Frequently called the first American classic, and the only American classic never to be out of print, The Scarlet Letter has been indelibly marked on the American consciousness since Nathaniel Hawthorne published it in 1850. Generations have grown up with its characters and their profound struggle against each other, their community, and themselves. Since the earliest days of film, The Scarlet Letter has been re-presented to each of those generations in a series of diverse cinematic adaptations, providing audiences with an opportunity to re-evaluate those characters, their struggle, and the lessons implicit in them. This dissertation surveys those films in order to produce a production history—one that extends beyond the production details and critical reception to consider how the lessons of The Scarlet Letter have been made to contribute to the cultural conversations of the American twentieth century. Following Chapter One's presentation of the method and intent of the study, in Chapter Two I consider the most enduring film in this novel's cinematic tradition, Victor Sjostrom's 1926 production starring Lillian Gish. In Chapter Three I examine Robert Vignola's 1934 ' B ' movie version in the context of Depression-era sexual politics. In Chapter Four, I unearth two live television plays that come to terms very differently with the Red Scare and the social retrenchment of Eisenhower's America. Chapter Five also presents a comparison of two very different but contemporaneous Scarlet Letters, one an eccentric feature from Wim Wenders (1972) , and the other a prestigious PBS miniseries (1979 ) . Finally, in Chapter Six I examine the 1995 Demi Moore vehicle in the context of the Family Values debates. By identifying the specific re-presentation strategies as rhetorically motivated, and linking them with the most salient social debates of their times, I argue for the ideological flexibility of the novel as a key to its endurance. I also demonstrate the effectiveness of film study, and specifically of a film adaptation production history focusing on one novel, as a tool for understanding emerging cultural attitudes and values.

Frequently called the first American classic, and the only American classic never to be out of print, The Scarlet Letter has been indelibly marked on the American consciousness since Nathaniel Hawthorne published it in 1850. Generations have grown up with its characters and their profound struggle against each other, their community, and themselves. Since the earliest days of film, The Scarlet Letter has been re-presented to each of those generations in a series of diverse cinematic adaptations, providing audiences with an opportunity to re-evaluate those characters, their struggle, and the lessons implicit in them. This dissertation surveys those films in order to produce a production history—one that extends beyond the production details and critical reception to consider how the lessons of The Scarlet Letter have been made to contribute to the cultural conversations of the American twentieth century. Following Chapter One's presentation of the method and intent of the study, in Chapter Two I consider the most enduring film in this novel's cinematic tradition, Victor Sjostrom's 1926 production starring Lillian Gish. In Chapter Three I examine Robert Vignola's 1934 ' B ' movie version in the context of Depression-era sexual politics. In Chapter Four, I unearth two live television plays that come to terms very differently with the Red Scare and the social retrenchment of Eisenhower's America. Chapter Five also presents a comparison of two very different but contemporaneous Scarlet Letters, one an eccentric feature from Wim Wenders (1972) , and the other a prestigious PBS miniseries (1979 ) . Finally, in Chapter Six I examine the 1995 Demi Moore vehicle in the context of the Family Values debates. By identifying the specific re-presentation strategies as rhetorically motivated, and linking them with the most salient social debates of their times, I argue for the ideological flexibility of the novel as a key to its endurance. I also demonstrate the effectiveness of film study, and specifically of a film adaptation production history focusing on one novel, as a tool for understanding emerging cultural attitudes and values. / Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies / Graduate

