What’s Up With the Ending?

But everything’s been going so well! Hester and her daughter Pearl can, at long last, escape the iron gaze and judgy ways of Massachusetts Bay colonists. In fact, they’ve been able to put an entire ocean between themselves and those stern Puritans. They live lavishly in England. The End.

But that’s not the end. Hester Prynne returns to the community that shunned her for so long. She goes back to her little cottage on the outskirts of town. She starts wearing the scarlet letter again. And all because she loves Arthur Dimmesdale. Too much of Hester’s life remains in Boston; it’s as though she can only find peace in returning to the Puritan society. The scarlet letter seems to have become part of Hester’s identity, and she cannot feel free without it.

The novel leaves us with a final picture of Hester and Arthur’s gravestone. They have been buried near one another (but not directly next to each other). A motto carved on the headstone they share ensures that their punishment follows them even into death: "on a field, sable, the letter A, gules."

This motto is a verbal representation of the scarlet letter ("sable" means black and "gules" means reddish). We could interpret this persistent A as a tragic final image. However, the fact that Hester and Dimmesdale can be buried near each other suggests that the community has, in many ways, forgiven them for their adultery. Even after death, the legend of their love continues.