The Scarlet Letter – Activity List
You will be expected to read the book The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. You will be expected to
participate in weekly discussions, fill in reading log, take chapter/vocabulary quizzes, produce a final project and
take a final test.
You will be able to pick activities from the following list to make up your final project. Each activity is
listed under a point category and you can earn up to that many points for each activity. Each activity is graded
separately, and you could lose points on any item if it has errors in it. You will be able to choose how many points
you what to earn for your project. You might want to do enough items to score over 100 points to make up any
points you may have lost on any of the other items.
Grade Range 100-90 = A, 89-80 = B, 79-73= C, 72-70=D, 69-0=F
Please note that you may turn in project pieces individually or as a whole before the final due date, but that
projects will not be accepted LATE. All work will be graded on good writing expectations, neatness and completion
of required elements. Be sure to proofread all work turned in.
20 Points Activities (Be sure to write well-written thought out answers.)
1. Five paragraph essay - Choose one topic.
- The power struggle between Hester and the Puritan authorities.
- Compare/Contrast - Pearl and the Puritan children of Boston.
- Symbolism in the novel so far. What things seem to be symbolic of something else?
- Hester Prynne: Fit or Unfit Parent?
- Compare/Contrast - Chillingworth's outward actions with his true inner intentions.
2. Design a "scarlet letter" for yourself or some famous person. Draw a picture of what the letter would look like.
Explain what the letter would represent and the effect if would have on the person wearing it.
3. Write a journal entry of 150-200 words as if you were one of the people in the marketplace on the day Hester
Prynne stood on the scaffold with her baby. Explain how your reaction to her and the other people there.
4. Find 5 newspaper articles that remind you of something in the novel The Scarlet Letter. Cut out each article;
attach it to a sheet of paper. Then write a short summary of what the article is about and explain what the connection
is to the novel.
5. Write a Lyric Poem 10 lines or more.
6. Choose a character (Hester, Dimmesdale, Chillingworth, Pearl) Choose a scene from chapters 1-12. Find 3 pieces
of music that would show that character's state of mind at that point of the story. Play the music for the class and
explain.
7. Write a "Character Biography" for one of the important characters in the novel.
Character:
1. Physical description.
2. Best character traits/worst character traits.
3. How the character sees herself or himself.
4. Daydreams, fantasies, or ambitions.
5. Philosophy of life.
6. Darkest secret.
7. Fears and trepidations.
8. Scars and handicaps: emotional and physical.
9. What he or she would have in a bag or scrapbook.
10. Most important thing to know about this person.
8. Write a personal experience about a time when you wanted to tell the truth about something, but felt you couldn't.
9. Create an Alphabet book using words found in the book that are unknown to you. Each entry must include the
word, its meaning, at least one synonym, the sentence with the page number in which it is found in the book, and an
illustration.
Create a Bio-Poem. The novel The Scarlet Letter is filled with symbolism: the letter, a rose, weeds, and a pearl just
to name a few. Write a bio-poem about one of the main characters: Hester, Pearl, Dimmesdale, or Chillingworth,
and attach it to a symbol that is appropriate to his/her character. In at least one of the lines refer to some symbol in
the book that helps describe the personality, emotions, or actions of the character featured in your poem. Include 11
lines and follow this pattern:
Line 1: Your character’s first name
Line 2: Four words that describe your character
Line 3: Relative of...
Line 4: Lover of...(three ideas or people)
Line 5: Who feels...(three ideas)
Line 6: Who needs...(three ideas)
Line 7: Who gives...(three ideas)
Line 8: Who fears...(three ideas)
Line 9: Who would like to see...
Line 10: Resident of
Line 11: His or her last name
Sample Bio Poem
Scout
Tomboy, brave, intelligent, loving
Sister of Jem
Lover of justice, chewing gum, reading, and Alabama summers
Who feels outrage when her dad is maligned, happiness when school is over, and fright on a dark
Halloween night.
Who needs her dad's acceptance, Jem's loyalty, and Dill's admiration
Who gives friendship easily, black eyes to cousins, and sassy words to Calpurnia
Who fears Boo's dark house, owls in the night, and giving her open palms to the teacher
Who would like to see all mockingbirds sing freely whether they are creatures of flight, shy neighbors, or kind
handymen
Resident of Maycomb, Alabama
Finch
40 Points Activities (Be sure to write well-written thought out answers.) Assignments must be 200 words or
more, must be proofread, edited and typed. All research must include a correct bibliography and all material not
original to you must be cited correctly.
