Hawthorne and The Scarlet Letter

Question 1

Hawthorne Birth and Death

Answer 1

1804-1864

Question 2

Where/When Born

Answer 2

July 4th, Salem MA

Question 3

What notable event was an ancestor present involved in?

Answer 3

Salem Witch Trials Judge

Question 4

Where did he go to college?

Answer 4

Bowdoin, contemporary of Longfellow

Question 5

Early Reviews

Answer 5

Debated Historical Accuracy

Question 6

Major Characters

Answer 6

Hester Prynne, Roger Chillingworth, Arthur Dimmesdale, Pearl

Question 7

When was “The Scarlet Letter” published?

Answer 7

1850

Question 8

What is the frame narrative for “The Scarlet Letter”?

Answer 8

A Salem Custom House worker finds historical documents, including the Letter A, telling the story.

Question 9

What Transcendentalist idea is explore in “The Scarlet Letter”?

Answer 9

That a personalized, direct relationship with the divine should take the place of organized religion.

Question 10

When does “The Scarlet Letter” take place?

Answer 10

The 1640’s; it is set in the past and explores the Puritan society of early Massachusetts.

Question 11

What is the difference between allegory and symbolism?

Answer 11

An allegory has a second level of meaning that could be represented through words, but instead is represented through an object/person/situation.

A symbol is subsumed by the meaning it stands for, generally something inexpressible

Question 12

Who is the wearer of the Scarlet Letter?

Answer 12

Hester Prynne

Question 13

Who is Hester’s husband?

Answer 13

Roger Chillingworth

Question 14

Who is Pearl’s father?

Answer 14

Arthur Dimmesdale

Question 15

What happens to Hester?

Answer 15

After Chillingworth and Dimmesdale’s death, Hester and Pearl leave for Europe and are not heard from again until Hester returns many years later. She takes up her quiet, charitable life again, sometimes hearing from Pearl, who has married a European aristocrat.

When she dies, she is buried next to Dimmesdale. The two share a letter “A” gravemarker,

Question 16

Why does Hawthorne use so much allegory in his work?

Answer 16

Contemporaries like Poe notes Hawthorne’s penchant for allegory and symbolism, and today it remains one of his trademarks.

In “The Scarlet Letter,” the use of allegory was particularly appropriate because the work is about Puritan society, and Puritans saw the world through allegory. (A comet was a sign from God, etc.)

Question 17

How does Hawthorne upend Puritan allegory in the Scarlet Letter?

Answer 17

Even though Puritan society saw the world through allegory, and Hawthorne uses allegory heavily throughout “The Scarlet Letter,” he inverts Puritan expectations for his characters.

Puritans would have seen a villain in Hester, a saint in Dimmesdale, and a victim in Chillingworth. Hawthorne, however, presents Hester as a resilient and steadfast woman, Dimmesdale as weak and hypocritical, and Chillingworth as downright evil.

Question 18

Discuss allegory and Pearl.

Answer 18

Though all of the main characters have allegorical meanings, Pearl is almost all symbol and no character. She is the living embodiment of the Scarlet Letter, at times bringing her mother joy, others torment.

Pearl also stands for the artistic imagination, utterly foreign to Puritan society. Her frequent descriptions as fey or otherworldy underline this alienation from Puritan society.

She is another way in which Hawthorne emphasizes Transcendental ideas. When she is out in the forest, she feels free and at home, but in town she is wild and misunderstood.

Question 19

What does “gules” mean?

Answer 19

It is the word for “red” in heraldic lingo.

Question 20

How is the sign of the meteor interpreted by Dimmesdale and the community?

Answer 20

The meteor leaves a path in the shape of an “A.”

Dimmesdale sees it as a personal sign that he should make his sin known and live with the shame, as Hester does.

The community sees it as a positive sign about the passing of Governor Winthrop, the founder of their community, and surmise it stands for “Angel.”

In a similar way to “As I Lay Dying,” interpretation is what creates meaning; seeing is in the eye of the beholder.

Question 21

What grows next to the prison door?

Answer 21

A rosebush

Question 22

Why is Hester’s daughter given the name “Pearl”?

Answer 22

She was “purchased with all her mother had of value.”

Question 23

Who is “the Black Man”?

Answer 23

Chillingworth

Question 24

Who is the town witch? What happens to her?

Answer 24

Mistress Hibbens; Nothing really, in the story, but the narrator tells us shortly afterwards she will be executed as a witch.