![]() ![]() ![]() In this lesson we are not going to concentrate on what the A means. Here’s a hint: Hawthorne suggests virtually all of the A’s meanings early in the novel when he introduces Hester as she emerges from jail. Perhaps your teacher has asked you to join that hunt. Critics have devoted a lot of time and ink to ferreting out all the meanings of that complex and contradictory symbol. What does the pink ribbon mean in “Young Goodman Brown,” or the plant and the fountain in “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” or Georgiana’s blemish in “The Birthmark”? The biggest Hawthorne trophy is that splendid red A Hester Prynne wears on her dress in The Scarlet Letter. On almost every page a big, inviting target lumbers into view. Teacher’s Guide (continues below)įor symbol hunters, reading Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novels and short stories is like going on a grand safari. The student version, an interactive PDF, includes all of the above, except for the answers to the close reading questions. The teacher’s guide includes a background note, an exercise that allows students to explore vocabulary in context, and the text analysis with answers to the close reading questions. This lesson is divided into two parts, both accessible below. By forcing her to contemplate daily the reality of sin and by leading her to question the harsh morality of Puritanism, the scarlet letter bestows upon her the emotional and intellectual depth that brings Boston’s troubled and perplexed to her door. Not only can she lend a sympathetic ear to the woes of her neighbors, particularly women, but she can also instill hope with a vision of a brighter future. The third passage shows how these emotional and intellectual qualities combine to make her, upon returning to her remote cottage, the community’s sought-after counselor and comforter. The isolation the letter imposes upon her gives her the critical perspective to liberate herself from the oppressive orthodoxy of Puritan New England and provides a hopeful, optimistic vision the transcends the grim theology of Boston’s magistrates and divines. The second illustrates how her punishment deepens her intellectual understanding. It allows her to sense moral weaknesses and failings beneath the outwardly unblemished virtue of her neighbors and teaches her that her sinfulness is not unique. The first illustrates how the wearing of the letter deepens Hester’s emotional understanding. ![]() It makes this case through a close reading of three brief passages. This lesson argues that the letter, meant to exclude her from the Puritan community, functions ironically as the agent of her inclusion. In light of all that, it is a challenge to say what the letter does for her. It isolates her from her neighbors it intensifies her guilt it kills her spirit, robs her of her beauty, subjects her to insult and ridicule, and inflicts deep pain and anguish. It is relatively easy to say what the “token of her shame” does to Hester. ![]() This lesson takes another tack: it explores not the letter’s meanings but rather an aspect of its function. When critics focus on the red A that Hester Prynne wears in The Scarlet Letter, they often concentrate on ferreting out the symbol’s complex and contradictory meanings. .9–10.4 (Meaning of words and phrases… figurative and connotative…)..9–10.3 (Analyze how complex characters develop…)..9–10.2 (Determine development of a theme over the course of a text…)..9–10.1 (Cite evidence to support explicit and inferential references). ![]()
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