Contents.Publication The Pump House Gang was published on the same day in 1968 as, Wolfe's story about the -fueled adventures of and the. They were Wolfe's first books since in 1965 which, like The Pump House Gang, was a collection of Wolfe's non-fiction essays.Though both books were well received and would go on to become best-sellers, of the two The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test was heralded as an instant classic and would become the better-known of the two books. Writing All but two of the stories in the book were written in 1965 and 1966, during the ten months after the publication of The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby. During this period Wolfe spent extensive time with many of his subjects, including, the founder of (whom Wolfe famously compared to );, a stripper who helped popularize breast-implants; and the surfers of the pump house.Other subjects Wolfe profiles in the book include actress, the, then-, the visionary media-theorist and various of New York. The essays collectively tell the story of the new status symbols and lifestyles of the 1960s and how the culture was changing from the traditional social hierarchies of the time. The success of the book cemented Wolfe as one of his generation's most prominent social critics.
Style The stories in The Pump House Gang are written in the style of that Wolfe and other writers like and helped to popularize. According to 's review of Wolfe's book:He uses a language that explodes with comic-book words like 'POW!' His sentences are shot with ellipses, stabbed with exclamation points, or bombarded with long lists of brand names and anatomical terms.
He is irritating, but he did develop a new journalistic idiom that has brought relief from standard Middle-High Journalese.Wolfe's style was simultaneously mocked and widely imitated. In 1990 the interviewed many of the surfers who had been involved with the pump house gang. Some of the surfers claimed that Wolfe took liberties with the facts to embellish and mythologize the lifestyle of the surfers.
Other members of the pump house gang believe Wolfe's characterizations were correct. Contents The Pump House Gang contains 15 stories:. The Pump House Gang. The Mid-Atlantic Man. King of the Status Dropouts. The Put-Together Girl.
The Noonday Underground. The Shockkkkkk of Recognition. The Hair Boys. What if He Is Right?. Bob and Spike.
Tom Wolfe's New Book of Etiquette. The Life & Hard Times of a Teenage London Society Girl. The Private Game. The Automated Hotel. The Mild Ones. O Rotten Gotham—Sliding Down into the Behavioral SinkReferences. Archived from on 2007-10-11.
Retrieved 2007-06-11. ^ C.D.B. Bryan (1968-08-18). Retrieved 2007-06-11.
Retrieved 2007-06-11. ^. Retrieved 2007-06-11.
Wolfe, Tom. 'The Pump House Gang,' Introduction. Green, Penelope (16 February 2017).
New York Times. ^ John M. Glionna (1990-11-25).
'An Era Revisited; 25 Years Ago, Tom Wolfe Immortalized a Group of Teens from Windansea Beach in 'The Pump House Gang'; Now, Some of the Gang Recall It With Mixed Feelings'.
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel HawthorneThe Project Gutenberg EBook of The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel HawthorneThis eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and withalmost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away orre-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License includedwith this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.netTitle: The Scarlet LetterAuthor: Nathaniel HawthorneIllustrator: Mary Hallock FooteL. IpsenRelease Date: May 5, 2008 EBook #25344Language: EnglishCharacter set encoding: ISO-8859-1. START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SCARLET LETTER.Produced by Markus Brenner, Irma Spehar and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at (Thisfile was produced from images generously made availableby The Internet Archive/American Libraries.). Uch to the author's surprise, and (ifhe may say so without additionaloffence) considerably to his amusement,he finds that his sketch of officiallife, introductory to The ScarletLetter, has created an unprecedented excitement inthe respectable community immediately around him.It could hardly have been more violent, indeed, hadhe burned down the Custom-House, and quenched itslast smoking ember in the blood of a certain venerablepersonage, against whom he is supposed to cherish apeculiar malevolence. As the public disapprobationwould weigh very heavily on him, were he consciousof deserving it, the author begs leave to say, that hehas carefully read over the introductory pages, with apurpose to alter or expunge whatever might be foundamiss, and to make the best reparation in his powerfor the atrocities of which he has been adjudged guilty.But it appears to him, that the only remarkable featuresof the sketch are its frank and genuine good-humor,and the general accuracy with which he hasconveyed his sincere impressions of the characterstherein described. As to enmity, or ill-feeling of anykind, personal or political, he utterly disclaims suchmotives.