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In Hawthorne criticism there is a tendency to categorize The Scarlet Letter as allegory and then fail to distinguish it carefully from traditional forms of this literary mode. Hawthorne is not, in this work, an allegorist of the same ilk as Bunyan or Spenser because his allegory is not a didactic strategy imposed from without but an emblematic structure that evolves from and is governed by internal necessities of the tale. A failure to understand the nature of these necessities leads us to an overly theologized view of Hawthorne’s purposes and achievement in The Scarlet Letter. Hawthorne's own moralizing editorials tend to complement the brazenly emblematic function of characters such as Pearl and Chillingworth and create the appearance of traditional religious allegory. Pearl and Chillingworth are punitive, avenging figures and resemble the stock allegorical images of guilt and penitence that afflict Hester and Dimmesdale in the aftermath of their crime. Their distinction lies in that they are not everyman's guilt, as a Bunyan of Spenser might depict them, but they specifically incarnate the self-torment Hester and Dimmesdale are prey to. Their roles fulfill primarily a psycho-allegorical scheme rather than any patently Christian parable of sin and expiation. The clues to this psychological priority Hawthorne gives his allegory are contained in the author's frequent allusions to the "mutability" of the substantial world and the extent to which the perturbed perceiver may "extend his egotism over the whole expanse of nature", creating events and omens which reflect his internal disorder. There is evidence that Dimmesdale himself inflicts Chillingworth on his person just as he, miraculously or otherwise, carves an "A" upon his bosom. It is Dimmesdale who consents to being attended by the leech by reason of his "fascination" for this man of science with his probing intellectuality. Dimmesdale's culpability in creating the presence of Chillingworth is further underlined by Hawthorne's observation that the minister's only "real existence on this earth, was the anguish in his inmost soul." Chillingworth's appearance and the increasingly demonic nature of his character is thus an inevitable byproduct of Dimmesdale's increasing introversion into the turmoil of his mind. Similarly Pearl's emblematic being usurps the humanity of her character as a result of her direct relation to Hester's psyche. Hester dresses Pearl in lavish finery with "morbid purpose" just as she embellishes the appearance of the letter on her dress. These are the superficial clues to the extent to which Hester creates the punishing role Pearl's personality fulfills. Hester's sense of guilt, like Dimmesdale's is sufficiently severe to re-create the realities of the external world and create the embodied phantoms of her inward strife. Hawthorne's psychological allegory creates a state of surreality in the world of The Scarlet Letter; a dream state where "the Actual and the Imaginary" do meet and the meeting ground is the interior of the human heart. Our insight into the minds of Hester and Dimmesdale derives from our participation in their anguished distortion of experience and their projected allegory. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

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This essay seeks to explore the various representations of fatherhood in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. Although The Scarlet Letter is Hawthorne’s most-studied text, very little critical attention has been paid to Hawthorne’s rendering of paternity in the story. This essay attempts to fill that void by examining the roles of the many father figures in the novel. I argue that Hawthorne’s anxiety about fatherhood, made manifest by his constant doubling and expunging of father figures, dominates the narratives of both The Scarlet Letter and “The Custom-House,” binding the texts together and providing the framework of the novel. The structure of The Scarlet Letter relies on Hawthorne’s continual introduction of potential fathers for Pearl, auditioning and discarding various paternal models – a process that carries implications both for Pearl, and for American fatherhood. I further contend that the figure of the absent father is a key thematic component of the American Renaissance as a whole, reflecting not only the authors’ personal fears, but also their anxieties about England’s paternal relationship to America – a concern that pervades the text of The Scarlet Letter. / text