1. Reaction paper. "To the untrue man, the whole universe is false, –it is impalpable–it shrinks to nothing within his
grasp. And he himself, in so far as he shows himself in a false light, becomes a shadow, or, indeed, ceases to exits."
Chapter 11. Discuss this quotation in relationship to the novel, your opinion, and life in our society today.
2. Timeline. Create a timeline that you think would have been significant to the Puritan world, or the world of the
1600's in America. Explain.
3. Opinion paper. Exclusion as Punishment. Are people today shunned as punishment? Give specific examples.
Discuss why you think this takes place and what the result is for our society.
4. Compare/Contrast paper. Compare Hester's experiences as a single parent with a parent in a similar situation
today.
5. Research. Find an example from history of a person who went against the social beliefs of their society. Locate 2
sources for your information.
6. Research. Witchcraft beliefs in Puritan society. Summarize the information and explain how this information
connects to The Scarlet Letter. Use specific examples. Locate 2 sources for your information.
7. Research. The settlement of Puritans in America. Summarize the information and give examples of whether or not
Hawthorne made his novel historically correct. Locate 2 sources for your information.
8. Research. Medical care and doctors in early America. (1600-1750.) Locate 2 sources for your information.
9. Research. The life and significance of Ann Hutchinson in Puritan society. Locate 2 sources for your information.
Reading Log and Questions:
Chapters 1-3
1. Where, place and time does the action of the novel take place?
2. What is the irony found in Ch. 1 concerning the rose bush planted by the prison door?
3. Within the first three chapters, Hawthorne reveals the purpose of his writing of the novel; what is that
purpose? How does it relate to the theme he mentions in Ch. 1?
4. What is the image portrayed in the beginning of Ch. 2? Why is it portrayed so horrifically?
5. How does Hawthorne describe the Puritan character as shown by the women of the religious sect?
6. What is the attitude of the women of the community toward Hester and her “crime?”
7. Who is Hester’s pastor?
8. In a brief phrase, summarize your impressions of Hester as described in Ch. 2.
9. What is Hester’s “crime” what is her punishment?
10. To what religious icon is Hester with her babe likened in Ch. 2? Why is this ironic?
11. How does Hester respond to being put upon display on the pillory?
12. What question does Hester refuse to answer even at the urging of her pastor?
13. In Ch. 3, a white man accompanied by an Indian observes Hester as she stands o the pillory; who is this
man? Where has he been: why does Hester regard him with so much dread?
14. Why does Hester “get off” so lightly for her “crime?”
15. Who is the John Wilson? What does he try to get Hester to do?
16. Why do you think Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale says to Hester, “What can thy silence do for him, except it
tempt him---yea compel him, as it were --- to add hypocrisy to sin?”
17. The third chapter ends with a vivid description of the supernatural power of the scarlet letter. Why does it
seem to loom over all actions of the characters?
Chapters 4-5
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What is Hester’s state when she returns to her cell from her display on the pillory?
What made her child ill, “writh[ing] in convulsions of pain?”
Who is occupying the jail at the same time as Hester? Why?
To what profession does Roger Chillingworth “announce himself?”
When offered some relief by Chillingworth, what does Hester think he is trying to do to her and/or the
babe?
To what is Chillingworth alluding when he refers t “Lethe” and Nepenthe?”
Why does Chillingworth tell Hester that it is better that she live a long life?
Who does Chillingworth blame for Hester’s state? Why?
Explain what this quote by Chillingworth to Hester means, “…I drew thee into my heart, into its innermost
chamber, and sought to warm thee by the warmth which thy presence made there!”
Why does Chillingworth change his name? What is his real name?
What promise does Chillingworth elicit from Hester? Why?
Why does Hester not leave this village and escape the antipathy with which the Puritans regard her?
How does Hester make a living?
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Describe Hester’s home. What is unusual about it?
What is ironic about the ordering of extravagantly trimmed garments by the Puritans?
What one thing is never ordered from Hester? Why?
What does Hester do with money she earns form which she has little need?
For what does the Puritans pastor use Hester and her scarlet letter?
What supernatural heightening of the senses does wearing of the letter give Hester?
What allegorical figure might Chillingworth exemplify?
If we look at the scarlet letter as not only an abstract quality but as also color symbology, what does
Hawthorne think it represents?