The sketch might, perhaps, have been whollyomitted, without loss to the public, or detriment tothe book; but, having undertaken to write it, he conceivesthat it could not have been done in a better ora kindlier spirit, nor, so far as his abilities availed, witha livelier effect of truth.The author is constrained, therefore, to republish hisintroductory sketch without the change of a word.Salem, March 30, 1850. PageThe Custom House.—IntroductoryTHE SCARLET LETTER.The Prison-DoorThe Market-PlaceThe RecognitionThe InterviewHester at her NeedlePearlThe Governor's HallThe Elf-Child and the MinisterThe LeechThe Leech and his PatientThe Interior of a HeartThe Minister's VigilAnother View of HesterHester and the PhysicianHester and PearlA Forest WalkThe Pastor and his ParishionerA Flood of SunshineThe Child at the Brook-sideThe Minister in a MazeThe New England HolidayThe ProcessionThe Revelation of the Scarlet LetterConclusion. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.Drawn by Mary Hallock Foote and Engraved by A. V. S. Theornamental head-pieces are by L. S. Ipsen.PageThe Custom-HouseThe Prison DoorVignette,—Wild RoseThe Gossips“ Standing on the Miserable Eminence”“ She was led back to Prison”“ The Eyes of the wrinkled Scholar glowed”The Lonesome DwellingLonely FootstepsVignetteA touch of Pearl's baby-handVignetteThe Governor's Breastplate“ Look thou to it! I will not lose the child!”The Minister and LeechThe Leech and his PatientThe Virgins of the Church“ They stood in the noon of that strange splendor”Hester in the House of MourningMandrake“ He gathered herbs here and there”Pearl on the Sea-Shore“ Wilt thou yet forgive me?”A Gleam of SunshineThe Child at the Brook-SideChillingworth,—“Smile with a sinister meaning”New England Worthies“ Shall we not meet again?”Hester's Return. T is a little remarkable, that—though disinclinedto talk overmuch of myself and my affairsat the fireside, and to my personal friends—anautobiographical impulse should twice in my lifehave taken possession of me, in addressing thepublic.
The first time was three or four yearssince, when I favored the reader—inexcusably, and for noearthly reason, that either the indulgent reader or the intrusiveauthor could imagine—with a description of my way of life inthe deep quietude of an Old Manse. And now—because, beyondmy deserts, I was happy enough to find a listener or twoon the former occasion—I again seize the public by the button,and talk of my three years' experience in a Custom-House. Theexample of the famous “P. P., Clerk of this Parish,” was nevermore faithfully followed. The truth seems to be, however, that,when he casts his leaves forth upon the wind, the author addresses,not the many who will fling aside his volume, or nevertake it up, but the few who will understand him, better thanmost of his schoolmates or lifemates. Some authors, indeed, dofar more than this, and indulge themselves in such confidentialdepths of revelation as could fittingly be addressed, only andexclusively, to the one heart and mind of perfect sympathy; asif the printed book, thrown at large on the wide world, werecertain to find out the divided segment of the writer's ownnature, and complete his circle of existence by bringing himinto communion with it.
It is scarcely decorous, however, tospeak all, even where we speak impersonally. But, as thoughtsare frozen and utterance benumbed, unless the speaker stand insome true relation with his audience, it may be pardonable toimagine that a friend, a kind and apprehensive, though not theclosest friend, is listening to our talk; and then, a native reservebeing thawed by this genial consciousness, we may prateof the circumstances that lie around us, and even of ourself,but still keep the inmost Me behind its veil. To this extent,and within these limits, an author, methinks, may be autobiographical,without violating either the reader's rights or hisown.It will be seen, likewise, that this Custom-House sketch hasa certain propriety, of a kind always recognized in literature, asexplaining how a large portion of the following pages came intomy possession, and as offering proofs of the authenticity of anarrative therein contained. This, in fact,—a desire to putmyself in my true position as editor, or very little more, of themost prolix among the tales that make up my volume,—this,and no other, is my true reason for assuming a personal relationwith the public.
