Hester walked across the room.

She stepped firmly upon her left foot first, then her right foot, and then her left foot again.

One cannot help but wonder, why in this particular instance of walking across the room, did she commence her journey upon the left foot and not the right?

Could it be due to her terrible sin?

Might it be that the devil, as he is known to inform the left hand and those bewitched, left-handed persons among us, also informeth the left foot?

Why, indeed, doth the left foot of sin drag the innocent right foot along its wretched journey from one side of the room to the other?

She walked across the room, I tell you!

It seems that her guilty feet hath got no rhythm, as if they are burdened by the weight of her transgressions.

Each step is a reminder of the sin that haunts her, a sin that she can never escape.

As she crosses the room, her footsteps echo in the silence, a solemn testament to her fallen state.

The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Scarlet Letter: A Romance is a remarkable 1850 novel that stands as a classic work of historical fiction. Authored by the renowned American writer Nathaniel Hawthorne, it is widely regarded as his "masterwork". Set in the 17th-century Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony, specifically during the years 1642 to 1649, the story revolves around Hester Prynne. Hester conceives a daughter through an affair and then has to endure the consequences as she strives to build a new life filled with repentance and dignity. Throughout the book, Hawthorne delves deep into profound themes such as legalism, sin, and guilt. The various translations and editions of this novel in Iran, with titles like "داغ ننگ" and "زنی با نشان قرمز", showcase its wide reach and impact. The plot is rich and engaging, with Hester's unwavering courage and dignity in the face of society's condemnation being a central focus. As the story progresses, Hester's actions gradually change the perception of the community towards her, and in the end, the letter "A" on her chest takes on a new meaning, representing "Angel" instead of "Adulteress".

This novel is a thought-provoking exploration of human nature and the power of redemption.

Oh god.

Hawthorne is that perpetually needy manchild of a writer. You know the one who peers over your shoulder while you're trying to read and keeps pointing out the parts of his own writing that he finds particularly good and/or moving.

"Yeah, see? Do you see? See how I talked about how the rose is red, and then I talk about how Hester's 'A' is red, too? Do you see what I'm trying to do here, with the symbolism?"

And it's like that all the way through the book.

*Edit 12 September 2008: I'm tutoring with this for one of my students, as her AP English teacher is teaching it as part of his curriculum. And yes, it still sucks as badly as I remember. Actually, even more so, because now I have to teach it. The constant self-promotion and the overemphasis on symbolism can be quite tiresome. It makes the reading experience feel more like a lecture than an enjoyable exploration of a story. I find myself having to explain and defend Hawthorne's choices to my student, which can be a challenge when I don't necessarily agree with them myself. However, I understand the importance of teaching this classic work, and I will do my best to help my student understand its significance.

This book is about a preacher's sperm.

It contains characters who are uptight.

The story likely delves into the complex and perhaps unexpected circumstances surrounding the preacher's sperm and how it impacts the lives of those involved.

We can imagine the various emotions and conflicts that might arise among the uptight individuals as they grapple with the situation.

Maybe there are secrets that are revealed, relationships that are tested, and personal growth that occurs as a result of this unique premise.

The book could offer a thought-provoking exploration of human nature, morality, and the consequences of actions.

It might also provide an opportunity for readers to reflect on their own attitudes towards sexuality, religion, and the unexpected turns that life can take.

Overall, this book seems to have the potential to be a captivating and engaging read that will leave readers with much to discuss and consider.

The story is not bad.

However, the style is unreadable.

Here is the kind of people to whom I would recommend this book.

It would be those who have a penchant for sentences that pack in four or five thoughts and are of paragraph length.

Consequently, these sentences are nearly impossible to understand.

By the time one reaches the end of the sentence, the beginning and whatever meaning it initially contained have been forgotten, and thus the point is lost.

This makes the reading experience rather challenging and perhaps only suitable for a specific niche of readers who enjoy grappling with such complex and convoluted writing styles.

Nevertheless, it's important to note that just because the style is difficult doesn't necessarily mean the story itself lacks merit.

It's a matter of personal preference and whether one is willing to invest the time and effort to untangle the web of words and ideas presented in the book.

Actually, I've read this book twice.

The first time was when I was in high school. Reading it again after some thirty years, I was truly amazed at the vast amount of meaning that I had missed during that initial reading!