Chapters 6-8
1. What is the name of Hester’s child? Describe her physical appearance and her personality.
2. From where does the child’s name come?
3. What is the significance of the manner in which Hester dresses the child?
4. Why does Hester look into the “child’s expanding nature?”
5. Analyze and explain this question: “The mother’s impassioned state had been the medium through which
were transmitted to the unborn infant the rays of its moral life; and however white and clear originally, they
had taken the deep stains of crimson and gold, the fiery luster, the black shadow, and the untempered light,
of the intervening substance.”
6. To what decision does Hester come in regards t the strict control of her child?
7. Why does Hester call the child “an airy sprite?”
8. What, based on Hawthorn’s description of the “little Puritans” can you make of Hawthorn’s opinion of the
Puritans?
9. When the child begins to notice the world about her, on what item of Hester’s clothing does she focus?
Why? What is the effect of the “baby hand?”
10. What image does Hester see in the child’s small visage, in “the small black mirror” of the child’s eyes?
11. When Hester tries to teach her child religious values, for example, asking her from where she comes and
who is her father, the child responds in what way? Why does she respond do strangely?
12. What is ironic about the manner of dress that Hester creates for the dominant Puritans?
13. What do the Puritans led by Bellingham propose to do about Hester and her child?
14. At times Hester dresses the child in the same manner in which she decorates the scarlet letter; why, and
what does this reveal about the power of the scarlet letter?
15. Why does Hawthorne devote four pages to describing Bellingham’s house?
16. Who has, since the first of the novel, become a good friend with The Reverend Mr. Arthur Dimmesdale?
17. How does the child respond to the questioning of Bellingham concerning her spiritual growth?
18. How does Hester respond to Bellingham’s proposal to take the child into a “Christian” home?
19. Who persuades Bellingham to leave the child with its mother? What argument does this person use?
20. What is inferred by the quotation, “Herein is the sinful mother happier that the sinful father?”
Chapters 7-10
1. Why does Hester visit Governor Bellingham’s mansion?
2. What reason does Hester give for her need to keep Pearl?
3. How does Pearl behave towards Dimmesdale in the Governor’s garden?
4. How does Roger Chillingworth come t be Dimmesdale’s personal physician
Chapters 11-13
1. How has Roger Chillingworth changed since Hester first knew him?
2. What does Chillingworth suggest if the cause of Dimmesdale’s suffering?
3. How does Pearl’s behavior in the cemetery express a link between Dimmesdale and Hester?
4. How does Chillingworth finally discover the cause of Dimmesdale’s suffering?
5. What reason is given for Dimmesdale’s ability to touch the souls of others?
6. What effect does public veneration have upon the Reverend Dimmesdale?
7. How does Dimmesdale seek penitence?
8. Describe Dimmesdale’s first vigil of the scaffold?
9. What meanings are given to the apparition in the sky?
10. What effect does the midnight vigil have on Hester?
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What is meant by “the minister’s vigil?”
What startles the governor in the middle of the night?
Who almost “catches Dimmesdale in an unusual place? What allows Dimmesdale to escape notice?
Who does discover Dimmesdale at his “vigil?” Of what significance is this scene?
With what question does Peal greet Dimmesdale? How does he respond?
What image does Dimmesdale see in the meteor’s appearance?
What is the significance of Chillingworth observing the scene with the tree characters on the scaffold?
Why does Hester not respond to Dimmesdale’s question concerning the identity of Chillingworth?
What is the significance of the “black glove?”
Based on what you have read to this pint, who is Pearl’s father?
What does Hester call the link between her and the minister?
How old is Pearl at this point in the novel? What possible significance could there be in this number?
Of what comfort has the scarlet letter become to those around Hester?
What irony is evident in the fact that the “A” stands for adultery and also for “Able?”
How do the villager’s attitudes change toward Hester and her scarlet letter over time?
What is evident in Hawthorn’s description of the nature of woman?
What is meant by this quotation: “The scarlet letter had not done its job?”
What does Hester determine to do concerning the promise given to Chillingworth about his identity? Why
does she change her mind?
Chapters 14-15
1. For what reason does Hester meet wit Chillingworth?
2. Why would Hester desire to keep the scarlet letter even against the wishes o the council?
3. The color symbology of Hester is red and gold; the color symbology of Roger Chillingworth is …?
4. What is the means for the tremendous change within Chillingworth?
5. Why does Hester seem to feel such a responsibility for the well begin of Dimmesdale?
6. What, according to Chillingworth, would be the punishment of Dimmesdale if Chillingworth gave him
away?