At the time of writing this article the author intended to publish, along with“The Scarlet Letter,” several shorter tales and sketches. A throng of bearded men,in sad-colored garments, andgray, steeple-crowned hats, intermixedwith women, somewearing hoods and othersbareheaded, was assembled infront of a wooden edifice, thedoor of which was heavilytimbered with oak, and studdedwith iron spikes.The founders of a new colony,whatever Utopia of human virtue and happiness they mightoriginally project, have invariably recognized it among their earliestpractical necessities to allot a portion of the virgin soil as acemetery, and another portion as the site of a prison.
In accordancewith this rule, it may safely be assumed that the forefathersof Boston had built the first prison-house somewhere in the vicinityof Cornhill, almost as seasonably as they marked out the first burial-ground,on Isaac Johnson's lot, and round about his grave, whichsubsequently became the nucleus of all the congregated sepulchresin the old churchyard of King's Chapel. Certain it is, that,some fifteen or twenty years after the settlement of the town, thewooden jail was already marked with weather-stains and otherindications of age, which gave a yet darker aspect to its beetle-browedand gloomy front. The rust on the ponderous iron-workof its oaken door looked more antique than anything else in theNew World. Like all that pertains to crime, it seemed never tohave known a youthful era. Before this ugly edifice, and betweenit and the wheel-track of the street, was a grass-plot, much overgrownwith burdock, pigweed, apple-peru, and such unsightlyvegetation, which evidently found something congenial in the soilthat had so early borne the black flower of civilized society, aprison. He grass-plot before the jail, in Prison Lane,on a certain summer morning, not less thantwo centuries ago, was occupied by a prettylarge number of the inhabitants of Boston;all with their eyes intently fastened on theiron-clamped oaken door.
Amongst anyother population, or at a later period in the history of New England,the grim rigidity that petrified the bearded physiognomiesof these good people would have augured some awful businessin hand. It could have betokened nothing short of the anticipatedexecution of some noted culprit, on whom the sentenceof a legal tribunal had but confirmed the verdict of public sentiment.But, in that early severity of the Puritan character, aninference of this kind could not so indubitably be drawn. Itmight be that a sluggish bond-servant, or an undutiful child,whom his parents had given over to the civil authority, was tobe corrected at the whipping-post. It might be, that an Antinomian,a Quaker, or other heterodox religionist was to bescourged out of the town, or an idle and vagrant Indian, whomthe white man's fire-water had made riotous about the streets,was to be driven with stripes into the shadow of the forest.
Itmight be, too, that a witch, like old Mistress Hibbins, thebitter-tempered widow of the magistrate, was to die upon thegallows. In either case, there was very much the same solemnityof demeanor on the part of the spectators; as befitted apeople amongst whom religion and law were almost identical,and in whose character both were so thoroughly interfused, thatthe mildest and the severest acts of public discipline were alikemade venerable and awful. Meagre, indeed, and cold was thesympathy that a transgressor might look for, from such bystanders,at the scaffold. “What do we talk of marks andbrands, whether on the bodice of hergown, or the flesh of her forehead?” cried another female, theugliest as well as the most pitiless of these self-constituted judges.“This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die.Is there not law for it? Truly, there is, both in the Scriptureand the statute-book. Then let the magistrates, who havemade it of no effect, thank themselves if their own wives anddaughters go astray!”“Mercy on us, goodwife,” exclaimed a man in the crowd,“is there no virtue in woman, save what springs from a wholesomefear of the gallows? That is the hardest word yet!Hush, now, gossips!
