Nathaniel Hawthorne:Analysis
In an attempt to redeem his name and honor from the shame of William Hathorne and his son, John Hathorne's actions during the Salem Witchcraft trails, Nathaniel Hawthorne created a cast of characters in The Scarlett Letter who, through the course of the novel try to gain redemption for their own sins. Hawthorne was born in Salem, Massachusetts in 1804. He graduated from Bowden University in 1825 with Fanshawe (1828) nearly complete. During his college career, Hawthorne excelled in his composition courses and came out determined to become a fiction writer. His writing "life" began in 1837 when a friend secretly paid for the publishing of Twice-Told Tales. To learn more about writing he then undertook editorial work in Boston, and then transferred to a job in the Boston Custom House. Hawthorne then invested over one thousand dollars in the Brook Farm Community hoping that in a socialist society he would be able to combine the practical and the creative. He left about a year later disappointed and worse off than he was when he joined. At the ripe age of 38, he married Sophia Peabody of the famous Salem Peabody family. During which he compiled the works to make Mosses from an Old Manse (1846). After he was fired from the Custom Hou
In 1849, the satirical "The Custom House" became the critically acclaimed prologue to The Scarlett Letter. He uses it to set the mood of the book by describing a weather beaten wooden prison to set the tale of human frailty and sorrow. Mixing his past with his literature, the cursed Hathornes become the cursed Pyncheons in The House of Seven Gables, declining from wealth and prominence to poverty and eccentricity. Hawthorne's opening to The Scarlett Letter "The Prison Door" is very somber, detailed, and graphic. "It remains relevant for it's philosophical and psychological depth and continues to be read as a classic tale on a universal theme. (Milliman) When Dimmesdale steps forward, "pale and holding his hand over his heart, as was his custom whenever his peculiarly nervous temperament was thrown into agitation" (The Scarlett Letter) the listeners probably attribute his distress to his concern for Hester's salvation, but it seems far more likely that Dimmesdale's agitation results from his full understanding of the impact of Hester's words, form his realization that in her anger she might well betray him is she loses Pearl. The March 1850 first edition sold out in ten days. The Scarlett Letter represents the height of Hawthorne's literary genius, dense with vivid descriptions. " (Unger 225) In 1852, The Blithedale Romance met with horrible failure, while Hawthorne's last completed romance The Marble Faun (1860), in which an innocent young man falls into sin and rises into maturity met with only moderate success. His focus is to convince Dimmesdale to keep the secret of his affair with Hester so that he would die a liar. Hester Prynne, who stood defiantly her hour on the scaffold and endured the contempt of the world, proved a woman of proud and unbending strength; it surpasses me not that you in your weakness and her held in common the most tender sympathies, opposites so often attracting in affairs of the heart. Its success is also credited to the novel addressing spiritual and moral issues from a uniquely American standpoint. "The Scarlett Letter is the perfect expression of what Roy Male has called Hawthorne's tragic vision. " (The Classic Text) Hawthorne filled his text with metaphors and similes that trap the reader in the mood and feelings of the story. Though the towns people of Boston hold varying opinions of the letter sentence, in one thing the townspeople are consistent, not they but the magistrates have had the sole power and authority to deal with Hester Prynne.
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Acceptance Essays
