Chapter 1 “The Prison Door”
1. What colony is the setting for the novel?
2. Where in the colony does the opening chapter take place?
3. For what 2 “practical necessities” did the new colony set aside land?
4. The story is set about ________years after the town was settled.
5. What is located outside, by the prison door? What does it symbolize?
Chapter 2 “The Market-Place”
1. Name 3 crimes and the punishments that the Puritans might witness.
2. What is the relationship between religion and law in Puritan New England?
3. Describe the Puritan women. Use one quote from the book to support your answer.
4. What punishments would the Puritan women have given Hester Prynne if it were left to them?
5. Who is Dimmesdale?
6. Describe the appearance of Hester Prynne.
7. What is Hester’s sin? Punishment?
8. What is astonishing about the “A” on her bodice? Why do the women criticize Hester’s scarlet
letter?
9. Why is Hester taken to the scaffold in the market-place?
10. What things does Hester think about while she is on the scaffold?
11. How old is her baby?
12. What detail is given to suggest the baby was born in jail?
13. Why does Hester’s infant to cry out when she is standing on the scaffold?
Chapter 3 “The Recognition”
1. Describer the man who is standing on the outskirts of the crowd.
2. What gesture does he make to Hester that suggests he knows her?
3. What does the stranger learn from the townsman next to him?
4. What is the usual punishment for adultery? Why is Hester’s punishment less severe?
5.
What do Bellingham and Wilson want Hester to do?
6. Describe Dimmesdale.
7.
What is his relationship to Hester? What does he ask her to reveal?
8.
Why won’t Hester name the child’s father?
Chapter 4 “The Interview”
1. How does Hester act when she returns to prison?
2. Why does the jailer call a doctor?
3. Where did the “doctor” learn his skill?
4. Quote 2 lines that indicate the doctor and Hester know each other before this meeting.
5. Why does Hester refuse to the medicine from the doctor?
6. Why does the doctor make Hester give the baby the medicine?
7. What is the relationship between the doctor and Hester?
8. Did Hester ever love her husband? Quote Hester to support your answer.
9. What does the doctor vow to do?
10. What secret does the doctor ask Hester to keep?
11. What is the doctor’s name?
12. What symbol is introduced for Chillingworth in Hester’s final lines in this chapter?
Chapter 5: “Hester at Her Needle”
1. What “general symbol” has Hester become?
2. Why doesn’t Hester leave the colony.
3. Describe Hester’s home.
4. What talent did Hester use to support herself and Pearl ?
5. What garments is Hester not allowed to sew?
6. Why type of dress did Hester wear? Pearl ?
7. What does Hester do that shows she has a charitable nature?
8. How did the poor, the ladies of Boston , the clergy, and the children treat Hester?
9. What did Hester do for her enemies?
10. What did Hester often hear when she entered a church?
11. What special knowledge does Hester feel the Scarlet Letter gives her?
Chapter 6: “ Pearl ”
1. Why did Hester name her child “ Pearl ” ?
2. Why did Hester have no faith that Pearl would be good?
3. What talent did Hester use to support herself and Pearl ?
4. Describe Pearl.
5. How would Pearl respond to the townspeople and children?
6. What was the first object of which Pearl seemed to become aware?
7. What did Pearl throw at her mother’s chest?
8. Who did Hester day sent Pearl? How did Pearl respond?
9. What did the townspeople say about Pearl ?
Chapter 7: “The Governor’s Hall”
1. Name 2 reasons Hester visits Governor Bellingham.
2. Pearl is said to be another form of _________________.
3. Why did the townspeople think Pearl should be taken from Hester?
4. Who attacks Pearl and Hester on their way to the governor’s house?
5. What did Pearl do?
6. What does Pearl see in the breastplate hanging on the wall?
7. Why was Pearl crying?
8. What quiets Pearl?
Chapter 8: “The Elf and the Minister”
1. Who are the other visitors at the Governor’s house?
2. How much time has elapsed since the opening scene?
3. What has happened to Dimmesdale’s health?
4. With what creatures of fantasy is Pearl continually compared?
5. Why does John Wilson question Pearl?
6. What is her response to Wilson’s question “who made thee”?
7. How has Rev. Dimmesdale changed since Hester’s public humiliation?
8. How has Chillingworth changed since Hester last saw him?
9. What does Dimmesdale do “whenever his particular nervous temperament was thrown into
agitation?”
10. Who pleads successfully for Hester to keep her child?
11. To which visitor does Pearl respond to lovingly? What does she do?
12. Who looked out the window at Hester and Pearl?
13. What does Mistress Hibbins ask Hester? How does Hester respond?
Chapter 9: “The Leech”
1. What new identity has Chillingworth assumed in Boston? Why is he successful?
2. To whom in the colony does Chillingworth attach himself as a medical advisor?
3.
