#an unhinged (and maybe inaccurate) summary of the scarlet letter (I read it years ago I may misremember details)

[drewtanakagf]

sososo sad that the scarlet letter was written by a pretentious fuck (hawthorne). give that story to literally anyone else and all of a sudden its readable. Bc the plot? Is so fucking juicy the DRAMA!

Hester thinks her husband, roger is dead so she gets hot n heavy with the MINISTER, Arthur. And they get a kid out of it. Now bc this was puritan times that was still a big no no despite the fact that hester was like “roger’s dead, crab rave” and especially getting a kids outta it? she gets the scarlet letter “a” to stand for adultery. And then she’s shamed for it but also wont tell ppl that minister Arthur is the baby daddy. crazy? NAH! roger is ALIVE and ends up at the settlements WHILE Hester is on the scaffold while people are throwing metaphorical tomatoes at her and the head guy is like "tell us who the father is!" and roger makes it his life mission to find out who hester had this kid with, so he's like maury but its a 10000x more personal.

okay? Now, seven years later hester has dedicated her life to humility and community and being a good Puritan woman. But Arthur this whole time is like “oh, this is so bad I feel so guilty im a pussy coward etc etc" 'kay? Roger WHO STILL HASN'T TOLD ANYONE HE'S HESTER'S HUSBAND is still around being a physician, and he's narrowed down his hunt to Arthur bc Arthur is this wet-looking nervous guy that does the equivalent of "Hester? oh no I never met Hester before" each time someone talks about her. so Roger like knows this guy is that father. Arthur's got that disposition to him and he's like weighed down by guilt bc he's a man of God and whatever and sex is a sin and other bc. All this guilt manifests in sickness and his boss is like "Yo, man. Please go see the physician you look like you're about to die" and Arthur tries to "no I'm fine *literally passes out*" his way out of it, but the main religion guy is like . "You're seeing this guy no matter what." and this physician is obviously ROGER who literally wants to strangle him but Arthur doesn't know that Roger knows that he and hester fucked and that the kid is his. So Roger is like "oh you suck" but Arthur is so snively and pathetic Roger changes his mind to be like "ohhh, yeah no existing is punishment enough. my bad g"

THEN Arthur fucking DIES!?!?! but not before standing before the ENTIRE settlement and doing a dramatic-ass monologue and ripping his shirt open to reveal an "A" burned into his chest. like. that is so much more interesting than suffering through that book. this is the only modern adaptation I want but I want it done by an experimental theater troop based in NYC aka correctly.