The Scarlet Letter and Other Writings by Nathaniel Hawthorne

A stark and allegorical tale of adultery, guilt, and social repression in Puritan New England, The Scarlet Letter is a foundational work of American literature. Nathaniel Hawthorne's exploration of the dichotomy between the public and private self, internal passion and external convention, gives us the unforgettable Hester Prynne, who discovers strength in the face of ostracism and emerges as a heroine ahead of her time.

I honestly love this book and have no idea what people mean when they say it is unreadable, the language is WONDERFUL.
Here are a couple of quotes I loved:

“Continuously, and in a thousand other ways, did she feel the innumerable throbs of anguish that had been so cunningly contrived for her by the undying, the ever-active sentence of the Puritan tribunal.”

“His form grew emancipated; his voice, though still rich and sweet, had a certain melancholy prophecy of decay in it”

“He now dug into the poor clergyman's heart, like a miner searching for gold; or, rather, like a sexton delving into a grave, possibly in quest of a jewel that had been buried on the dead man's bosom, but likely to find nothing save mortality and corruption.”

” To the untrue man, the whole universe is false - it is impalpable - it shrinks to nothing within his grasp. And he himself, in so far as he shows himself in a false light, becomes a shadow or, indeed, ceases to exist.”

“The truth seems to be, however, that the mother-forest, and these wild things which it nourished, all recognized a kindred wildness in the human child. And she was gentler here than in the grassy-margined streets of the settlement, or in her mother's cottage. The flowers appeared to know it, and one and another whispered as the passed ‘Adorn thyself with me, thou beautiful child, adorn thyself with me!' - and, to please them, Pearl gathered the violets, and anemones, and columbines, and some twigs of the freshest green, which the old trees held down before her eyes. With these she decorated her hair and her young waist, and became a nymph-child, or an infant-dryad, or whatever else was in closest sympathy with the antique wood.”

Seriously, did we read the same book?!

super quick and fun read! I wouldve loved to read this in one sitting but i spent 10 days fixing my sleep schedule so i never had time to read as i was so tired in the day time ugh

Some attribute had departed from her, the permanence of which had been essential to keep her a woman. Such is frequently the fate, and such the stern development, of the feminine character and person, when the woman has encountered, and lived through, an experience of peculiar severity. If she be all tenderness, she will die. If she survive, the tenderness will either be crushed out of her, or—and the outward semblance is the same—crushed so deeply into her heart that it can never show itself more. The latter is perhaps the truest theory.

Skip the first 20%. It's about the author's life as a worker in custom-house. It might be the best description of the daily life of a worker in a custom-house, still doesn't make for a good reading.

The story seems like it could be good, Esther is a young woman is sent to this puritan town in America by her husband, and wait for him there. She ends up pregnant, and the townspeople decide not to kill her, the usual penalty for that crime, but to brand her clothes with the A letter.

However, the story purposely focus too much on the description of the characters and their feelings, with numerous metaphors and useless descriptions. No content at all.

PLEASE see the mots likes reviewer here, she got it right!

Read 3:33/8:55 40%