A Utah county attorney says he will not pursue criminal charges against this polygamous family made famous by a reality TV show. A federal judge is set to decide whether to allow a lawsuit to move forward that challenges the constitutionality of Utah's bigamy law. (AP Photo/TLC, Bryant Livingston, File)
For other uses, see Scarlet Letter (disambiguation). The Scarlet Letter: A Romance is an 1850 work of fiction in a historical setting, written by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne. The book is considered to be his masterwork.
The Scarlet Letter. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, many of the characters suffer from the tolls of sin, but none as horribly as Hester's daughter Pearl. She alone suffers from sin that is not her own, but rather that of her mother.