For the lock is turning in the prison-door,and here comes Mistress Prynne herself.”The door of the jail being flung open from within, thereappeared, in the first place, like a black shadow emerging intosunshine, the grim and grisly presence of the town-beadle, witha sword by his side, and his staff of office in his hand. Thispersonage prefigured and represented in his aspect the wholedismal severity of the Puritanic code of law, which it was hisbusiness to administer in its final and closest application to theoffender. Stretching forth the official staff in his left hand, helaid his right upon the shoulder of a young woman, whom hethus drew forward; until, on the threshold of the prison-door,she repelled him, by an action marked with natural dignity andforce of character, and stepped into the open air, as if by herown free will. She bore in her arms a child, a baby of somethree months old, who winked and turned aside its little facefrom the too vivid light of day; because its existence, heretofore,had brought it acquainted only with the gray twilight ofa dungeon, or other darksome apartment of the prison.When the young woman—the mother of this child—stoodfully revealed before the crowd, it seemed to be her first impulseto clasp the infant closely to her bosom; not so much byan impulse of motherly affection, as that she might thereby conceala certain token, which was wrought or fastened into herdress. In a moment, however, wisely judging that one token ofher shame would but poorly serve to hide another, she took thebaby on her arm, and, with a burning blush, and yet a haughtysmile, and a glance that would not be abashed, looked aroundat her towns-people and neighbors. On the breast of her gown,in fine red cloth, surrounded with an elaborate embroidery andfantastic flourishes of gold-thread, appeared the letter A. It wasso artistically done, and with so much fertility and gorgeousluxuriance of fancy, that it had all the effect of a last and fittingdecoration to the apparel which she wore; and which was ofa splendor in accordance with the taste of the age, but greatlybeyond what was allowed by the sumptuary regulations of thecolony.The young woman was tall, with a figure of perfect eleganceon a large scale.
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She had dark and abundant hair, so glossythat it threw off the sunshine with a gleam, and a face which,besides being beautiful from regularity of feature and richnessof complexion, had the impressiveness belonging to a markedbrow and deep black eyes. She was lady-like, too, after themanner of the feminine gentility of those days; characterized bya certain state and dignity, rather than by the delicate, evanescent,and indescribable grace, which is now recognized as itsindication.
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And never had Hester Prynne appeared more lady-like,in the antique interpretation of the term, than as she issuedfrom the prison. Those who had before known her, and hadexpected to behold her dimmed and obscured by a disastrouscloud, were astonished, and even startled, to perceive how herbeauty shone out, and made a halo of the misfortune and ignominyin which she was enveloped. It may be true, that, to asensitive observer, there was something exquisitely painful in it.Her attire, which, indeed, she had wrought for the occasion, inprison, and had modelled much after her own fancy, seemed toexpress the attitude of her spirit, the desperate recklessness ofher mood, by its wild and picturesque peculiarity. But the pointwhich drew all eyes, and, as it were, transfigured the wearer,—sothat both men and women, who had been familiarly acquaintedwith Hester Prynne, were now impressed as if they beheld herfor the first time,—was that Scarlet Letter, so fantasticallyembroidered and illuminated upon her bosom. It had the effectof a spell, taking her out of the ordinary relations with humanity,and enclosing her in a sphere by herself.“She hath good skill at her needle, that's certain,” remarkedone of her female spectators; “but did ever a woman, beforethis brazen hussy, contrive such a way of showing it!
Why,gossips, what is it but to laugh in the faces of our godly magistrates,and make a pride out of what they, worthy gentlemen,meant for a punishment?”“It were well,” muttered the most iron-visaged of the olddames, “if we stripped Madam Hester's rich gown off herdainty shoulders; and as for the red letter, which she hathstitched so curiously, I'll bestow a rag of mine own rheumaticflannel, to make a fitter one!”“O, peace, neighbors, peace!” whispered their youngest companion;“do not let her hear you! Not a stitch in thatembroidered letter but she has felt it in her heart.”The grim beadle now made a gesture with his staff.“Make way, good people, make way, in the King's name!”cried he. “Open a passage; and, I promise ye, Mistress Prynneshall be set where man, woman, and child may have a fair sightof her brave apparel, from this time till an hour past meridian.A blessing on the righteous Colony of the Massachusetts, whereiniquity is dragged out into the sunshine! Come along, MadamHester, and show your scarlet letter in the market-place!”A lane was forthwith opened through the crowd of spectators.Preceded by the beadle, and attended by an irregular processionof stern-browed men and unkindly visaged women, Hester Prynneset forth towards the place appointed for her punishment. Acrowd of eager and curious school-boys, understanding little ofthe matter in hand, except that it gave them a half-holiday, ranbefore her progress, turning their heads continually to stare intoher fa.