<p>As Catherine Clément argues in her 1979 publication "L'Opéra ou la Défaite des Femmes" most female operatic characters befall a tragic ending: death, suicide, madness, murder. Building on Clément and observations of more recent feminist scholars (Carol Gilligan, Susan McClary, Marcia Citron), and on the compositional work of Paula Kimper and others, the current project strives to problematize opera's dominant paradigm, and to use my artistic work as a composer to present a different one. With a dearth of stories that highlight the relationship between a mother and a daughter, I have sought to create an artistic work with strong female leads featuring women whose lives carry on and, even, thrive. It was a propitious opportunity to have been approached by conductor Sara Jobin and feminist theorist and author Carol Gilligan (under the auspices of A Different Voice Opera Project) to develop such an opera based upon Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter". What better way to break free from a paradigm than to do so with a popular and well-loved novel? The present artistic foray seeks thus to depart from an accepted paradigm while remaining within the bounds of something fundamentally familiar and popular. In a separately available essay "Gender and Music: A Survey of Critical Study, 1988-2012", I explored a wide survey of scholarship on gender. </p><p>The feminist reinterpretation of "The Scarlet Letter" was first developed into a play, "The Scarlet Letter", work-shopped and staged at Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, MA, the Culture Project in New York City, the National Players, and the Primary Stage Theatre. It was ripe for development into a libretto for operatic presentation by a Different Voice Opera Project. As the selected composer, I began a long collaboration with Sara Jobin, Carol Gilligan, and poet Jonathan Gilligan (co-author of the libretto). Pearl, the opera, was presented in workshop versions by A Different Voice Opera Project at Shakespeare and Company in Lenox, MA during the summers of 2012 and 2013. Subsequently, our collaborative efforts were expanded through the addition of Sandra Bernhard, a dramaturg and director for a community outreach program at the Houston Grand Opera. Through conversations with Sandra, the opera became more streamlined and I was able to give it a smoother dramatic flow. In particular, Sandra's advice informed much of the opera in terms of increasing the presence of the chorus to provide the medium through which Pearl understands her past. Musically, the chorus also becomes the third part of what I call "Dimmesdale's triangle of pressure" in which he is caught within a patriarchy and pulled by three separate forces: his love and family (Hester and Pearl), his responsibility as a minister (the townspeople represented by the Chorus), and a father figure and mentor (Reverend Wilson). The present work, extensively revised during 2013-2015, grew out of these experiences.</p><p>In Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter", Pearl is a seven-year-old girl, born from the love affair of Hester Prynne and minister, Arthur Dimmesdale. The pregnancy of Hester immediately places her upon dangerous footing with her only preservation being silence. She is required to permanently wear a scarlet A upon her chest, whereas the minister, Dimmesdale, hides his identity as the father of the child both for himself and for the protection of his lover and child, also through silence. In the times of Puritan New England during the 17th century, a crime such as adultery (a term that is never mentioned in Hawthorne's novel) would have been punishable by death. Needless to say, the ability of Pearl and others to speak the truth within this story becomes much too perilous for the characters to voice. The silence surrounding the life of this little girl is the focus behind the development of our main character for the opera: Pearl as a grown adult, thus making this opera a sequel, of sorts, to "The Scarlet Letter". As quoted in Gilligan's 2003 publication, "The Birth of Pleasure": "At turning points in psychic life and also in cultural history - and I believe we are at one now - it is possible to hear with particular clarity the tension between a first-person voice, an "I" who speaks from human emotional experience, and a voice that overrides what we know and feel and experience, that tells us what we should see and feel know." </p><p>Pearl as a grown woman, reflects back upon her life as a child where she is both the main character and the narrator of the story, often breaking the fourth wall. In this sense, this opera is reminiscent of the term "memory play"; a term coined by Tennessee about his work, "The Glass Menagerie". In the opening of his play, Tom, the main character, begins with: </p><p>The play is memory. Being a memory play, it is dimly lighted, it is sentimental, it is not realistic. In memory everything seems to happen to music. That explains the fiddle in the wings. I am the narrator of the play, and also a character in it. </p><p>With the creation of Pearl, a new character, the opera is able to integrate the relationships that do not exist within Hawthorne's novel, providing the libretto fertile material through which to explore Carol Gilligan's psychological theories . (See page vi, Note 2). We now see the story through the lens of Pearl as she remembers her childhood with highlights upon her relationships with her mother (Hester Prynne), her father (Arthur Dimmesdale), her mother's husband (Roger Chillingworth, née Roger Prynne), the townspeople, her father's mentor, Reverend Wilson, and herself as a child, allowing for the creation of duets, trios, and ensembles to highlight these relationships. The most notable of these relationships is the one between Adult Pearl and her child self, Child Pearl. In this way, and reminiscent of Williams' "memory play", Pearl's memories and current life can now be juxtaposed, together in time, memorialized through the music that binds these events and memories together.</p><p>In life we can experience our past through memory. In film we can be provided with visual flashbacks to offer a retrospective. However, it is only within music where the relationship between two eras of self can be juxtaposed. Thus, the gambit of my opera is to find musical means where the audience may now experience the character of Pearl as a child, as an adult, and as both child and adult in duet, as an echo, as a memory, a reflection. This phenomenon is most effectively evoked within opera or musical theatre. While a libretto must fundamentally be created using fewer words than say a novel or a play - it takes longer to sing a line than it would to speak it - it falls to music to express that which cannot be extrapolated through words alone. This dilemma creates a most wonderful opportunity for music to soar with tension and emotion. It is the music that can bridge together certain characters and scenes through the creation of themes that represent (in the case of this opera) truth/honesty, a patriarchy, and love, among other themes as well as the representation of particular characters. The necessity for the score to embellish the drama through music's tools: melody, harmony, motivic development and orchestration, essentially enables the audience to draw closer to the story and the characters by means that only music can provide.</p><p>In creating Pearl, it was my hope to birth the first of many such operas that shift one operatic paradigm on its head. To create an opera where the main characters are women and where they both have independent voices and thrive. As I have written elsewhere: "Some, throughout history, have argued that music has been exhausted. That everything that can be said, particularly within the Western language of tonality, has already been said. However, I must wonder, did any of the authors of such statements consider that the female voice has yet to really sing? For, we are just beginning. And I cannot wait to hear what `she' has to say."</p> / Dissertation