Most modern readers are completely unaware (and definitely not taught in school) that Hawthorne, as his fiction, essays, and journals clearly demonstrate, was a devout Christian. Despite this, he firmly refused to affiliate with any particular denomination. Here, his central subject is none other than the central theme of the Christian gospel: the guilt of sin and the possibility of forgiveness. (Unlike many modern individuals, Hawthorne does not view Hester's adultery as completely acceptable and excusable. However, he also does not consider it an unforgivable sin.) But his faith was of a resolutely Arminian nature. And as he makes abundantly clear, it is extremely difficult for sinners trapped in the opposing, Calvinist tradition to embrace repentance and redemption when their religious beliefs convince them that they may not be among the pre-chosen "elect." (It is no coincidence that his setting is 17th-century New England, the very heartland of an unadulterated, unquestioned Calvinism whose grip on people's minds was far more unyielding than it had become in his own time.) If you are not deterred by 19th-century diction, this book is an absolute delight to read. It is filled with marvelous symbolism and a masterful evocation of the atmosphere of the setting. The occasional hints of the possibly supernatural add an extra layer of flavor to the whole, much like salt in a stew. Highly recommended!

I came across my old high school review of this book, and here is a small part of my assessment.

Apologies in advance: If there is a hell, Hawthorne is the devil's sidekick. The moment you realize you're in hell, burning and facing an eternity of this, the first thing you're handed is this book. And you have to write a 10-page paper extolling the wonderful virtues of this huge waste of time. After you've completed writing (with your own blood, mind you) your silly paper, you're given another essay topic related to this same dull book. Congratulations, this is what you'll be doing forever.

Haha, I really didn't like this book in high school, and it's part of the reason why I've always been hesitant about US literature, especially the classics.

Now that I'm a teacher, I'm going to revisit this behemoth of high school trauma and approach it with as open a mind as possible. I did the same with "The Old Man and the Sea" (I remember hating that book when I read it in my freshman year), and the second time around, I liked it!

I didn't like either book because my teachers didn't do a good job of convincing me. There was little to no background, no setup, no explanation as to why we should read it - other than "ED Hirsch said you have to, so go read it."

Teaching 101: never have your students read a book that you yourself don't enjoy. I think my teachers disliked both books, and it influenced their students.

✩ 5 stars
~
This book was truly a remarkable find for my high school junior year great books class.

It was definitely a fun, interesting, and good read. From the very first page, it captured my attention and held it throughout. The story was engaging, filled with vivid characters and a plot that kept me on the edge of my seat.

What I loved most about this book was how it made me think. It presented complex ideas and themes in a way that was accessible and thought-provoking. It challenged my assumptions and made me look at the world from different perspectives.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a great read. Whether you're a student or just someone who loves a good story, this book is sure to delight. It's a must-read for anyone interested in literature and the power of words.

**Puritans**:
Puritans were one of the groups in 16th-century England who took steps to reform the church and tried to abolish the hierarchical structure of the church. Their ideas, which had roots in the thoughts of John Calvin, introduced harsh and radical critiques of the Catholic Church and considered its ceremonies sinful.
Puritans believed that to find true Christianity, one had to return to the era of the church fathers and the martyrs of Christianity (in fact, they had a fundamentalist approach to Christianity). They said that for this purpose, small religious communities should be created so that they could build a vision of God's heavenly church on earth.
Puritans provided specific and fundamentalist interpretations of some parts of the Old and New Testament books. They saw themselves as part of and in line with God's chosen people and imagined that they were on the verge of the end times and the second coming of Christ. They came to complete the historical narrative present in the Bible and fulfill God's promises as the chosen people. So they imagined a sacred historical mission for themselves and read and interpreted their history and daily lives within this sacred framework (as opposed to the secular).
So in the early 17th century, Puritans emigrated to the New World to build their church in this new land (the Garden of Eden) without any interference and persecution and fulfill their mission based on "God's will." They began a life of austerity, self-denial, and simplicity because they were the chosen class among the corrupt children of men and had to carry out their mission regardless of the appearances and glitz of this world.