Describe Dimmesdale’s health.
4. What gesture has become Dimmesdale’s habit?
5. What was depicted on the tapestries of Dimmesdale’s house?
6. What two opposing views do the townspeople hold about Roger Chillingworth?
Chapter 10: “The Leech and His Patient”
1. What “investigation” consumes Chillingworth?
2. Why did Chillingworth say the weeds grew on a grave?
3. What does Chillingworth believe is buried in Dimmesdale’s heart?
4. Who od Chillingworth and Dimmesdale see walking and skipping in the graveyard?
5. What does Pearl do on the tombstone?
6. What did Pearl do with the burrs she picked up?
7. What did Pearl do when she saw Dimmesdale?
8. Why would Dimmesdale live with guilt and not confess his sin openly?
9. What reaction does Pearl have to Chillingworth when she sees him with Rev. Dimmesdale?
10. What discovery does Chillingworth make when Dimmesdale “fell into a deep, deep slumber”?
Chapter 11: “The Interior of a Heart”
1. What effect does Reverend Dimmesdale’s guilt have upon his popularity in the colony?
2. What vision/dream does Dimmesdale have?
3. What practices does Dimmesdale begin as a result of his guilt?
Chapter 12: “The Minister’s Vigil”
1. What is a vigil?
2. Where does Dimmesdale hold his vigil?
3. What was on Dimmesdale’s chest?
4. What did Dimmesdale cry out during his vigil?
5. Who heard Dimmesdale’s cry?
6. Why are Hester and Pearl out at midnight ?
7. What does Dimmesdale ask Hester and Pearl to do?
8. What promise does Dimmesdale refuse to make to Pearl ?
9. What is in the sky?
10. What is miraculous about the meteor (what does it make)?
11. Who does Pearl point to?
12. What does Dimmesdale ask Hester? How does she respond?
13. What does the sexton find at the scaffold?
14. What does the sexton say to Dimmesdale?
15. What do the townspeople think the meteor stands for?
Chapter 13: “Another View of Hester”
1. How old is Pearl in this chapter?
2. How has Hester become more active in society?
3. How has the townspeople’s view changed toward Hester?
4. How has Hester’s appearance changed?
5. What do the townspeople say the letter A stands for now?
6. What does Hester resolve to do?
7. What was Chillingworth doing when Hester found him?
Chapter 14: “Hester and the Physician”
1. What does Chillingworth tell Hester the magistrate is considering doing? How does Hester
respond?
2. How has Roger Chillingworth changed in the past 7 years?
3. What does Hester want Chillingworth to do?
4. Why does Chillingworth refuse Hester’s request that he stop tormenting Dimmesdale?
5. What revelation is she going to make to Reverend Dimmesdale.?
Chapter 15: “Hester and Pearl ”
1. Read Hester’s description of Chillingworth carefully. How does she feel about him?
2. What was Pearl pretending to be?
3. What does she make and place on her chest?
4. What does Hester ask Pearl?
5. What connection does Pearl make concerning Dimmesdale?
6. What questions does Pearl ask her mother? Why does this trouble Hester?
7. What keeps Hester from explaining the meaning of the scarlet letter?
8. What reason does Hester give for wearing the scarlet letter?
Chapter 16: “A Forest Walk”
1. Where does Hester plan to meet Dimmesdale? Why?
2. Why does Pearl say the sunlight shines on her and not on Hester?
3. What does Pearl say to Hester bout the sunlight?
4. What story has Pearl heard about the “black man”?
5. What does Hester mean when she says, “Once in my life, I met the Black Man. This scarlet letter
is his mark.”?
6. Why does Pearl think the minister holds his hand over his heart? How is there symbolic truth in
what she says?
Chapter 17: “The Pastor and His Parishioner”
1. When Hester and Dimmesdale sat down, what did he ask her?
2. Hester follows up with the same question. How did he answer?
3. Where did Hester tell Dimmesdale he has an enemy?
4. What is Dimmesdale’s “secret poison his malignity, infecting all air about him?”
5. From what does Hester hope to save Dimmesdale by telling him the truth about Chillingworth?
5. Does Hester still love Dimmesdale? Use a quote to support your answer. Cite a page number.
6. What is Dimmesdale’s reaction to the truth?
7. How does Hester respond?
8. Does he forgive her?
9. What does Dimmesdale say about Chillingworth?
10. What future plans does Hester suggest to Dimmesdale as a way to escape Chillingworth?
Chapter 18: “A Flood of Sunshine”
