Scarlet Letter

America’s first psychological novel, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter is a dark tale of love, crime, and revenge set in colonial New England.  It revolves around a single, forbidden act of passion that forever alters the lives of three members of a small Puritan community.

The landscape of this class novel is uniquely American, but the themes it explores are universal – the nature of sin, guilt, and penitence; the boundary between our private and public selves; and the spiritual and psychological cost of living outside society.  Constructed with the elegance of a Greek tragedy, The Scarlet Letter illuminates the truth that lies deep within the human heart.