THE SCARLET LETTER

The novel is set in Boston, in Puritan New England, during 17^th century; it is the story of Hester Prynne. Hester was born in Old England and her family was not very rich but noble. After her marriage with Roger Chillingworth, who was a scholar, she went to Massachussets; her married life, in the connection with her old and ugly husband, was dull and narrow, so when Hester arrives in Boston (her husband plains to join her later), she has a love affair with the young reverend Arthur Dimmesdale and bears him a daughter, Pearl. Adultery was severely punished by the strict laws and the strict moral code of Puritans (English Calvinists), so Hester is kept in prison, where she bears the baby, and then she is condemned to wear a scarlet letter A, which is the initial of "adultery", as a sign of her guilt.

When Chillingworth arrives in Boston, he decides to take his revenge and, suspecting Dimmesdale, begins to torment him.

Hester leads a solitary life with her dauther Pearl in a cottage on the outskirts of the town and becomes a needlewoman; her work is appreciated and her submission to her fate wins her respect of the community. She is hard-working, charitable, and some people say that the A on her dress stands for "able".

Unable to confess, Dimmesdale is torn by sense of guilt and becomes ill; at the end of the story he publicly confesses his sin and he dies on Hester's arms.

Hester has a natural dignity and force of character, an impulsive and passionate nature.

Hester is a woman outside ordinary reality of her century, I think she is an atypical woman of her age because she looks for the freedom of her mind, against the unjust laws of the world and of the society, against prejudice, on the contrary other women follow rigorously a religious and puritan life in accordance with the rules learned by parents' education. I think we can describe Hester as a nonconformist, as an emancipated woman. Maybe she is a woman above the other people (puritan people), because she refuses Puritans' hypocrisy; she believes in God and she is sorry for her adultery, she knows she is a sinner, but she doesn't feel guilty.

After the imprisonment, Hester is alone in the world; she lives in her cottage by the sea-shore with little Pearl to be guided and protected, she is hopeless of retrieving her position. She is isolated from other people because nobody wants to accept an adulteress or a sinful woman, but she assumes a freedom of speculation against the whole system of ancient prejudice. To assume a freedom of speculation to overthrow and rearrange the whole system of ancient prejudice is the crime considered worse than that stigmatises by the scarlet letter, because it expresses the intention of change the society and the reports among people.

The world law was no law for her mind I think this quotation means that Hester doesn't want to be like other people, to have prejudice or to respect unjust law (God's law and law of the society), but she wants to be free following only her mind and her heart.

Thought visited her I think this quotation means that Hester, while she is alone in her cottage, thinks over her destiny but over the life of other people too, their life is tied up by unjust laws and prejudice, but nobody can realise it, so she can't freely express her point of view. Hester can think in a different way, but she has to show freedom of her mind only into herself, not in front of puritan and strict society.

After Hester's imprisonment, I think Hester and Arthur are still in love, in fact they hug and at the and they decide to go away together. But their relationship is a secret one. She is deeply in love with him and she wants his pardon, but he is a very weak, insecure and frightened, he is especially frightened because of Chillingworth's revenge, so he is an egoist because he doesn't tell anything about his sin and he didn't help Hester when she was in prison; he is afraid because he is a minister but he sinned in front of God and now the sense of guilt invades him. She's the strongest of the two, she is the one who takes decisions and spurs Arthur to do something; she wants to help him to overcome his sense of guilt and give him courage to go on living, even if he considers himself and Hester two sinners and he is afraid of the judgement of God and of the revenge of Hester's husband.