The Scarlet Letter chapter 1-4 (pg. 45-74)

            In chapter 1 of the Scarlet letter, the narrator starts of describing a large group of men and women outside a wooden prison, waiting for the door to open. He adds that this particular prison was most likely built upon the founding of Boston and describes prisons as the "black flower of civilized society." Reading this part of the chapter some questions are going through my head. Why are there a crowd of men and women outside of the wooded prison? And what crime leads up to this scene? The narrator mentions a blooming wild rose bush next to the prison. He describes the rose bush as sitting on the threshold of the story he plans to tell. He then plucks one of the rose blossoms and offers it to the reader. He describes the gesture and the blossom as a symbol of the moral that the reader might learn in reading his "tale of human frailty and sorrow." (46)

            In chapter 2 the women in the crowd start gossiping, not a surprise, about Hester Prynne who everyone is waiting for to come out of the prison doors. Some say she deserves to get a harsher punishment than the one she received. One person even suggests death upon her for her sin. When reading this part I already felt sorry for Hester Prynne even before she was introduced in the novel. What did she do so wrong that people think that she should die? When Hester Prynne finally comes out of the prison door she is holding a three-month-old baby looking proud, radiant, and beautiful. On her chest Hester wears a scarlet letter “A,” affixed with beautiful embroidery that strikes some women in the crowd as inappropriate. I am proud of Hester Prynne for the way she handled herself after coming out of the prison. She showed to everyone that she could be composed and strong even in the most difficult of situations. I believe her punishment was fare because she has to stand up in the scaffold for hours and look at and angry crowd who judge her. While she is standing she realizes that her baby and the letter are reality.

            In chapter 3 Hester locks eyes with a man who stands out from every one else in the crowd. “When he found the eyes of Hester Prynne fastened on his own, and saw that she appeared to recognized him, he slowly and calmly raised his finger, made a gesture with it in the air, and laid it on his lips.” (58-59) When reading this passage, my first though was that this could possibly be the father of Hester’s baby. Something tells me it is more than that. What important role does he play in this story? One part of this chapter that makes me side with the crowd is when Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale, in front of the crowd asks Hester who she committed this adultery with. Hester refuses to tell who the father is. Like the crowd I really wanted to know. But then again the story won’t be as interesting if she told us right away.

            In chapter 4 Hester and her baby go back inside the prison and away from the disapproving crowd. The same man Hester recognized visits them posing to be a physician. From my reading he is not the father of the baby and is shockingly Hester Prynne’s husband, his name Roger Chillingworth. Why is he so eager to know the father of the baby? And why did he come back to town after many years without reveling his identity to anyone but Hester Prynne.