7. What is the actual punishment visited upon Dimmesdale by Chillingworth?
8. According to Chillingworth, Dimmesdale has caused him to be a fiend. Why and how?
9. Why do Chillingworth and Hester pity the other?
10. What is the significance of the “black flower” mentioned by Chillingworth?
11. How does Hester now feel about Chillingworth?
12. When Pearl makes for her own breast the letter “A,” what is the significance of the color?
13. What relationship, according to Pearl, do the scarlet letter on her mother’s breast and the minister’s hand on
his breast have?
14. How does Hester answer the child when asked what the meaning of the scarlet letter is? How is this
indicative of “some new evil?”
15. Why does Hester hesitate to meet with Dimmesdale in his study?
16. When does Pearl think she will receive her own “scarlet letter?”
17. Who and/or what is the “Black Man of the forest?”
Chapters 16-19
1. Once Hester has made the decision to tell Dimmesdale of Chillingworth’s identity, where do they meet so
that their privacy will be maintained? What is significant about this setting?
2. What is Pearl’s strange belief concerning the wearing of a scarlet letter?
3. Who and what is the “Black Man?” Why would he be found in the forest?
4. What is the “mark” of suffering that Hester notices about Dimmesdale?
5. How do the two former lovers greet each other?
6. Why has the young minister never confessed to his part in the adultery?
7. How does Hester still feel about Dimmesdale? How does he feel about her?
8. The juxtaposition of light and darkness in this episode is striking. What in your opinion is its purpose?
9. Of what does Hester feel great regret? Why?
10. How does Dimmesdale first greet Hester’s confession?
11. The former lovers try to overcome their great troubles by ______________?
12. What has been so terrible about Chillingworth’s revenge?
13. Dimmesdale seems to be a very weak man; why do you suppose Hester loves him so? What is the nature
of their love?
14. What is significance of the “sunshine” imagery?
15. Why is Hester unable to remove and destroy the scarlet letter?
16. What is Pearl’s reaction to the removal of the scarlet letter? Why do you think she reacts this way?
17. Water is often symbolic of new life, of salvation; what does it symbolize to Pearl?
18. How does Pearl respond to Dimmesdale’s expression of love? Why does she respond this way?
Chapter 20
1. Where and when do Hester, Dimmesdale plan to flee? Why are they going?
2. When a person lies to others often, Hawthorne says that sooner or later, the person does not know
_______?
3. What is the difference in how Dimmesdale looks upon the people of his parish before and after the meeting
with Hester?
4. What change does the Mistress Hibbons; notice in Dimmesdale?
5. In yielding himself to a dream of happiness, what has Dimmesdale done?
6. Why does Dimmesdale refuse and medications of Chillingworth?
Chapters 21-22
1. What holiday do the people of Boston Begin to celebrate at this point in the novel?
2. What is the significance of the talk between the commander of a Spanish vessel and Chillingworth?
3. What horrible fact does the commander of the vessel reveal to Hester?
4. Why does Hawthorne describe the procession of the Puritan magistrates so specifically?
5. How does Dimmesdale appear to Hester as he marches froth in the procession?
6. Of what does the mistress Hibbons warn Hester about concerning Dimmesdale?
7. What does Hester hear in Dimmesdale’s sermon?
8. What message is given to Pearl by the commander of the vessel to carry to Hester?
Chapters 23-24
1. How does the Dimmesdale’s audience respond to his “last” sermon? Why is there a “deep, sad undertone
of pathos?
2. Who does Dimmesdale find near the pillory when he leaves the church?
3. Why does the populace give such a shout at the end or the sermon?
4. What great change has come over Dimmesdale as he finishes the sermon?
5. When Dimmesdale invites Hester and Pearl to mount the pillory with him, how does Chillingworth react?
6. What has given Dimmesdale the power to confess now?
7. What does Dimmesdale (seemingly) reveal upon his own chest? What are the speculations concerning the
origin of the object appearing there?
8. What does Hester mean by the quotation, “Surely, surely, we have ransomed one another, with all this
woe?”
9. What thematic statement is revealed by the “Be true!” quotation?
10. What change does the confession have on the appearance of Chillingworth?
11. What happens to Chillingworth’s property when he dies?
12. What happens to Pearl in her later years?
13. How does this tragedy end for Hester Prynne?