Hester Prynne

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Hester Prynne, the young protagonist of Nathaniel Hawthorne's novel The Scarlet Letter, is a woman condemned by her Puritan neighbors. In various film adaptations of the novel, she has been portrayed by actresses such as Lillian Gish, Meg Foster, and Demi Moore. In the TV Series Twin Peaks the name was also adopted as a pseudonym by the character Audrey Horne.

A resident of colonial America, Hester is sent ahead to the New World by her husband, who later assumes the name of Roger Chillingworth, as he has some business to finish before he can join her. After he is involved in a shipwreck and assumed dead, Hester continues to live her life as a seamstress in the town. She looks to the local pastor Arthur Dimmesdale for comfort, somewhere along the way passion emerges, culminating in the conception and subsequent birth of their child, Pearl. Due to the fact that Hester has no husband with her, she is imprisoned, convicted of the crime of adultery, and sentenced to be forced to wear a prominent scarlet letter 'A' for the rest of her life.

Though scorned by her fellow citizens, Hester continues to lead a relatively uneventful life. Shortly after the birth of the child and her punishment, Hester's husband reappears and compels her to tell him the name of the child's father. Hester refuses, but swears not to reveal the fact that Chillingworth is her husband to the town folk. Hester continues living her life as a seamstress, providing for herself and her child.