At the beginning of a long line of Great American Novels, there is The Scarlet Letter. It is the earliest in a group of publications that scholars of literature have deemed worthy of "The Great American Novel". Moby Dick, The Great Gatsby, The Grapes of Wrath, Invisible Man, Blood Meridian and American Pastoral are some of its successors. I don't think it's on the same level as some of these other novels, but it certainly helped put American literature on the map.
The Scarlet Letter takes us all the way back into the 1640s, when the colonization of America had just gotten underway. It’s set in a Puritan community, where a woman commits adultery with an unknown man and must face the social consequences of her actions. She births an impish child with the man, and her husband is dead set on finding and getting revenge on whoever it is that has wronged him.
The depth of character exploration in The Scarlet Letter is its greatest strength. Each chapter lets us venture inside the mind of one of its four main characters- Chillingworth, Hester Prynne, Pearl, and the minister- so that we may be shown their psychological dilemmas in brute form, whether they be the absolving of guilt, the seeking of forgiveness, or the desire for retribution and repentance for or against sinners, the community, and the church. Hawthorne shows us that while we may be wrong in our actions, mercy will be given to us after we’ve faced their consequences for long enough, and forgiveness is the greatest healer of wounds in our hearts. It seems pretty straight forward, but the iconic symbolism gives it some extra juice.
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