining men and women was exercised with almostuncanny prescience and subtlety. "The Scarlet Letter," whichexplains as much of this unique imaginative art, as is to begathered from reading his highest single achievement, yet needsto be ranged with his other writings, early and late, to have itslast effect. In the year that saw it published, he began "TheHouse of the Seven Gables," a later romance or prose-tragedy ofthe Puritan-American community as he had himself known it—defrauded of art and the joy of life, "starving for symbols" asEmerson has it. Nathaniel Hawthorne died at Plymouth, NewHampshire, on May 18th, 1864.
The following is the table of his romances,stories, and other works:
Fanshawe, published anonymously, 1826; Twice-Told Tales, 1st Series, 1837; 2nd Series, 1842; Grandfather's Chair, a history for youth, 1845: Famous Old People (Grandfather's Chair), 1841 Liberty Tree: with the last words of Grandfather's Chair, 1842; Biographical Stories for Children, 1842; Mosses from an Old Manse, 1846; The Scarlet Letter, 1850; The House of the Seven Gables, 1851: True Stories from History and Biography (the whole History of Grandfather's Chair), 1851 A Wonder Book for Girls and Boys, 1851; The Snow Image and other Tales, 1851: The Blithedale Romance, 1852; Life of Franklin Pierce, 1852; Tanglewood Tales (2nd Series of the Wonder Book), 1853; A Rill from the Town-Pump, with remarks, by Telba, 1857; The Marble Faun; or, The Romance of Monte Beni (published in England under the title of "Transformation"), 1860, Our Old Home, 1863; Dolliver Romance (1st Part in "Atlantic Monthly"), 1864; in 3 Parts, 1876; Pansie, a fragment, Hawthorne' last literary effort, 1864; American Note-Books, 1868; English Note Books, edited by Sophia Hawthorne, 1870; French and Italian Note Books, 1871; Septimius Felton; or, the Elixir of Life (from the "Atlantic Monthly"), 1872; Doctor Grimshawe's Secret, with Preface and Notes by Julian Hawthorne, 1882.
Tales of the White Hills, Legends of New England, Legends of theProvince House, 1877, contain tales which had already beenprinted in book form in "Twice-Told Tales" and the "Mosses""Sketched and Studies," 1883.
Hawthorne's contributions to magazines were numerous, and most ofhis tales appeared first in periodicals, chiefly in "The Token,"1831-1838, "New England Magazine," 1834,1835; "Knickerbocker,"1837-1839; "Democratic Review," 1838-1846; "Atlantic Monthly,"1860-1872 (scenes from the Dolliver Romance, Septimius Felton,and passages from Hawthorne's Note-Books).
Works: in 24 volumes, 1879; in 12 volumes, with introductorynotes by Lathrop, Riverside Edition, 1883.
Biography, etc.; A. H. Japp (pseud. H. A. Page), Memoir of N.Hawthorne, 1872; J. T. Field's "Yesterdays with Authors," 1873 G.P. Lathrop, "A Study of Hawthorne," 1876; Henry James English Menof Letters, 1879; Julian Hawthorne, "Nathaniel Hawthorne and hiswife," 1885; Moncure D. Conway, Life of Nathaniel Hawthorne,1891; Analytical Index of Hawthorne's Works, by E. M. O'Connor1882.
Introductory to "The Scarlet Letter"
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It is a little remarkable, that—though disinclined to talkovermuch of myself and my affairs at the fireside, and to mypersonal friends—an autobiographical impulse should twice in mylife have taken possession of me, in addressing the public. Thefirst time was three or four years since, when I favoured thereader—inexcusably, and for no earthly reason that either theindulgent reader or the intrusive author could imagine—with adescription of my way of life in the deep quietude of an OldManse. And now—because, beyond my deserts, I was happy enoughto find a listener or two on the former occasion—I again seizethe public by the button, and talk of my three years' experiencein a Custom-House. The example of the famous "P. P., Clerk ofthis Parish," was never more faithfully followed. The truthseems to be, however, that when he casts his leaves forth uponthe wind, the author addresses, not the many who will flingaside his volume, or never take it up, but the few who willunderstand him better than most of his schoolmates or lifemates.Some authors, indeed, do far more than this, and indulgethemselves in such confidential depths of revelation as couldfittingly be addressed only and exclusively to the one heart andmind of perfect sympathy; as if the printed book, thrown atlarge on the wide world, were certain to find out the dividedsegment of the writer's own nature, and complete his circle ofexistence by bringing him into communion with it. It is scarcelydecorous, however, to speak all, even where we speakimpersonally. But, as thoughts are frozen and utterancebenumbed, unless the speaker stand in some true relation withhis audience, it may be pardonable to imagine that a friend, akind and apprehensive, though not the closest friend, islistening to our talk; and then, a native reserve being thawedby this genial consciousness, we may prate of the circumstancesthat lie around us, and even of ourself, but still keep theinmost Me behind its veil. To this extent, and within theselimits, an author, methinks, may be autobiographical, withoutviolating either the reader's rights or his own.
It will be seen, likewise, that this Custom-House sketch has acertain propriety, of a kind always recognised in literature, asexplaining how a large portion of the following pages came intomy possession, and as offering proofs of the authenticity of anarrative therein contained. This, in fact—a desire to putmyself in my true position as editor, or very little more, ofthe most prolix among the tales that make up my volume—this,and no other, is my true reason for assuming a personal relationwith the public. In accomplishing the main purpose, it hasappeared allowable, by a few extra touches, to give a faintrepresentation of a mode of life not heretofore described,together with some of the characters that move in it, among whomthe author happened to make one.
In my native town of Salem, at the head of what, half a centuryago, in the days of old King Derby, was a bustling wharf—butwhich is now burdened with decayed wooden warehouses, andexhibits few or no symptoms of commercial life; except, perhaps,a bark or brig, half-way down its melancholy length, discharginghides; or, nearer at hand, a Nova Scotia schooner, pitching outher cargo of firewood—at the head, I say, of this dilapidatedwharf, which the tide often overflows, and along which, at thebase and in the rear of the row of buildings, the track of manylanguid years is seen in a border of unthrifty grass—here, witha view from its front windows adown this not very enliveningprospect, and thence across the harbour, stands a spaciousedifice of brick. From the loftiest point of its roof, duringprecisely three and a half hours of each forenoon, floats ordroops, in breeze or calm, the banner of the republic; but withthe thirteen stripes turned vertically, instead of horizontally,and thus indicating that a civil, and not a military, post ofUncle Sam's government is here established. Its front isornamented with a portico of half-a-dozen wooden pillars,supporting a balcony, beneath which a flight of wide granitesteps descends towards the street. Over the entrance hovers anenormous specimen of the American eagle, with outspread wings, ashield before her breast, and, if I recollect aright, a bunch ofintermingled thunderbolts and barbed arrows in each claw. Withthe customary infirmity of temper that characterizes thisunhappy fowl, she appears by the fierceness of her beak and eye,and the general truculency of her attitude, to threaten mischiefto the inoffensive community; and especially to warn allcitizens careful of their safety against intruding on thepremises which she overshadows with her wings. Nevertheless,vixenly as she looks, many people are seeking at this verymoment to shelter themselves under the wing of the federaleagle; imagining, I presume, that her bosom has all the softnessand snugness of an eiderdown pill