Plot Summary
In this brief preface, written for the second edition of The Scarlet Letter in March 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne responds to the public furor provoked by his introductory essay, "The Custom-House." He reports with a mixture of surprise and amusement that his sketch of official life in the Salem Custom-House has created "an unprecedented excitement in the respectable community immediately around him." He compares the intensity of the backlash to what might have occurred had he literally burned down the Custom-House and shed the blood of a prominent local figure against whom he supposedly bears ill will. Hawthorne states he has carefully reread his introductory pages with the intent of correcting any offenses, but ultimately concludes there is nothing to change. He finds only "frank and genuine good-humor" and faithful accuracy in his descriptions. He denies any personal or political enmity, and concedes that the sketch might have been omitted without harming the book, but insists it was written in the kindest spirit possible. In a final stroke of defiance, he declares he is "constrained" to republish the Custom-House introduction "without the change of a word."
Character Development
The only "character" in this preface is Hawthorne himself, appearing as a semi-autobiographical narrator. He presents himself as a reasonable, good-humored man bewildered by the ferocity of the public's reaction. His tone shifts between mock humility and quiet self-assurance: he "begs leave" to address the criticism yet refuses to alter a single word. This reveals a writer who is both diplomatically aware and artistically uncompromising. The passage also hints at unnamed antagonists—the "respectable community" and a "certain venerable personage"—whose outrage Hawthorne treats with dry wit rather than genuine concern.
Themes and Motifs
The preface touches on themes of public judgment versus private conscience, mirroring the novel’s central concern with how communities punish perceived transgressors. Hawthorne positions himself as a figure under communal censure, much as Hester Prynne will be throughout the novel. The motif of truth-telling and its consequences runs through the passage: Hawthorne insists his portrait was truthful, yet truth itself has provoked condemnation. There is also a quiet theme of artistic integrity—the refusal to revise honest work under social pressure—that anticipates the novel’s exploration of authenticity versus conformity.
Reading the preface alongside the novel reveals a deeper parallel: Hawthorne and Hester travel remarkably similar paths. Both were hemmed in, restricted, and unhappy while bound by the rigid expectations of their respective Puritan worlds—Hester condemned to wear her scarlet letter under the community’s unrelenting gaze, Hawthorne stifled by years of drudgery at the Custom-House, his creative gifts wasting under the dead weight of bureaucratic routine. Yet once freed from those constraints—Hester through her quiet perseverance and moral courage, Hawthorne through his dismissal from the customs post—both went on to richer and more purposeful lives, elevating not only themselves but those around them. Hester becomes a figure of compassion and wisdom in her community; Hawthorne, liberated to write, produced the masterwork that would enrich generations of readers. The preface, then, is not merely a reply to critics—it is the author’s quiet acknowledgment that, like his heroine, he emerged stronger for having been cast out.
Literary Devices
Hawthorne employs irony throughout: the preface that promises to address offense instead doubles down on it. His hyperbole—comparing community outrage to arson and bloodshed—satirizes the disproportionate reaction. The understated tone creates a contrast between his measured, polite language and the violence of the imagery he invokes. The closing line, declaring the sketch republished "without the change of a word," serves as a rhetorical climax that undercuts the preceding show of diplomatic concern. Hawthorne also uses self-referential narration, blurring the line between author and persona, a technique that continues into "The Custom-House" itself.