Showing results by author "Nathaniel Hawthorne" in All Categories

The American Classics Collection is a century-spanning collection of 17 classic novels, short stories, essay, and poetry by American authors, read by a cast of incredible narrators including Kobna Holdbrook-Smith; Nathan Osgood; Robert G. Slade; Jonathan Keeble, and more. Included here are stories by some of the greatest writers of all time, including Ernest Hemingway; Mark Twain; F. Scott Fitzgerald; Edith Wharton; Frederick Douglass; and H.P. Lovecraft, amongst a host of others.

This gripping anthology gathers classic American short fiction where deception is an art, truth is perilous, and crime often wears a human smile. From a real-life axe murder on a lonely New England island to calculated impostures, whispered rumors, political terror, and crimes born of obsession, these stories explore the dangerous motives that surface when masks begin to slip.

Written in the winter of 1849, The Scarlet Letter unfolds the story of Hester Prynne, a young woman branded as an adulteress in the harsh Puritan world of 17th-century New England. As Hester calls on her inner strength to transcend her shame, the scarlet letter ceases to be a stigma and finally becomes Hester's symbol of self-affirmation. This dramatic reading heightens the sense of lyric poetry that permeates every line of Nathaniel Hawthorne's great novel.

One of the most important novels in classic literature, Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter tackles the subject of adultery, with the notorious Hester Prynne at the forefront of the scandal in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. In the beginning of the novel, Hester is serving time in prison for having a child out of wedlock and is forced to wear a scarlet A on her clothing at all times, so she cannot run from her sin no matter where she goes.

A communal experiment in living a utopian pastoral life is shared by lively, beautiful Zenobia, lovely, gentle Priscilla, their demanding leader Hollingsworth, and Miles Coverdale, but their dreams are interrupted by the realities of human imperfections.

The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s, magnum opus, tells the story of Hester Prynne, who gives birth two years after separation from her husband and is condemned to wear the scarlet letter A on her breast as punishment for her adultery. She resists all attempts of the 17th century Boston clergy to make her reveal the name of her child’s father while she struggles to create a new life of repentance and dignity.

Discover the timeless tale of love, sin, and redemption with "The Scarlet Letter: Adapted for Modern Readers." This refreshed edition presents Nathaniel Hawthorne's classic through a contemporary lens, featuring clean formatting, updated typography, and lightly clarified language. Perfect for today's audience, it offers an easier yet authentic reading experience, making Hawthorne's intricate prose and profound themes more accessible without losing the original's depth and nuance. Set against the rigid backdrop of 17th-century Puritan New England, this novel explores themes of guilt, ...

Set in the rigid world of Puritan New England, The Scarlet Letter is a haunting exploration of sin, identity, and the consequences of silence. Hester Prynne is an outcast. Forced to wear the scarlet "A" for adultery, she refuses to name her child's father. While she finds unexpected strength in her open shame, the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale rots from the inside with hidden guilt, and the malevolent Roger Chillingworth becomes consumed by revenge.

The red letter A on her dress marks young mother Hester Prynne among her Puritan neighbors, who demand to know who fathered her child. Rumors swirl, but the shunned and shamed Hester keeps her secret - and his - for years, until a guilt-ridden confession reveals the truth, with unexpected consequences.

In this allegorical short story, Nathaniel Hawthorne parodies John Bunyan’s famous book, The Pilgrim’s Progress. Rather than take the long and arduous road to the Celestial City, Hawthorne’s narrator hops on the express train to paradise. As he gets closer to his destination, however, he realizes that the clever-talking Mr. Smooth-It-Away may not be who he claims. While a caricature of Bunyan’s original tale, “The Celestial Railroad” ultimately drives home a similar point: there is no easy road to Heaven, so tough it out on the straight and narrow.

The Ultimate Classics Collection: Volume One is a continent-hopping, century-spanning collection of 15 essential classic novels by British, American, and Russian authors, read by a cast of incredible narrators including Stephen Fry, Jason Isaacs, Adjoa Andoh, David Rintoul, and many more.

How long would you walk, if the Devil sauntered up to you of an evening, and journeyed alongside of you? Young Goodman Brown is led by the Devil to a midnight ritual, where fire, blood, and water change his opinions of the nature of humanity.

Set in Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony during the years 1642 to 1649, the novel tells the story of Hester Prynne who conceives a daughter through an affair and then struggles to create a new life of repentance and dignity. Containing a number of religious and historic allusions, the book explores themes of legalism, sin, and guilt.

This powerful story of passion, adultery, honor, and repression caused a tremendous controversy in 1850 when it was published, because of its provocative subject matter. Set in Puritan New England, the novel begins with Hester Prynne, a young woman with an illegitimate baby daughter, leaving prison to face her scornful townsfolk. Forced to wear a scarlet letter "A" to remind people of her adultery, Hester obstinately holds her head high and refuses to reveal the father of her child.

The Scarlet Letter – published first in 1850, was in its time considered as an innovative and at the same time scandalous novel, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. This book was strongly disapproved by the fellow countrymen of the author and banned by the Russian tsars. The Scarlet Letter tells the story of Hester Prynne, who conceives a daughter through an affair and struggles to create a new life of repentance and dignity. For the Puritan Boston in the 17th century New England, this is a terrible violation of morality.

The Ultimate Classics Collection: Volume Two is the second instalment of our wide-ranging classic collections. Volume Two features 13 essential classic novels from Jane Austen; Edith Wharton; Leo Tolstoy; D.H. Lawrence, and many more, alongside selected poetry from Christina Rossetti; Elizabeth Browning; and Emily Dickinson. Read by a cast of incredible narrators including Joanne Froggatt, Adjoa Andoh, Jonathan Keeble, and many more, this is your new go-to collection to catch up on those classics you've always wanted to hear.

The Scarlet Letter is one of the great classics of American literature. Set in the harsh Puritan environment of 17th-century Boston, it describes the plight of Hester Prynne, an independent-minded woman who stands alone against society. Having given birth to a child after an illicit affair, she refuses to name the father and is forced to wear the letter "A", for Adulteress, embroidered on her dress.

A portrait of Colonel Pyncheon looms over his family in the house of the seven gables - an ominous reminder of the curse he left behind over a century ago. The shadow still falls over the New England mansion's current residents, siblings Clifford and Hepzibah - unless they can expose the one secret that offers an escape from the hex. Set in seventeenth- and nineteenth-century Massachusetts, Nathaniel Hawthorne's gothic tale was inspired by the Salem Witch Trials and by a family home that still stands today.

"To inherit a great fortune. To inherit a great misfortune." These words, from Nathaniel Hawthorne's notebook, neatly encapsulate the theme of The House of the Seven Gables - that of a family whose fortunes are poisoned by its past misdeeds. The sins of the Pyncheon father are visited upon his children over a period of several generations, until such time as one of his descendants unites with a member of the family he has wronged. Love conquers hate, and new blood washes away the original crime.

Ambientada en la Nueva Inglaterra de los puritanos del siglo XVII, La letra escarlata (1849) narra el terrible impacto que un simple acto de pasión desencadena en las vidas de tres miembros de la comunidad: Hester Prynne, una mujer de espíritu libre e independiente, objeto del escarnio público y condenada a llevar la «A» de «Adúltera»; el reverendo Dimmesdale, un alma atormentada por la culpa aunque digno de la estima general, y Chillingworth, un ser siniestro, cruel y vengativo, que maquina en la sombra.