Nathaniel Hawthorne Research Paper

Nathaniel Hawthorne was born on July 4, 1804 to a New English family in Salem, Massachusetts. Nathaniel Hawthorne was born into a strict Puritan family. His great-great grandfather, John Hathorne, was the primary judge in the Salem Witch Trials (Nathaniel). Nathaniel Hawthorne most likely added the “W” to his last name to distance himself from his Puritan heritage (Brooks). Hawthorne only published two books under the name Hathorne, before adding the “W” in 1830 (Brooks). He was born into a relatively average income household. His father, Nathaniel Hathorne, Sr. was a Captain of a ship in the East India Company. Hawthorne’s father died when he was only four, in 1808 because of yellow fever (Nathaniel). After his father’s death, his mother,

However, as soon as she drinks the potion, she dies. Furthermore, many of Hawthorne’s short stories included death and a strangely dark mood (Turner). According to the founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, “what most appealed to Hawthorne’s imagination was the old secret of mankind in general . . . the secret that we are really not by any means so good as a well-regulated society requires us to appear.” (Kellman). Hawthorne’s dark mood centers around human guilt. In The Scarlet Letter, for example, the guilt piles up on Arthur Dimmesdale because of his affair with Hester Prynne and the fact that he is a reverend. Eventually, Arthur dies because of all of the guilt that he held inside. In the same novel, Hawthorne uses rich

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s writing stood out from all other American Literature authors because he was not afraid the write about the dark side of human nature. He commonly incorporated human guilt into this dark mood. Likewise, Hawthorne utilized rich imagery to further describe scenes in his stories. The imagery is needed because there were no pictures in books in the nineteenth century. Also, Hawthorne uses symbols to help the reader understand the underlying theme of the story. Almost all of the objects in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s stories are symbolic either because of their juxtaposition or their color. Finally, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s bold and ingenious writing style coupled with his use of allegory and modern themes of human psychology make him the most influencing American Literature