Nathaniel Hawthorne
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Nathaniel Hawthorne ( Hathorne; July 4, 1804 – May 19, 1864) was an American novelist and short story writer. His works often focus on history, morality, and religion. He was born in 1804 in
Salem, Massachusetts Salem ( ) is a historic coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States, located on the North Shore (Massachusetts), North Shore of Greater Boston. Continuous settlement by Europeans began in 1626 with English colonists. Salem was one ...
, from a family long associated with that town. Hawthorne entered
Bowdoin College Bowdoin College ( ) is a Private college, private liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Brunswick, Maine. It was chartered in 1794. The main Bowdoin campus is located near Casco Bay and the Androscoggin River. In a ...
in 1821, was elected to
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in 1824, and graduated in 1825. He published his first work in 1828, the novel '' Fanshawe''; he later tried to suppress it, feeling that it was not equal to the standard of his later work. He published several short stories in periodicals, which he collected in 1837 as '' Twice-Told Tales''. The following year, he became engaged to Sophia Peabody. He worked at the Boston Custom House and joined Brook Farm, a transcendentalist community, before marrying Peabody in 1842. The couple moved to The Old Manse in
Concord, Massachusetts Concord () is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. In the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the town population was 18,491. The United States Census Bureau considers Concord part of Greater Boston. The town center is n ...
, later moving to Salem, the Berkshires, then to The Wayside in Concord. '' The Scarlet Letter'' was published in 1850, followed by a succession of other novels. A political appointment as consul took Hawthorne and family to Europe before their return to Concord in 1860. Hawthorne died on May 19, 1864. Much of Hawthorne's writing centers on
New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...
, and many works feature moral
metaphor A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another. It may provide, or obscure, clarity or identify hidden similarities between two different ideas. Metaphors are usually meant to cr ...
s with an anti-
Puritan The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to rid the Church of England of what they considered to be Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should b ...
inspiration. His fiction works are considered part of the
Romantic movement Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century. The purpose of the movement was to advocate for the importance of subjec ...
and, more specifically, dark romanticism. His themes often center on the inherent evil and sin of humanity, and his works often have moral messages and deep psychological complexity. His published works include novels, short stories, and a biography of his college friend
Franklin Pierce Franklin Pierce (November 23, 1804October 8, 1869) was the 14th president of the United States, serving from 1853 to 1857. A northern Democratic Party (United States), Democrat who believed that the Abolitionism in the United States, abolitio ...
, written for his 1852 campaign for
President of the United States The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president directs the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive branch of the Federal government of t ...
, which Pierce won, becoming the 14th president.


Biography


Early life

Nathaniel Hathorne, as his name was originally spelled, was born on July 4, 1804, in Salem, Massachusetts; his birthplace is preserved and open to the public. His great-great-great-grandfather, William Hathorne, was a
Puritan The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to rid the Church of England of what they considered to be Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should b ...
and the first of the family to emigrate from England. He settled in
Dorchester, Massachusetts Dorchester () is a Neighborhoods in Boston, neighborhood comprising more than in the city of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. Originally, Dorchester was a separate town, founded by Puritans who emigrated in 1630 from Dorchester, Dorset, E ...
, before moving to Salem. There he became an important member of the
Massachusetts Bay Colony The Massachusetts Bay Colony (1628–1691), more formally the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, was an English settlement on the east coast of North America around Massachusetts Bay, one of the several colonies later reorganized as the Province of M ...
and held many political positions, including magistrate and judge, becoming infamous for his harsh sentencing. William's son, Hawthorne's great-great-grandfather John Hathorne was one of the judges who oversaw the Salem witch trials. Hawthorne probably added the "w" to his surname in his early twenties, shortly after graduating from college, in an effort to dissociate himself from his notorious forebears. Hawthorne's father Nathaniel Hathorne Sr. was a sea captain who died in 1808 of yellow fever in Dutch Suriname; he had been a member of the East India Marine Society. After his death, his widow moved with young Nathaniel, his older sister Elizabeth, and their younger sister Louisa to live with relatives named the Mannings in Salem, where they lived for 10 years. Young Hawthorne was hit on the leg while playing "bat and ball" on November 10, 1813, and he became lame and bedridden for a year, though several physicians could find nothing wrong with him. In the summer of 1816, the family lived as boarders with farmers before moving to a home recently built specifically for them by Hawthorne's uncles Richard and Robert Manning in Raymond, Maine, near Sebago Lake. Years later, Hawthorne looked back at his time in Maine fondly: "Those were delightful days, for that part of the country was wild then, with only scattered clearings, and nine tenths of it primeval woods." In 1819, he was sent back to Salem for school and soon complained of homesickness and being too far from his mother and sisters. He distributed seven issues of ''The Spectator'' to his family in August and September 1820 for fun. The homemade newspaper was written by hand and included essays, poems, and news featuring the young author's adolescent humor. Hawthorne's uncle Robert Manning insisted that the boy attend college, despite Hawthorne's protests.Edwards, Herbert.
Nathaniel Hawthorne in Maine
", ''Downeast Magazine'', 1962
With the financial support of his uncle, Hawthorne was sent to
Bowdoin College Bowdoin College ( ) is a Private college, private liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Brunswick, Maine. It was chartered in 1794. The main Bowdoin campus is located near Casco Bay and the Androscoggin River. In a ...
in 1821, partly because of family connections in the area, and also because of its relatively inexpensive tuition rate. Hawthorne met future president
Franklin Pierce Franklin Pierce (November 23, 1804October 8, 1869) was the 14th president of the United States, serving from 1853 to 1857. A northern Democratic Party (United States), Democrat who believed that the Abolitionism in the United States, abolitio ...
on the way to Bowdoin, at the stage stop in Portland, and the two became fast friends. Once at the school, he also met future poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, future congressman Jonathan Cilley, and future naval reformer Horatio Bridge. He graduated with the class of 1825, and later described his college experience to Richard Henry Stoddard:


Early career

Hawthorne's first published work, ''Fanshawe: A Tale'', based on his experiences at Bowdoin College, appeared anonymously in October 1828, printed at the author's own expense of $100. Although it received generally positive reviews, it did not sell well. He published several minor pieces in the '' Salem Gazette''. In 1836, Hawthorne served as the editor of the '' American Magazine of Useful and Entertaining Knowledge''. At the time, he boarded with poet Thomas Green Fessenden on Hancock Street in Beacon Hill in
Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
. He was offered an appointment as weigher and gauger at the Boston Custom House at a salary of $1,500 a year, which he accepted on January 17, 1839. During his time there, he rented a room from George Stillman Hillard, business partner of
Charles Sumner Charles Sumner (January 6, 1811March 11, 1874) was an American lawyer and statesman who represented Massachusetts in the United States Senate from 1851 until his death in 1874. Before and during the American Civil War, he was a leading American ...
. Hawthorne wrote in the comparative obscurity of what he called his "owl's nest" in the family home. As he looked back on this period of his life, he wrote: "I have not lived, but only dreamed about living." He contributed short stories to various magazines and annuals, including " Young Goodman Brown" and " The Minister's Black Veil", though none drew major attention to him. Horatio Bridge offered to cover the risk of collecting these stories in the spring of 1837 into the volume '' Twice-Told Tales'', which made Hawthorne known locally.


Marriage and family

While at Bowdoin, Hawthorne wagered a bottle of Madeira wine with his friend Jonathan Cilley that Cilley would get married before Hawthorne did. By 1836, he had won the bet, but he did not remain a bachelor for life. He had public flirtations with Mary Silsbee and Elizabeth Peabody, then he began pursuing Peabody's sister, the illustrator and transcendentalist Sophia Peabody. He joined the transcendentalist
Utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia (book), Utopia'', which describes a fictiona ...
n community at Brook Farm in 1841, not because he agreed with the experiment but because it helped him save money to marry Sophia. He paid a $1,000 deposit and was put in charge of shoveling the hill of manure referred to as "the Gold Mine". He left later that year, though his Brook Farm adventure became an inspiration for his novel '' The Blithedale Romance''.McFarland, 149 Hawthorne married Sophia Peabody on July 9, 1842, at a ceremony in the Peabody parlor on West Street in Boston. The couple moved to The Old Manse in
Concord, Massachusetts Concord () is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. In the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the town population was 18,491. The United States Census Bureau considers Concord part of Greater Boston. The town center is n ...
, where they lived for three years. His neighbor
Ralph Waldo Emerson Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803April 27, 1882), who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, minister, abolitionism, abolitionist, and poet who led the Transcendentalism, Transcendentalist movement of th ...
invited him into his social circle, but Hawthorne was almost pathologically shy and stayed silent at gatherings. At the Old Manse, Hawthorne wrote most of the tales collected in '' Mosses from an Old Manse''. Like Hawthorne, Sophia was a reclusive person. Throughout her early life, she had frequent migraines and underwent several experimental medical treatments. She was mostly bedridden until her sister introduced her to Hawthorne, after which her headaches seem to have abated. The Hawthornes enjoyed a long and happy marriage. He referred to her as his "Dove" and wrote that she "is, in the strictest sense, my sole companion; and I need no other—there is no vacancy in my mind, any more than in my heart ... Thank God that I suffice for her boundless heart!" Sophia greatly admired her husband's work. She wrote in one of her journals:
I am always so dazzled and bewildered with the richness, the depth, the ... jewels of beauty in his productions that I am always looking forward to a second reading where I can ponder and muse and fully take in the miraculous wealth of thoughts.
Poet Ellery Channing came to the Old Manse for help on the first anniversary of the Hawthornes' marriage. A local teenager named Martha Hunt had drowned herself in the river and Hawthorne's boat ''Pond Lily'' was needed to find her body. Hawthorne helped recover the corpse, which he described as "a spectacle of such perfect horror ... She was the very image of death-agony". The incident later inspired a scene in his novel ''The Blithedale Romance''. The Hawthornes had three children. Their first was daughter Una, born March 3, 1844; her name was a reference to ''
The Faerie Queene ''The Faerie Queene'' is an English epic poem by Edmund Spenser. Books IIII were first published in 1590, then republished in 1596 together with books IVVI. ''The Faerie Queene'' is notable for its form: at over 36,000 lines and over 4,000 sta ...
'', to the displeasure of family members. Hawthorne wrote to a friend, "I find it a very sober and serious kind of happiness that springs from the birth of a child ... There is no escaping it any longer. I have business on earth now, and must look about me for the means of doing it." In October 1845, the Hawthornes moved to Salem.Reynolds, 10 In 1846, their son Julian was born. Hawthorne wrote to his sister Louisa on June 22, 1846: "A small troglodyte made his appearance here at ten minutes to six o'clock this morning, who claimed to be your nephew." Daughter
Rose A rose is either a woody perennial plant, perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred Rose species, species and Garden roses, tens of thousands of cultivar ...
was born in May 1851, and Hawthorne called her his "autumnal flower".


