EGL 2050 - Early American Literature: Nathaniel Hawthorne

As the author of The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne has been established as a major writer of the nineteenth century and the most prominent chronicler of New England and its colonial history. This introductory book for students coming to Hawthorne for the first time outlines his life and writings in a clear and accessible style. Leland S. Person also explains some of the significant cultural and social movements that influenced Hawthorne's most important writings: Puritanism, Transcendentalism and Feminism. The major works, including The Scarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables and The Blithedale Romance, as well as Hawthorne's important short stories and non-fiction, are analysed in detail. The book also includes a brief history and survey of Hawthorne scholarship, with special emphasis on recent studies. Students of nineteenth-century American literature will find this a rewarding and engaging introduction to this remarkable writer.

This volume, brings together some of the representative high points of Hawthorne criticism, ranging chronologically from the 1940s to the present. The essays take a variety of critical and theoretical approaches: some ask biographical questions, while others examine Hawthorne's psychology; still others look at his historical and literary contexts. There are essays on mythology, on politics, and on theology. Together, they trace Hawthorne's reception through changing critical fashions, and illuminate some of the central concerns in Hawthorne criticism: the place of sin and Providence in his fiction, the genres in which he wrote, and the shape of his career as a whole. None of the essays presumes to be the final word on the subject. Instead, each is valuable for offering a starting point for thinking about Hawthorne's work, and for suggesting avenues for further exploration.

The Author on His Work contains the prefaces Hawthorne wrote for the three collections of tales published during his lifetime as well as relevant selections from his American Notebooks and selected letters, both of which are reprinted from The Centenary Edition of the Works of Nathaniel .A Chronology of Hawthorne's life and a Selected Bibliography are included.