Symbols
List two symbols from the book so far. What do you think these symbols mean?
"Thou hearest what this good man says, and seest the accountability under which I labor. If thou feelest it to be for thy soul’s peace, and that thy earthly punishment will thereby be more effectual to salvation, I charge thee to speak out the name of thy fellow-sinner and fellow-sufferer!”
Who is Dimmesdale?
The two secrets Hester keeps in the novel.
What is the name of her lover + the identity of Roger Chillingworth?
Somnambulism
What is sleepwalking?
Genre of the Scarlet Letter, according to Hawthorne.
What is a romance?
A magical quality that the Scarlet Letter is rumored to have.
What is "red-hot with infernal fire"/burning hot/etc? OR a few other answers are possible...
"A strange child! It is easy to see the mother's part in her. Would it be beyond a philosopher's research, think ye, gentlemen, to analyze that child's nature, and, from its make and mould, to give a shrewd guess at the father?"
Who is Roger Chillingworth?
List two reasons Hester stays in the colony after her public shaming.
Visage
What is a person's face?
Place where the narrator of the frame story works.
What is the Custom House?
What happens with the suit of armor at the Governor's Hall?
And for review: why is this significant? What might it represent?
Pearl and Hester see their reflections in the armor + the A is greatly exaggerated
"Thou art not my child! Thou art no Pearl of mine!... Tell me, then, what thou art, and who sent thee hither?"
Who is Hester?
Character who is known to be capricious, or given to caprice
Ignominy
What is public shame or disgrace?
Two things the narrator of the frame story finds at his place of work, inspiring him to write Hester Prynne's story.
What is the scarlet letter and an old manuscript?
What Pearl cries for at the Governor's hall.
To review: why do you think this is significant?
What is a red rose?
"What do we talk of marks and brands, whether on the bodice of her gown, or the flesh of her forehead? This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die."
Who is one of the women outside the prison-door?
What Dimmesdale laughs at while on the scaffold.
His imagination/the image that everyone in the neighborhood "would come stumbling over their thresholds" to find Dimmesdale standing on the scaffold
Contumaciously
What is stubbornly disobedient or rebellious?
Decade that Hester Prynne's story is set in
What are the 1640s?
What is the significance of the weeds that Chillingworth brings back from the graveyard and talks to Dimmesdale about?
Chillingworth says they "grew out of [the dead man's] heart" and "typify, it may be, some hideous secret that was buried with him." He wants Dimmesdale to confess
"Wilt thou go with us to-night? There will be merry company in the forest; and I wellnigh promised the Black Man that comely Hester Prynne should make one."
Who is Mistress Hibbins or the Governor's sister?
The names of the two characters who argue that Pearl should be taken away from Hester.
Who are Mr. Wilson and the Governor?
“In Mr. Dimmesdale's secret closet, under lock and key, there was a bloody _____."
What is a scourge?
Historical event that Hawthorne's family was involved with and that made him feel so guilty he changed his name.
What are the Salem Witch Trials?