Middle years

In April 1846, Hawthorne was officially appointed the Surveyor for the District of Salem and Beverly and Inspector of the Revenue for the Port of Salem at an annual salary of $1,200. He had difficulty writing during this period, as he admitted to Longfellow:
I am trying to resume my pen ... Whenever I sit alone, or walk alone, I find myself dreaming about stories, as of old; but these forenoons in the Custom House undo all that the afternoons and evenings have done. I should be happier if I could write.
This employment, like his earlier appointment to the custom house in Boston, was vulnerable to the politics of the spoils system. Hawthorne was a Democrat and lost this job due to the change of administration in Washington after the presidential election of 1848. He wrote a letter of protest to the ''Boston Daily Advertiser'', which was attacked by the Whigs and supported by the Democrats, making Hawthorne's dismissal a much-talked about event in New England. He was deeply affected by the death of his mother in late July, calling it "the darkest hour I ever lived". He was appointed the corresponding secretary of the Salem Lyceum in 1848. Guests who came to speak that season included Emerson, Thoreau,
Louis Agassiz Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz ( ; ) FRS (For) FRSE (May 28, 1807 – December 14, 1873) was a Swiss-born American biologist and geologist who is recognized as a scholar of Earth's natural history. Spending his early life in Switzerland, he recei ...
, and Theodore Parker. Hawthorne returned to writing and published '' The Scarlet Letter'' in mid-March 1850, including a preface that refers to his three-year tenure in the Custom House and makes several allusions to local politicians—who did not appreciate their treatment. It was one of the first mass-produced books in America, selling 2,500 volumes within ten days and earning Hawthorne $1,500 over 14 years.McFarland, 136 The book became a best-seller in the United States and initiated his most lucrative period as a writer. Hawthorne's friend Edwin Percy Whipple objected to the novel's "morbid intensity" and its dense psychological details, writing that the book "is therefore apt to become, like Hawthorne, too painfully anatomical in his exhibition of them", while 20th-century writer D. H. Lawrence said that there could be no more perfect work of the American imagination than ''The Scarlet Letter''. Hawthorne and his family moved to a small red farmhouse near Lenox, Massachusetts, at the end of March 1850. He became friends with
Herman Melville Herman Melville (Name change, born Melvill; August 1, 1819 – September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, short story writer, and poet of the American Renaissance (literature), American Renaissance period. Among his best-known works ar ...
beginning on August 5, 1850, when the authors met at a picnic hosted by a mutual friend. Melville had just read Hawthorne's short story collection '' Mosses from an Old Manse'', and his unsigned review of the collection was printed in '' The Literary World'' on August 17 and August 24 titled "Hawthorne and His Mosses". Melville wrote that these stories revealed a dark side to Hawthorne, "shrouded in blackness, ten times black".Mellow, 335 He was composing his novel ''
Moby-Dick ''Moby-Dick; or, The Whale'' is an 1851 Epic (genre), epic novel by American writer Herman Melville. The book is centered on the sailor Ishmael (Moby-Dick), Ishmael's narrative of the maniacal quest of Captain Ahab, Ahab, captain of the whaler ...
'' at the time, and dedicated the work in 1851 to Hawthorne: "In token of my admiration for his genius, this book is inscribed to Nathaniel Hawthorne." Hawthorne's time in the Berkshires was very productive.Wright, John Hardy. ''Hawthorne's Haunts in New England''. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2008: 93. While there, he wrote ''
The House of the Seven Gables ''The House of the Seven Gables: A Romance'' is a Gothic fiction, Gothic novel written beginning in mid-1850 by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne and published in April 1851 by Ticknor and Fields of Boston. The novel follows a New England fam ...
'' (1851), which poet and critic James Russell Lowell said was better than ''The Scarlet Letter'' and called "the most valuable contribution to New England history that has been made." He also wrote '' The Blithedale Romance'' (1852), his only work written in the first person. He also published '' A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys'' in 1851, a collection of short stories retelling myths that he had been thinking about writing since 1846. Nevertheless, poet Ellery Channing reported that Hawthorne "has suffered much living in this place". The family enjoyed the scenery of the Berkshires, although Hawthorne did not enjoy the winters in their small house. They left on November 21, 1851. Hawthorne noted, "I am sick to death of Berkshire ... I have felt languid and dispirited, during almost my whole residence."


