Hester Prynne, of Nathaniel Hawthornes The Scarlet Letter, and Margare

Hester Prynne, of Nathaniel Hawthornes The flushed Letter, and Margaret brimful, Themid-nineteenth-century Campaigner for the Rights of WomenEndowed in certain respects with the sensibility of Margaret Fuller, the huge campaigner for the rights of women, Hester Prynne is as much a woman of mid-nineteenth-century American culture as she is of seventeenth-century Puritan New England.Is this an accurate assessment of Nathaniel Hawthornes The Scarlet Letter?Margaret Fuller (1810-1850) was an author, critic, editor and teacher who possessed more influence on the thought of American women than any woman previous to her term 1. She contributed significantly to the American metempsychosis in literature and to mid-nineteenth century reform movements. A brilliant and highly educated member of the Transcendentalist group, she challenged Ralph Waldo Emerson both intellectually and emotionally. Women who attended her conversations and many men of her time found Fullers influence life-changin g. Her major work, Woman in the Nineteenth Century published in 1845, profoundly affected the womens rights movement which had its formal beginning at Seneca Falls, New York, three years later.Hester Prynne is the protagonist of Nathaniel Hawthornes romantic novel, The Scarlet Letter, which is set in seventeenth-century Puritan New England. As a young woman, Hester married an gray scholar, Roger Chillingworth, who sent her ahead to America to live but never followed. While waiting for him, she had an affair with a Puritan minister named Dimmesdale, after which she gave birth to Pearl. appoint guilty of adultery (through the absence of her husband and the birth of Pearl), Hester is punished by being forced to wear a scarlet lette... ...on, 19964 The Scarlet Letter, p.2635 Puritanism in Early America, edited by George M. Waller, p.66 The Scarlet Letter, p.537 Ibid. p.144-58 Ibid. p.1959 Ibid. p.16510 Ibid. p.8611 Ibid. p.26312 Charles Capper, in An American Romantic Life. p.ix.13 T he Scarlet Letter, p.165. 14 Ibid. p.26315 Ibid. p.26316 An American Romantic Life, p. xi17 The Scarlet Letter, p.9418 Ibid. p.26319 Ibid. p.26320 Margaret Fuller, Julia Ward Howe, 188921 The Scarlet Letter, p.11322 Ibid. p.117BibliographySusan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. History of Woman Suffrage, 1881Nathaniel Hawthorne. The Scarlet Letter, Oxford Worlds Classics, 1990The Concise Oxford Dictionary, Ninth Edition, 1996George M. Waller, (Ed). Puritanism in Early AmericaCharles Capper. An American Romantic LifeJulia Ward Howe. Margaret Fuller. 1889