Scarlet Letter, inscribed by Sophia Hawthorne - photo 1
Scarlet Letter, inscribed by Sophia Hawthorne - photo 2
Scarlet Letter, inscribed by Sophia Hawthorne - photo 3

Scarlet Letter, inscribed by Sophia Hawthorne

Lot 93
15.06.2023 10:00UTC -05:00
Classic
Starting price
$ 10 000
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUSA, New York
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Archive
ID 967692
Lot 93 | Scarlet Letter, inscribed by Sophia Hawthorne
Estimate value
$ 10 000 – 15 000
Scarlet Letter, inscribed by Sophia Hawthorne

Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1850

HAWTHORNE, Nathaniel (1804-1864). The Scarlet Letter, a Romance. Boston: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, 1850.



The only known presentation copy of the first edition of The Scarlet Letter inscribed by Sophia Hawthorne. On the front endpaper she has written: "Theresa St. A. from her Friend Sophia Hawthorne." The recipient, Marianne Theresa St. Agnan (1805-1889), is said to have been “the intimate friend of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Margaret Fuller” (Amherst). Her friendship with Sophia likely dated to their years together in Salem in the 1820s and 30s.



Sophia Hawthorne played a vital role in furthering her husband’s literary career, befriending publisher James T. Fields and his wife Annie and copying his notebooks for publication. Hawthorne would praise his wife in 1862: “She is the most sensible woman I ever knew in my life, much superior to me in general talent, and of fine cultivation.” Also a talented artist, she illustrated Hawthorne's The Gentle Boy (1839). After completing The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel would report on Sophia’s response to its ending in a letter to Horatio Bridge on 4 February 1850: “It broke her heart and sent her to bed with a grievous headache—which I look upon as triumphant success” (CE 16:311). She considered the novel to be cautionary—she wrote to her sister Mary Mann a week later, “It is most powerful, & contains a moral as terrific & stunning as a thunder bolt. It shows that the Law cannot be broken” (CE 16:313n). When Hawthorne broke through with this book, Sophia wrote to her sister-in-law Louisa in May 1850, “Nathaniel’s fame is prodigious” (CE 16:338).



Marianne Theresa St. Agnan, born in 1805 in Trinidad Port of Spain, lived with her husband Richard S. Stearns in Salem, Massachusetts, in the 1820s and 30s, where she may have first met Nathaniel Hawthorne or Sophia Peabody. According to one account, she was later successful as a kindergarten teacher in Boston with the support of the Peabody sisters (Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, Sophia Hawthorne, and Mary Mann) (Harry Hudson Barrett, UMass Amherst). In later years, Marianne Theresa St. Agnan Stearns was a widow living in Malden, Massachusetts, with her son-in-law Henry Barrett and her daughter Lucy T. G. Barrett, whose name appear in pencil in the book. Also appearing is the name Henry Barrett Huntington, revealing that the book continued to descend in the family.



Sophia’s friendship with Marianne must have been special for her to give a presentation copy of a first edition of her husband’s greatest work—this volume is an enticing clue. This is the only first edition of The Scarlet Letter inscribed by Sophia that we have been able to trace, with no examples in the celebrated collections of Maier, Chamberlain, Arnold, Wakeman, Kern, Terry, Wilson, Hogan, Howe, et al. BAL 7600; Clark A16.1.



Octavo. Title-page printed in red and black; without publisher's ads (front hinge cracked, blank before title detached). Original cloth (worn, loss at spine ends); modern chemise and quarter morocco slipcase. Provenance: Marianne Theresa St. Agnan Stearns, 1805-1889 (inscription from Sophia Hawthorne; by descent to:) – Lucy T.G. Stearns Barrett, 1824-1916 (ownership inscription; by descent to:) – Henry Barrett Huntington, 1875-1965, professor of English (ownership inscription).

Artist:Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804 - 1864)
Auction house category:Printed books
Address of auction CHRISTIE'S
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