The Wayside and Europe

In May 1852, the Hawthornes returned to Concord where they lived until July 1853. In February, they bought The Hillside, a home previously inhabited by Amos Bronson Alcott and his family, and renamed it The Wayside. Their neighbors in Concord included Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. That year, Hawthorne wrote ''The Life of Franklin Pierce'', the campaign biography of his friend, which depicted him as "a man of peaceful pursuits".Miller, 381 Horace Mann said, "If he makes out Pierce to be a great man or a brave man, it will be the greatest work of fiction he ever wrote." In the biography, Hawthorne depicts Pierce as a statesman and soldier who had accomplished no great feats because of his need to make "little noise" and so "withdrew into the background". He also left out Pierce's drinking habits, despite rumors of his alcoholism, and emphasized Pierce's belief that slavery could not "be remedied by human contrivances" but would, over time, "vanish like a dream". With Pierce's election as President, Hawthorne was rewarded in 1853 with the position of United States
consul Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states thro ...
in
Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...
shortly after the publication of '' Tanglewood Tales''. The role was considered the most lucrative foreign service position at the time, described by Hawthorne's wife as "second in dignity to the Embassy in London". During this period he and his family lived in the Rock Park estate in Rock Ferry in one of the houses directly adjacent to Tranmere Beach on the Wirral shore of the River Mersey. Thus to attend his place of employment at the United States consulate in Liverpool, Hawthorne would have been a regular passenger on the steamboat operated Rock Ferry to Liverpool ferry service departing from the Rock Ferry Slipway at the end of Bedford Road. His appointment ended in 1857 at the close of the Pierce administration. The Hawthorne family toured France and Italy until 1860. During his time in Italy, the previously clean-shaven Hawthorne grew a bushy mustache. The family returned to The Wayside in 1860, and that year saw the publication of '' The Marble Faun'', his first new book in seven years. Hawthorne admitted that he had aged considerably, referring to himself as "wrinkled with time and trouble".


Later years and death

At the outset of the
American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861May 26, 1865; also known by Names of the American Civil War, other names) was a civil war in the United States between the Union (American Civil War), Union ("the North") and the Confederate States of A ...
, Hawthorne traveled with William D. Ticknor to Washington, D.C., where he met
Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States, serving from 1861 until Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, his assassination in 1865. He led the United States through the American Civil War ...
and other notable figures. He wrote about his experiences in the essay " Chiefly About War Matters" in 1862. Failing health prevented him from completing several more romance novels. Hawthorne was suffering from pain in his stomach and insisted on a recuperative trip with his friend Franklin Pierce, though his neighbor Bronson Alcott was concerned that Hawthorne was too ill. While on a tour of the White Mountains, he died in his sleep on May 19, 1864, in Plymouth, New Hampshire. Pierce sent a
telegram Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas pi ...
to Elizabeth Peabody asking her to inform Mrs. Hawthorne in person. Mrs. Hawthorne was too saddened by the news to handle the funeral arrangements herself. Hawthorne's son Julian, a freshman at
Harvard College Harvard College is the undergraduate education, undergraduate college of Harvard University, a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Part of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Scienc ...
, learned of his father's death the next day; coincidentally, he was initiated into the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity on the same day by being blindfolded and placed in a coffin. Longfellow wrote a tribute poem to Hawthorne published in 1866 called " The Bells of Lynn". Hawthorne was buried on what is now known as "Authors' Ridge" in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Concord,
Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...
. Pallbearers included Longfellow, Emerson, Alcott, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.,
James T. Fields James Thomas Fields (December 31, 1817 – April 24, 1881) was an American publisher, editor, and poet. His business, Ticknor and Fields, was a notable publishing house in 19th century Boston. Biography Early life and family He was born in ...
, and Edwin Percy Whipple. Emerson wrote of the funeral: "I thought there was a tragic element in the event, that might be more fully rendered—in the painful solitude of the man, which, I suppose, could no longer be endured, & he died of it." His wife Sophia and daughter Una were originally buried in England. However, in June 2006, they were reinterred in plots adjacent to Hawthorne.