1. What is Dimmesdale’s decision in response to Hester’s plea that they leave the colony?
2. What happens to Dimmesdale once he agrees to leave the colony?
3. What does Hester do that symbolizes putting the past behind them?
4. What else did Hester remove?
5. How is Hester transfigured
6. What happens to the forest?
7. What does the author say must always create sunshine?
8. What does Dimmesdale say about Pearl?
9. What happens with Pearl and the forest animals?
10. What did Pearl do with the flowers she picked in the forest?
Chapter 19: “The Child at the Brookside ”
1. What does Dimmesdale about how most children feel about him?
2. How many times does he say Pearl has been kind to him?
3. What is separating Pearl from Hester and Dimmesdale?
4. What does Dimmesdale do when Pearl looks at him?
5. What did Pearl point to?
6. What did Pearl start to do when Hester told her to leap across the brook?
7. What does Dimmesdale tell Hester to do?
8. What does Hester as Pearl to do? How does she respond?
9. What happens when Hester puts the letter back on her chest, and puts her hair back under the
cap?
10. How did Pearl respond?
11. How does Pearl respond when Hester tells her that Dimmesdale loves them?
12. How did Pearl react to Dimmesdale?
13. What did Dimmesdale do to try and make Pearl like him? How did Pearl respond?
14. What does Pearl wash off his kiss?
Chapter 20: “The Minister in a Maze”
1.
Where have Hester and Dimmesdale decided to go when they leave Boston ?
2. Why do they feel they have to leave the new world?
3. How is Hester acquainted with the ship’s captain? Why is this considered to be a good thing?
4. Why does Dimmesdale consider it fortunate that the ship is not to sail for 4 days?
5. How does Dimmesdale feel/react to the thought of running away with Hester and Pearl?
6. What does Dimmesdale want to do when he sees the church elder? The children?
7. What does Dimmesdale fear he has done?
8. What does Mistress Hibbins tell Dimmesdale she will do the next time he goes into the forest?
9. What does Dimmesdale tell Chillingworth?
10. What does Dimmedale do with the sermon he had previously written for Election Day
Chapter 21 “The New England Holiday ”
1. What question does Pearl ask Hester?
2. How does Hester respond to Pearl’s question?
3. What have the crowds of people gathered in the market-place to witness?
4. Who did Chillingworth enter the market-place talking to?
5. What piece of unwelcome news does the master of the ship on which, she, Pearl, and
Dimmesdale are to sail have for Hester?
6. What does Chillingworth do after Hester receives this news?
Chapter 22 “The Procession”
1. What is particularly noticeable about Dimmesdale’s manner as he walks in the procession?
2. When Hester sees Dimmesdale, how does she feel?
3. What does Pearl ask her mother after Dimmesdale passes them?
4. When Hester tells Pearl to be quiet, how does Pearl respond?
5. Who came and spoke to Hester? What did she talk to Hester about?
6. Who does Mistress Hibbins tell Pearl her father is?
7. Where does Hester stand during the procession and during Dimmesdale’s sermon in the church?
8. What is Pearl doing during the sermon?
9. What does the shipmaster throw to Pearl?
10. What message does the shipmaster ask Pearl to give her mother?
11. What does the shipmaster call Pearl, and how does she respond?
12. What is everyone doing to Hester at the end of this chapter?
Chapter 23 “The Revelation of the Scarlet Letter”
1. What did the townspeople say about Dimmesdale’s election sermon?
2. What was the subject of Dimmesdale’s sermon?
3. What do the people believe is going to happen to Dimmesdale?
4. How does Dimmesdale appear as he leaves the church after his triumphant sermon?
5. As Dimmesdale walked (tottered), who tried to help him?
6. Who did Dimmesdale see standing by the scaffold?
7. What did Dimmesdale say when he turned to the scaffold?
8. How does Pearl react when Dimmesdale calls Hester and herself to mount the scaffold with
him?
9. How does Hester react?
10. Who thrust himself forward? What was he trying to do?
11. What did Dimmesdale ask Hester? How did she respond?
12. What did Dimmesdale show everyone?
13. What did Dimmesdale say to Chillingworth?
14. What did Dimmesdale ask Pearl to do?
15. What did Hester ask Dimmesdale about eternity? How did he respond?
Chapter 24 “Conclusion”
1. What were some of the theories about where Dimmesdale’s “A” came from?
2. What happened to Chillingworth within a year?
3. What was in his last will and testament?
4. What happened to Pearl and Hester?
5. When the children were playing near the cottage, who did they see return? What was she
wearing?
6. Was Pearl with Hester? What is believed to have happened to Pearl?
7. Where was Hester buried?
8. What was on their gravestone?