**Hester Prynne, Eve, the Rebel Woman**:
In the Puritan interpretation of the Old Testament, Eve, by disobeying God's command and eating the forbidden fruit, breaks God's covenant with Adam and condemns all of humanity to eternal damnation. This interpretation became one of the most important principles in their theology, namely "original sin." An interpretation according to which the only way forward for all humans (except God's chosen people) is to go to hell.
Therefore, in their view, women are essentially entirely evil, the source of sin and lust, and the cause of human shame.
So it is natural that in such a closed and religious society, "Hester Prynne," who is accused of having illegal sexual relations, must be severely punished, and she, more than other women, is the embodiment of shame. So she must wear a scarlet letter (the letter "A") on her chest for the rest of her life, both to be a symbol of her shame and disgrace and to serve as a moral lesson for the other members of this chosen society, so that they see it as a sign of sin, shame, and nakedness and refrain from committing sins. Hester Prynne, who had a pure heart and a noble spirit, felt remorse for her sin for a long time, was unhappy, and repented.
Just like real personalities like "Anne Hutchinson" who try to create a crack in the rigid structure of Puritan thought, Hester's main sin (of course, according to the Puritans, a sin, and according to us, freedom of thought and idea) occurs secretly in her mind and thoughts because our 17th-century Eve has eaten the fruit of the tree of knowledge.
In this way, a revolutionary desire for freedom takes shape in Hester's thoughts. "Thoughts take the place of love and affection in her; thoughts that force her to break the bonds and restrictions of society." In the words of the narrator of the novel, "The laws and customs of the world in which she lived were not laws that pleased her mind. Her time was an era when human reason had been freed from the constraints of the past."
Now, when the story gets interesting, we place Hester in front of her lover, a person of high rank and status in the church of these settlers. A person who, despite his outward strength and power, is inwardly more like a weak-willed man who is always in conflict with his conscience and, to maintain his position and status, is forced to hide his love.
We can explain the many signs and indications present in the book based on this religious and historical background, and then we see how different this novel is from other novels with the same theme of "historical injustice to women."

**Nathaniel Hawthorne, or Where Does Hawthorne Stand in American Literature?**
Hawthorne is considered a revolutionary in American literature, both in terms of literary form and content. He, who in those years had been a successful short story writer, tries in an era when "hordes of malicious women have taken public taste captive" (quoted from the author's letter to his publisher in 1855), to take the same stories about women and family relationships and, in the form of a novel (although he himself calls it a romance), create something magnificent.
Although this masterpiece ("The Scarlet Letter") does not sell well and only attracts the attention of a few critics like Melville, but later it becomes one of the greatest works in the history of American literature, and Hester Prynne becomes the most important woman in the literature of this land. The analysis and description of the psychological and spiritual states of the characters, the highly polished and poetic prose, and the use of cultural and religious images and symbols have elevated the work far above its time.
On the other hand, Hawthorne, who himself was a descendant of the Puritans, also appears revolutionary in terms of his choice of subject matter. Although in Hawthorne's time, Puritanism, after the Enlightenment and after two hundred years, was no longer the dominant culture in American society, but the remnants of this culture still lurked beneath the surface of society (even until the late 20th century).
Although earlier, Thoreau and Emerson had tried to distance themselves from Puritan ideas, but it is Hawthorne and later Melville who directly enter the battle against this dark culture. And of course, this struggle has difficulties and also causes them to hesitate. Melville also refers to Hawthorne's struggle with and his attraction to Puritan concepts. And in the preface of this book, Hawthorne says that he knows what his Puritan ancestors would say to him when they look down on him from above. Is he writing a story?
In "The Scarlet Letter," Hawthorne challenges Puritan religious ideas such as the total depravity of man, original sin, and the futility of man's actions in his salvation. Although at times one feels that the narrator of the book is also oscillating between the same Puritan themes and the revolutionary ideas of the author.

**The Scholar and the Custom House**:
The scholar says in his preface that "I have learned not to repeat the stories of others, and translation is a kind of exercise or at least a craft."
This view of the translator (and later the storyteller) of that era precisely becomes the familiar path of translating this work. The scholar probably, with the idea of practicing for writing his own women's stories, approaches a novel with a "woman's story" and probably does not realize that he has touched one of the most difficult and profound novels in America.
Apart from the historical background that was mentioned, Hawthorne's heavy, complex, and highly poetic prose, which is one of the most beautiful prose in American literature, especially at the beginning of the book, has created many difficulties for the young translator and has not been able to keep up with this magnificent and hardworking horse.
But one of the strange things that the scholar has done is to omit the very detailed and influential preface of Hawthorne to the book. In this preface, which has the name "The Custom House," the narrator/Hawthorne explains how he finds the manuscript of Hester's story among the scattered papers in the building of his workplace, the Custom House, and what path he takes until he writes it. Apart from the fact that some consider this preface itself to be a long and independent short story, but I think that because of the explanation of the author's thoughts during the writing of the book, it is very useful and valuable.