Writings

Hawthorne had a particularly close relationship with his publishers William Ticknor and
James T. Fields James Thomas Fields (December 31, 1817 – April 24, 1881) was an American publisher, editor, and poet. His business, Ticknor and Fields, was a notable publishing house in 19th century Boston. Biography Early life and family He was born in ...
. Hawthorne once told Fields, "I care more for your good opinion than for that of a host of critics." In fact, it was Fields who convinced Hawthorne to turn ''The Scarlet Letter'' into a novel rather than a short story. Ticknor handled many of Hawthorne's personal matters, including the purchase of cigars, overseeing financial accounts, and even purchasing clothes. Ticknor died with Hawthorne at his side in Philadelphia in 1864; according to a friend, Hawthorne was left "apparently dazed".


Literary style and themes

Hawthorne's works belong to
romanticism Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century. The purpose of the movement was to advocate for the importance of subjec ...
or, more specifically, dark romanticism, cautionary tales that suggest that guilt, sin, and evil are the most inherent natural qualities of humanity. Many of his works are inspired by Puritan
New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...
, combining historical romance loaded with symbolism and deep psychological themes, bordering on surrealism. His depictions of the past are a version of historical fiction used only as a vehicle to express common themes of ancestral sin, guilt and retribution. His later writings also reflect his negative view of the Transcendentalism movement. Hawthorne was predominantly a short story writer in his early career. Upon publishing ''Twice-Told Tales'', however, he noted, "I do not think much of them," and he expected little response from the public. His four major romances were written between 1850 and 1860: '' The Scarlet Letter'' (1850), ''
The House of the Seven Gables ''The House of the Seven Gables: A Romance'' is a Gothic fiction, Gothic novel written beginning in mid-1850 by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne and published in April 1851 by Ticknor and Fields of Boston. The novel follows a New England fam ...
'' (1851), '' The Blithedale Romance'' (1852) and '' The Marble Faun'' (1860). Another novel-length romance, '' Fanshawe'', was published anonymously in 1828. Hawthorne defined a romance as being radically different from a novel by not being concerned with the possible or probable course of ordinary experience. In the preface to ''The House of the Seven Gables'', Hawthorne describes his romance-writing as using "atmospherical medium as to bring out or mellow the lights and deepen and enrich the shadows of the picture". The picture, Daniel Hoffman found, was one of "the primitive energies of fecundity and creation." Critics have applied feminist perspectives and historicist approaches to Hawthorne's depictions of women. Feminist scholars are interested particularly in Hester Prynne: they recognize that while she herself could not be the "destined prophetess" of the future, the "angel and apostle of the coming revelation" must nevertheless "be a woman."
Camille Paglia Camille Anna Paglia ( ; born April 2, 1947) is an American academic, social critic and Feminism, feminist. Paglia was a professor at the University of the Arts (Philadelphia), University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from 1984 until ...
saw Hester as mystical, "a wandering goddess still bearing the mark of her Asiatic origins ... moving serenely in the magic circle of her sexual nature". Lauren Berlant termed Hester "the citizen as woman ersonifyinglove as a quality of the body that contains the purest light of nature," her resulting "traitorous political theory" a "Female Symbolic" literalization of futile Puritan metaphors. Historicists view Hester as a protofeminist and avatar of the self-reliance and responsibility that led to women's suffrage and sometime-reproductive emancipation. Anthony Splendora found her literary genealogy among other archetypally fallen but redeemed women, both historic and mythic. As examples, he offers Psyche of ancient legend; Heloise of twelfth-century France's tragedy involving world-renowned philosopher Peter Abelard; Anne Hutchinson (America's first heretic, circa 1636), and Hawthorne family friend Margaret Fuller. In Hester's first appearance, Hawthorne likens her, "infant at her bosom", to Mary, Mother of Jesus, "the image of Divine Maternity". In her study of Victorian literature, in which such "galvanic outcasts" as Hester feature prominently, Nina Auerbach went so far as to name Hester's fall and subsequent redemption, "the novel's one unequivocally religious activity". Regarding Hester as a deity figure, Meredith A. Powers found in Hester's characterization "the earliest in American fiction that the archetypal Goddess appears quite graphically," like a Goddess "not the wife of traditional marriage, permanently subject to a male overlord"; Powers noted "her syncretism, her flexibility, her inherent ability to alter and so avoid the defeat of secondary status in a goal-oriented civilization". Aside from Hester Prynne, the model women of Hawthorne's other novels—from Ellen Langton of ''Fanshawe'' to Zenobia and Priscilla of ''The Blithedale Romance,'' Hilda and Miriam of ''The Marble Faun'' and Phoebe and Hepzibah of ''The House of the Seven Gables''—are more fully realized than his male characters, who merely orbit them. This observation is equally true of his short-stories, in which central females serve as allegorical figures: Rappaccini's beautiful but life-altering, garden-bound, daughter; almost-perfect Georgiana of " The Birth-Mark"; the sinned-against (abandoned) Ester of "Ethan Brand"; and
goodwife Goodwife ( Scots: ''Guidwife''), usually abbreviated Goody, was a polite form of address for women, formerly used as ''Mrs.'', ''Miss'' and ''Ms.'' are used today. Its male counterpart is Goodman. However, a woman addressed by this title was of ...
Faith Brown, linchpin of Young Goodman Brown's very belief in God. "My Faith is gone!" Brown exclaims in despair upon seeing his wife at the Witches' Sabbath. Perhaps the most sweeping statement of Hawthorne's impetus comes from Mark Van Doren: "Somewhere, if not in the New England of his time, Hawthorne unearthed the image of a goddess supreme in beauty and power." Hawthorne also wrote nonfiction. In 2008, the Library of America selected Hawthorne's "A show of wax-figures" for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American True Crime.


