Books

First edition, first issue. Boston: Ticknor, Reed and Fields, 1850. First edition, first issue. Octavo ( 7 1/8" x 4 3/8", 181mm x 112mm). [Full collation available.] With 4pp. advertisements, dated March 1, 1850. Bound in the publisher's brown ribbed cloth. Title, author and publisher gilt to spine. Yellow glazed end-papers. Presented in a quarter blue morocco slip-case with chemise. Text-block split at quire 14, connected by the lower cord. Spine attached only at front hinge. Wear to the front fore-corners. Head and tail worn. Some spotting to the binding. Internally quite clean, with the very occasional spot of foxing. Pencil ownership inscription of F. Quincy to the front paste-down. Occasional pencil side-lining. With a typed point-collation laid in. Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) brought out The Scarlet Letter, his second novel, some 23 years after his first attempt: Fanshawe. Immediately Hawthorne rose to the first rank of American romantic authors, with Herman Melville crowning him the best of the new generation; he would go on to dedicate Moby-Dick (1851) to him. Hester Prynne has become an icon of American letters. The first issue of the first edition was 2,500 copies, which sold wildly quickly. Some errors were corrected and others introduced in later issues. The present copy has, in addition to 4pp. advertisements dated March 1, 1850 (inserted between the front paste-down and the first free end-paper, as issued), all points of the first issue: A. p. 21, l. 20: "reduplicate" (second: "repudiate") A. p. 31, l. 7: "for a man" (second: "fora man") A. p. 41, l. 5: "characterss" A. p. 100, l. 2 "mortal interests" (third: "moral interests") A. p. 102, l. 22: "tobelieve" A. p. 143, ll. 23-24: "heaven-ordained" (third (on. p. 137) "heavenly-ordained") A. p. 189, l. 23: "said the physician" (second: "answered the physician"). BAL 7600, Clark A16.1, Grolier American 59.

The Scarlet Letter, published in 1850, is considered one of Nathaniel Hawthorne's most famous works. It is a historical romance set in the puritanical Massachusetts Bay Colony during the mid-17th century.