**Me and American Literature**:
When I look at most of the professional readers around me (including in this very Goodreads), unfortunately, I notice a meaningful neglect of American fictional literature (the literature that I am interested in myself). It seems that this literature is regarded as a literature of some sort (now with a few good books) that only has the aspect of mere entertainment.
This attention to my interest and love for American fictional literature, which I have always had and still have, led me to find the reason for this interest and the intellectual roots of the books I am interested in. After reading the book "The Blithedale Romance," I decided to start a long-term project called "American Reading in Isfahan" for myself.
And I try in this project to delve into the detailed and meticulous study of the American literary tradition and the canonical books of American literature, perhaps to search for the intellectual roots of this literature in the heart of the history of American literature and understand how American literature became American literature. And in this process of becoming, what rises and falls it has gone through.

**Footnote**: All the ideas in this review are taken from the courses and classes of Western literature available on YouTube, and the numbering of these lines has no special claim in this regard.

Modern society and a significant number of people seem to be rather confused about our ancestors.

On one hand, they view them as dumbass peasants who added BYOW (Bring Your Own Witch) to their barbeque invitations.

On the other hand, they sometimes endow them with super mystical intelligence, class, and abilities while lamenting how stupid and uncouth we have become in comparison.

The Scarlet Letter enables us to judge that the reality was likely somewhere in between, but mostly leaning towards pathological stupidity.

And borderline sluttery, but we don't complain about that part...

The Scarlet Letter is one of those books that American schools force children to read at gunpoint in an attempt to "educate" them and force otherwise useful knowledge out of those young brains.

In fact, reading this book reminded me precisely why I am so passionately vocal about education reform.

This book is almost everything that is wrong with our education system today. It is outdated, read almost uniformly across the board regardless of its applicability, and its lessons are not entirely fundamental to today's society. What little value can be learned from this book is better acquired through other means.

The truth is that people are constantly getting smarter. Although it may not seem that way when Jersey Shore starts playing on your television set, it is indeed true. And we are truly too intelligent for a book whose object lessons are so comically outdated in today's society. This book mainly deals with issues that are no longer relevant, and any moral lessons that might apply to life today are so poorly translated that one must question why this book is still circulating in the education system. This is precisely why most high school graduates do not like reading, and mostly, do not like reading the classics. They assume it will be more of the same as The Scarlet Letter.

So, please, if you are in school and your psycho bitch of an English teacher (remember: men can be bitches too!) is asking you to read this book, tell them that their antiquated ideas of education are suppressing your self-actualized desire to learn in a mode that is both natural and effective for one day becoming a valued member of society.

Remind them that reading a bunch of old books is about as educational as placing said books on your head and hoping to absorb the knowledge through a form of psychic-osmosis.

If they argue, please feel free to tell them that I give you full permission to go read something that is not a complete waste of your time.

I don't really know why I liked this book so much. What on earth

\\n  “No man can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true.”\\n

This is one of those classics that is famous for basically being universally considered boring. I mean, just look at the 3.3 average rating. And you know what, I do not disagree. Hawthorne repeats every single thing he says eighty times because that's the style of the time. But the strength of the message shines through.

And despite the marketing, I'd argue this book isn't really about slut-shaming. The Scarlet Letter is about the effect of shame on people, both when external and when internal. It delves deep into the exploration of the roots of shame - the way our society's view of us can be a root into our own view of us.

This is a surprisingly complex book to analyze - with so much nuance added to every theme and symbol, it's hard to argue that this book is one-note. And the characters have some interest to them, too; Hester has some amazing moments, and Pearl is simply an icon.

Listen, I'm not one to stan classics just because they're classics. Classic books are books like any other and should be praised or criticized at will. But my experience with this book was completely different from the experience of other reviewers on this page. I do think having a good English teacher can be super essential in reading books like this; having a bad one is going to totally ruin your experience, and I get that. But I loved this book.

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This piece of writing is truly amazingly intense. The characterizations within it are not only bizarre but also iconic. It's quite a strange yet interesting choice that high schoolers are compelled to read this particular work. It has a surprisingly perverse nature to it. Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author, is really something of a weirdo. His writing style and the themes he explores are unique and often leave the reader with a sense of shock and wonder. One can't help but be intrigued by the strange world he creates through his words. Whether it's the unusual characters or the unexpected plot twists, Hawthorne's work has a certain allure that keeps readers coming back for more. Despite its perverse aspects, there is also a certain beauty and depth to it that makes it a worthy read for high school students and beyond.