Critical reception

Hawthorne's writings were well received at the time. Contemporary response praised his sentimentality and moral purity while more modern evaluations focus on the dark psychological complexity. Herman Melville wrote a passionate review of ''Mosses from an Old Manse'', titled " Hawthorne and His Mosses", arguing that Hawthorne "is one of the new, and far better generation of your writers." Melville describes an affinity for Hawthorne that would only increase: "I feel that this Hawthorne has dropped germinous seeds into my soul. He expands and deepens down, the more I contemplate him; and further, and further, shoots his strong New-England roots into the hot soil of my Southern soul."
Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe (; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic who is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales involving mystery and the macabre. He is widely re ...
wrote important reviews of both ''Twice-Told Tales'' and ''Mosses from an Old Manse''. Poe's assessment was partly informed by his contempt for allegory and moral tales, and his chronic accusations of plagiarism, though he admitted:
The style of Mr. Hawthorne is purity itself. His tone is singularly effective—wild, plaintive, thoughtful, and in full accordance with his themes ... We look upon him as one of the few men of indisputable genius to whom our country has as yet given birth.
John Neal John Neal (August 25, 1793 – June 20, 1876) was an American writer, critic, editor, lecturer, and activist. Considered both eccentric and influential, he delivered speeches and published essays, novels, poems, and short stories between the 1 ...
's magazine '' The Yankee'' published the first substantial public praise of Hawthorne, saying in 1828 that the author of ''Fanshawe'' has a "fair prospect of future success."
Ralph Waldo Emerson Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803April 27, 1882), who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, minister, abolitionism, abolitionist, and poet who led the Transcendentalism, Transcendentalist movement of th ...
wrote, "Nathaniel Hawthorne's reputation as a writer is a very pleasing fact, because his writing is not good for anything, and this is a tribute to the man." Henry James praised Hawthorne, saying, "The fine thing in Hawthorne is that he cared for the deeper psychology, and that, in his way, he tried to become familiar with it." Poet John Greenleaf Whittier wrote that he admired the "weird and subtle beauty" in Hawthorne's tales. Evert Augustus Duyckinck said of Hawthorne, "Of the American writers destined to live, he is the most original, the one least indebted to foreign models or literary precedents of any kind." Beginning in the 1950s, critics have focused on symbolism and didacticism. The critic
Harold Bloom Harold Bloom (July 11, 1930 – October 14, 2019) was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was called "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking world". Af ...
wrote that only Henry James and
William Faulkner William Cuthbert Faulkner (; September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) was an American writer. He is best known for William Faulkner bibliography, his novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi, a stand-in fo ...
challenge Hawthorne's position as the greatest American novelist, although he admitted that he favored James as the greatest American novelist.Nathaniel Hawthorne by Harold Bloom p. xii Bloom saw Hawthorne's greatest works to be principally ''The Scarlet Letter'', followed by ''The Marble Faun'' and certain short stories, including "My Kinsman, Major Molineux", "Young Goodman Brown", "Wakefield", and "Feathertop".


Selected works

According to Hawthorne scholar Rita K. Gollin, the "definitive edition" of Hawthorne's works is ''The Centenary Edition of the Works of Nathaniel Hawthorne'', edited by William Charvat and others, published by The Ohio State University Press in twenty-three volumes between 1962 and 1997. ''Tales and Sketches'' (1982) was the second volume to be published in the Library of America, ''Collected Novels'' (1983) the tenth.


