The Scarlet Letter. New Critical Essays

The book is a collection of critical essays on Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter (1850). The interpretations deal with its main characters, «The Custom-House», the Spanish sailors, the Book of Revelations, and the artist as adulterer. The authors apply different critical tools such as allegory or hermeneutical exposition.

Autorentext

Janusz Semrau is Associate Professor of American literature at the University of Social Sciences (SAN) in Warsaw. He has authored several books and numerous papers on 19th- and 20th-century American literature.

Klappentext

This book is a collection of critical essays on Nathaniel Hawthorne s The Scarlet Letter (1850) one of the most influential American works of fiction. The presented interpretations deal not only with the principal characters of the novel, but also with «The Custom-House», the Spanish sailors, the Book of Revelations, and the artist as adulterer. The critical tools employed include allegory, the Biedermeier, hermeneutical exposition, semiosis of the infans, and triangular desire. This publication is dedicated to the memory of Andrzej Kopcewicz (1934-2007), the first professor ordinarius of American literature in the history of English studies in Poland, on the tenth anniversary of his death.

Inhalt

Joseph Kuhn The children of Pearl: The Scarlet Letter in the criticism and fiction of Henry James Marek Pary Resettlement, mobility and modernity in The Scarlet Letter Janusz Semrau From the Spanish Main to the Book of Revelation; or, Another view of Hester Pawel Stachura The Custom-House as a Biedermeier text Jørgen Veisland The artist as adulterer