A Biography of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Term Paper, including Bibliography.

"Mother," said little Pearl, "the sunshine does not love you. It runs away and hides itself, because it is afraid of something on your bosom... It will not flee from me, for I wear nothing on my bosom yet!"

"Nor ever will, my child, I hope," said Hester. "And why not, mother?" asked Pearl, stopping short... "Will it not come of its own accord, when I am a woman grown?" (The Scarlet Letter)

My novel, The Scarlet Letter was recognized as one of the greatest of American novels. I was also the first professional writer to be college educated and familiar with great European writers (Encarta Online). I focused my work on themes such as; initiation, guilt, pride, Puritan New England, my Italian background, allegory, symbolism, man vs. society, love vs. hate, fate vs. free will, isolation, ancestral sin, humanity's potential for cruelty, the dark side of people, and mortality.

Salem, Oregon

"The witch no. 1" lithograph

Salem, Oregon

I am most famous for my novel The Scarlet Letter that "explores the symbolic romance that assumes the universality of guilt and the complexities and ambiguities of mans choices" (Encarta Online). I am also known as a "skillful craftsman with an impressive architectonic sense of form with writings so tightly woven together, no chapter nor paragraph could be omitted without doing violence to the whole" (Encarta Online). Some of my greatest influences are my brief membership in the society of Brook Farm, my childhood in Salem, and my Puritan family background.

Life at Brook Farm was an influence and The Blithedale Romance was the novel that came out of that period of my life. I joined the community of Brook Farm hoping to live in such comfort that I could marry and still have plenty of time to devote to my writings (Encarta Online). Brook Farm was supposed to be...