Novels

* '' Fanshawe'' (published anonymously, 1828)Publication info on books fro
Editor's Note
to ''The Scarlet Letter'' by Nathaniel Hawthorne; Page Books, accessed June 11, 2007.
* '' The Scarlet Letter, A Romance'' (1850) * '' The House of the Seven Gables, A Romance'' (1851) * '' The Blithedale Romance'' (1852) * '' The Marble Faun: Or, The Romance of Monte Beni'' (1860) (as ''Transformation: Or, The Romance of Monte Beni'', UK publication, same year) * ''The Dolliver Romance'' (1863) (unfinished) * ''Septimius Felton; or, the Elixir of Life'' (unfinished, published in the '' Atlantic Monthly'', 1872) * ''Doctor Grimshawe's Secret: A Romance'' (unfinished, with preface and notes by Julian Hawthorne, 1882)


Short story collections

* '' Twice-Told Tales'' (1837) * ''Legends of the Province House'' (1838–1839) * ''Grandfather's Chair'' (1840) * '' Mosses from an Old Manse'' (1846) * '' A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys'' (1851) * '' The Snow-Image, and Other Twice-Told Tales'' (1852) * '' Tanglewood Tales'' (1853) * ''The Dolliver Romance and Other Pieces'' (1876) * ''The Great Stone Face and Other Tales of the White Mountains'' (1889)


Selected short stories

* "
The Hollow of the Three Hills "The Hollow of the Three Hills" is a story published in 1830 by the American writer Nathaniel Hawthorne. It is considered to be his first published short story. The story is about a young woman who asks a fortune teller for information about the ...
" (1830) * " Roger Malvin's Burial" (1832) * " My Kinsman, Major Molineux" (1832) * " Young Goodman Brown" (1835) * " The Gray Champion" (1835) * "The White Old Maid" (1835) * "Wakefield" (1835) * " The Ambitious Guest" (1835) * " The Minister's Black Veil" (1836) * " The Man of Adamant" (1837) * " The May-Pole of Merry Mount" (1837) * " The Great Carbuncle" (1837) * " Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" (1837) * " A Virtuoso's Collection" (May 1842) * " The Birth-Mark" (March 1843) * " The Celestial Railroad" (1843) * " Egotism; or, The Bosom-Serpent" (1843) * "Earth's Holocaust" (1844) * " Rappaccini's Daughter" (1844) * " P.'s Correspondence" (1845) * " The Artist of the Beautiful" (1846) * "Fire Worship" (1846) * " Ethan Brand" (1850) * " The Great Stone Face" (1850) * " Feathertop" (1852)


Nonfiction

* ''Life of Franklin Pierce'' (1852) * ''Our Old Home: A Series of English Sketches'' (1863) * ''Passages from the English Note-Books'' (1870) * ''Passages from the French and Italian Note-Books'' (1871) * ''Passages from the American Note-Books'' (1879) * ''Twenty Days with Julian & Little Bunny, a Diary'' (written 1851, published 1904), an excerpt from ''Passages from the American Note-Books''.


See also

*
Gothic fiction Gothic fiction, sometimes referred to as Gothic horror (primarily in the 20th century), is a literary aesthetic of fear and haunting. The name of the genre is derived from the Renaissance era use of the word "gothic", as a pejorative to mean me ...
* Young America movement


References


Notes


Sources

* Auerbach, Nina, ''Woman and the Demon: The Life of a Victorian Myth'' (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press 1982) * Berlant, Lauren. ''The Anatomy of National Fantasy: Hawthorne, Utopia, and Everyday Life'' (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press 1991) * Cheever, Susan. ''American Bloomsbury: Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Henry David Thoreau; Their Lives, Their Loves, Their Work''. Detroit: Thorndike Press, 2006. Large print edition. . * Crews, Frederick. ''The Sins of the Fathers: Hawthorne's Psychological Themes''. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966; reprinted 1989. . * Hoffman, Daniel G. ''Form and Fable in American Fiction.'' University of Virginia Press 1994. * Madison, Charles A. ''Irving to Irving: Author-Publisher Relations 1800–1974''. New York: R. R. Bowker Company, 1974. * McFarland, Philip. ''Hawthorne in Concord''. New York: Grove Press, 2004. . * * Miller, Edwin Haviland. ''Salem Is My Dwelling Place: A Life of Nathaniel Hawthorne''. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1991. . * Paglia, Camille. ''Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson'' (New York: Vintage 1991) * Porte, Joel. ''The Romance in America: Studies in Cooper, Poe, Hawthorne, Melville, and James''. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1969. * Powers, Meredith A. ''The Heroine in Western Literature: The Archetype and Her Reemergence in Modern Prose'' (Jefferson, North Carolina and London: McFarland 1991) * Reynolds, Larry J. "Hawthorne's Labors in Concord". ''The Cambridge Companion to Nathaniel Hawthorne''. Edited by Richard H. Millington. Cambridge, UK; New York; and Melbourne, Australia: Cambridge University Press, 2004. * Schreiner, Samuel A. Jr. ''The Concord Quartet: Alcott, Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau, and the Friendship that Freed the American Mind''. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, 2006. . * Splendora, Anthony. "Psyche and Hester, or Apotheosis and Epitome: Natural Grace, ''La Sagesse Naturale''", ''The Rupkatha Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies in the Humanities,'' Vol. 5, No. 3 (2014), pp. 1–3
Volume V, Number 3, 2013 – Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities
* Van Doren, Mark. ''Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Critical Biography''. 1949; New York: Vintage 1957. * Wineapple, Brenda. ''Hawthorne: A Life''. Random House: New York, 2003. .


