Revelation of the Scarlet Letter, from Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter"

Revelation of the Scarlet Letter, from Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter"

Felix Octavius Carr Darley

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Darley here illustrates Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter, A Romance" (published 1850). The drawing was reproduced in 1879 as the first print in a set of twelve "Compositions in Outline." Set in seventeenth-century Boston, the story explores the consequences of a liason between Hester Prynne and the Puritan pastor Arthur Dimmesdale. When Hester becomes pregnant, she refuses to identify her child's father, is imprisoned, and forced to wear a red letter "A" on her dress (to mark her as an adultress). After release, she lives in an isolated cottage, supports herself as a seamstress, and raises her daughter Pearl. This image responds to the tale's climactic ending where Dimmesdale collapses after making a public confession. Before dying, he reveals a scarlet letter of his own–a red mark that has appeared on the skin of his chest. Lines from Hawthorne's text, inscribed below the image, are addressed by the pastor to Hester's revengeful husband, who kneels at left. See 14.111.2–.5 for other drawings from the set.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Revelation of the Scarlet Letter, from Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter"Revelation of the Scarlet Letter, from Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter"Revelation of the Scarlet Letter, from Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter"Revelation of the Scarlet Letter, from Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter"Revelation of the Scarlet Letter, from Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter"

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.