Biography
Hawthorne was born in Salem, Massachusetts, a descendant
of Puritan ancestors, including one of the judges of the
Salem witchcraft trials. He graduated from Bowdoin College
in Maine, where he had become friends with Henry
Wadsworth Longfellow and later president of the United
States Franklin Pierce, and then returned to Salem to write.
Hawthorne's early endeavors were mostly short stories, but
even though he published many of these tales in magazines
and literary annuals, they always appeared anonymously and
did little to advance his literary career. Only when he published
these stories in collections, as in Twice-Told Tales (1837)
and Mosses from an Old Manse (1846), did Hawthorne
become a recognized literary force. In 1842 he married Sophia
Peabody of Salem, and Hawthorne's primary focus turned to
family. His masterpiece, The Scarlet Letter, appeared
in 1850 and became an international sensation, with critics
in Great Britain and the United States proclaiming him the
finest American romance writer. Other novels by Hawthorne
include The House of Seven Gables (1851), The Blithedale
Romance (1852), and The Marble Faun (1860).
Explorations
My Kinsman, Major Molineux (1832) and Young Goodman
Brown (1835) are two famous Hawthorne stories, tales
that are often strip-mined for allegorical signification.
If we assume a good narrative ought to be more than the
sum of its symbols, then we can ask what more there is
to these two stories, and to Hawthorne as an artist, rather
than as a mere allegorizer of human experience. 1. In My Kinsman, Major Molineux, most attention
focuses on the moral or symbolic significance of Robin's
outburst of laughter when he sees his kinsman humiliated
by the Boston revolutionaries. But what about this as a
psychological moment, as a revelation or confirmation of
Robin's emotional state? Is this a believable response
from a young man who has been through the sort of night
that Robin has experienced? Does this fit of laughter suggest
anything about his character or about what he has learned
-- as an individual rather than as an emblem of young,
naive New England?
2. In My Kinsman, Major Molineux, Hawthorne represents
eighteenth-century Boston, about forty years before the
Revolution, as a festive place, where masque and anarchy
and playfulness have taken over the streets as a result
of the widening political rift between England and the
colonies. How does this portrait compare with other representations
which you have seen of Boston in pre-Revolutionary times?
3. Working from the obvious cues in Young Goodman
Brown, we can read Brown's wife, Faith, as a representation
of his own religious "faith" and map out the color symbolism
to understand the story as a commentary on innocence
or purity, sin or the world of the flesh, and the complications
of living in a world where these qualities are mingled.
But is Brown a plausible human being? What internal conflicts
take him on this wilderness errand? What does he want
when he ventures into the woods?
Other sites to consult:
Nathaniel
Hawthorne. An impressive site maintained
by the Eldritch Press, featuring an exhaustive amount
of Hawthorne-related material: links to his work
online; other Hawthorne sites organized by subject;
a forum; indices of places and names in his work;
timelines; a glossary; and a study text of The
Scarlet Letter.
Romanticism:
Nathaniel Hawthorne. Extensive bibliography
and notes on Hawthorne's writing with an introduction
to Romanticism. From the PAL: Perspectives in
American Literature site maintained by Paul P.
Reuben (California State University, Stanislaus).
Selected
bibliography of biographical works and criticism
on Hawthorne. Posted by Steve Adams, University
of Minnesota -- Duluth.
Nathaniel
Hawthorne: The Salem Years. An informative
biographical account focusing on Hawthorne's life
in Salem. With many wonderful photographs.
http://www.bartleby.com/people/HawthornN.html:
Project Bartleby’s Hawthorne page includes writings
by and about Hawthorne.
http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/classrev/scarlet.htm:
A review of The Scarlet Letter that ran in the Atlantic
Monthly in 1886.
|