Further reading

* Bell, Michael Davitt
''Hawthorne and the Historical Romance of New England''
Princeton University Press (2015). * Forster, Sophia. "Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and the Emergence of American Literary Realism." ''Studies in the Novel'' 48.1 (2016): 43–64

* Greven, David. ''Gender Protest and Same-Sex Desire in Antebellum American Literature: Margaret Fuller, Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Herman Melville'' (2015). * Hallock, Thomas. "'A' is for Acronym: Teaching Hawthorne in a Performance-Based World." ''ESQ: A Journal of Nineteenth-Century American Literature and Culture'' 62#1 (2016): 116–121. * Hawthorne, Julian. ''Nathaniel Hawthorne and His Wife: A Biography'' (2 vols.). Cambridge University Press (1884); Boston: James R. Osgood and Company (1885). * Hawthorne, Julian. ''Hawthorne and His Circle''. New York and London: Harper & Brothers Publishers (1903). * Hawthorne, Julian. ''The Memoirs of Julian Hawthorne, Edited by His Wife Edith Garrigues Hawthorne''. New York: The Macmillan Company (1938). * * Parks, Tim
"Hawthorne's Mood Swings"
''The New York Review of Books'', November 21, 2024 (review of Salwak, Dale, ''The Life of the Author: Nathaniel Hawthorne''). * Reynolds, Larry J., ed. ''A Historical Guide to Nathaniel Hawthorne''. New York: Oxford University Press (2001). * Salwak, Dale. ''The Life of the Author: Nathaniel Hawthorne''. Chichester: Wiley Blackwell (2022). ISBN 978-1-119-77181-4 * Scribner, David, ed. ''Hawthorne Revistied: Honoring the Bicentennial of the Author's Birth''. Lenox, Massachusetts: Lenox Library Association (2004). * Ticknor, Caroline. ''Hawthorne and His Publisher''. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company (1913). * Williamson, Richard Joseph. "Friendship, politics, and the literary imagination: The impact of Franklin Pierce on Hawthorne's work" (PhD dissertation, University of North Texas, ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 1996. 9638512). * Young, Philip. ''Hawthorne's Secret: An Un-Told Tale''. Boston: David R. Godine (1984).


External links

* Peabody Essex Museum Hawthorn
digital collection
at Phillips Library * Th
Hawthorne in Salem
website *
C. E. Frazer Clark collection of Nathaniel Hawthorne
at the University of South Carolina Irvin Department of Rare Books and Special Collections.
Hawthorne Family Papers, c. 1825–1929
housed in th

at Stanford University Libraries
"Writings of Nathaniel Hawthorne"
from
C-SPAN Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network (C-SPAN ) is an American Cable television in the United States, cable and Satellite television in the United States, satellite television network, created in 1979 by the cable television industry as a Non ...
's '' American Writers: A Journey Through History''
Joint diary of Sophia and Nathaniel Hawthorne
at The Morgan Library & Museum * Nathaniel Hawthorne Collection. Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
Hawthorne Community Association
and boyhood home in Raymond, Maine
The House of the Seven Gables
in Salem, Massachusetts Works * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hawthorne, Nathaniel 1804 births 1864 deaths 19th-century American diplomats 19th-century American novelists American male novelists American male short story writers American people of English descent Bowdoin College alumni Burials at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery (Concord, Massachusetts) Hall of Fame for Great Americans inductees Massachusetts Democrats Writers from Concord, Massachusetts People from Raymond, Maine Consuls for the United States in Liverpool Writers from Salem, Massachusetts 19th-century American short story writers People from Lenox, Massachusetts 19th-century American male writers Novelists from Massachusetts Writers of Gothic fiction