This Norton Critical Edition of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s most widely read novel appears during the bicentennial anniversary year of his birth. The text of The Scarlet Letter is based on the 1850 third edition, the first set in stereotype plates and the basis of subsequent printings in Hawthorne’s lifetime.

An invaluable selection of contextual material includes five Hawthorne stories that are closely related to The Scarlet Letter, along with relevant letters and notebook entries. A substantial excerpt from Hawthorne’s campaign biography of Franklin Pierce offers a revealing glimpse at Hawthorne’s political thought, especially regarding slavery and abolition.

"Criticism" provides a comprehensive overview of early and modern commentary on The Scarlet Letter and the stories in this edition, including nineteenth-century reviews of the novel and critical essays by Robert S. Levine, Nina Baym, Larry J. Reynolds, and Jean Fagan Yellin.

A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are also included.

Contents:

The Text of The Scarlet Letter

Note on the Text

Other Writings

• Mrs. Hutchinson
• Endicott and the Red Cross
• Young Goodman Brown
• The Minister’s Black Veil
• The Birth-mark
• Contexts
  • Passages from Hawthorne’s Notebooks and Letters
  • Passages from The Life of Franklin Pierce (1852)

Criticism

• NINETEENTH-CENTURY REVIEWS OF THE SCARLET LETTER
  • Evert A. Duyckinck, from Literary World
  • Edwin Percy Whipple, from Graham’s Magazine
  • Anne W. Abbott, from North American Review
  • Orestes Brownson, from Brownson’s Quarterly
  • Arthur Cleveland Coxe, from Church Review
  • Amory Dwight Mayo, from Universalist Quarterly
  • Jane Swisshelm, from Saturday Visitor
• MODERN CRITICISM
  • Robert S. Levine, Antebellum Feminists on Hawthorne: Reconsidering the Reception of The Scarlet Letter
• PURITAN BACKGROUND AND SOURCES
  • Charles Ryskamp, The New England Sources for The Scarlet Letter
  • Michael J. Colacurcio, Footsteps of Ann Hutchinson: The Context of The Scarlet Letter
  • Frederick Newberry, A Red-Hot A and Lusting Divine: Sources for The Scarlet Letter
  • Kristin Boudreau, Hawthorne’s Model of Christian Charity
  • Ellen Weinauer, Considering Possession in The Scarlet Letter
• "THE CUSTOM-HOUSE"
  • John Franzosa, "The Custom-House," The Scarlet Letter, and Hawthorne’s Separation from Salem
  • Douglas Anderson, Jefferson, Hawthorne, and "The Custom-House"
• THE SCARLET LETTER
  • Michael Winship, Hawthorne and the "Scribbling Women:" Publishing The Scarlet Letter in the Nineteenth-Century United States
  • Laura Hanft Korobkin, The Scarlet Letter of the Law: Hawthorne and Criminal Justice
  • Millicent Bell, The Obliquity of Signs: The Scarlet Letter
  • David Levernz, Mrs. Hawthorne’s Headache: Reading The Scarlet Letter
  • Stephen Railton, The Address of The Scarlet Letter
  • Louise DeSalvo, Nathaniel Hawthorne and the Feminists: The Scarlet Letter
  • Robert K. Martin, Hester Prynne, C’est Moi: Nathaniel Hawthorne and the Anxieties of Gender
  • T. Walter Herbert, Jr., Nathaniel Hawthorne, Una Hawthorne, and The Scarlet Letter: Interactive Selfhoods and the Cultural Construction of Gender
  • Nina Baym, Revisiting Hawthorne’s Feminism
  • Bethany Reid, Narrative of the Captivity and Redemption of Roger Prynne: Rereading The Scarlet Letter
  • Sacvan Bercovitch, The A-Politics of Ambiguity in The Scarlet Letter
  • Michael T. Gilmore, Hawthorne and the Making of the Middle Class
  • Larry J. Reynolds, The Scarlet Letter and Revolutions Abroad
  • Jean Fagan Yellin, The Scarlet Letter and the Anti-Slavery Feminists
  • Leland S. Person, The Dark Labyrinth of Mind: Hawthorne, Hester, and the Ironies of Racial Mothering Amy Schrager Lang, Anne Hutchinson
  • John Nickel, Hawthorne’s Demystification of History in "Endicott and the Red Cross"
  • David Levin, Shadow of Doubts: Specter Evidence in Hawthorne’s "Young Goodman Brown"
  • Frederick Crews, Escapism in "Young Goodman Brown" and "The Minister’s Black Veil"
  • J. Hillis Miller, The Problem of History in "The Minister’s Black Veil"
  • Judith Fetterley, Women Beware Science: "The Birthmark"
  • Cindy Weinstein, The Invisible Hand Made Visible: "The Birthmark"

Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Chronology

Selected Bibliography