This study examines Hawthorne's use of symbols, particularly flowers, in The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables. Romantic ideals stressed the full development of the self¬reliant individual, and romantic writers such as Hawthorne believed the individual would fully develop not only spiritually, but also intellectually by taking instruction from the natural world. Hawthorne's heroines reach their full potential as independent women in two steps: they first work together to defeat powerful patriarchies, and they then learn to read natural symbols to cultivate their artistic sensibilities which lead them to a full development of their intellect and spirituality. The focus of this study is Hawthorne's narrative strategy; how the author uses symbols as a language his heroines use to communicate from one generation to the next. In The Scarlet Letter, for instance, the symbol of a rose connects three generations of feminine reformers, Ann Hutchinson, Hester Prynne, and Pearl. By the end of the novel, Pearl interprets a rose as a symbol of her maternal line, which links her back to Ann Hutchinson. Similarly in The House of the Seven Gables Alice, Hepzibah, and Phoebe Pyncheon are part of a family line of women who work together to overthrow the Pyncheon patriarchy. The youngest heroine, Phoebe, comes to an understanding of her great, great aunt Alice's message from the posies her feminine ancestor plants in the Pyncheon garden. Through Phoebe's interpretation of the flowers, she deciphers how the cultivation of a sense of artistic appreciation is essential to the progress of American culture.

Through a close study of Hawthorne's four major romances--The Scarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables, The Blithedale Romance, and The Marble Faun-—this thesis singles out all significant references to apparel or accessories and evaluates the use he makes of them.

This thesis examines the works of Nathaniel Hawthorne and the archetypal images therein. The Scarlet Letter is discussed extensively with references made to The Blithedale Romance. Characters in the following short stories are referred to: “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” “Young Goodman Brown” and “The Birthmark.” An overall analysis of feminine repression in both male and female characters is explored. Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, and Pearl are the subjects of lengthy discussion. Journeys, both inward and outward are explored in the characters. The context is nineteenth-century culture of which Hawthorne is a product. The characters in The Scarlet Letter search for a complete existence, an integration of the unconscious and the conscious. Through a mythological study of Hawthorne’s work, we draw closer to understanding this complex example of nineteenth-century literature.