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NHNathaniel Hawthorne

121 collected words

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Life dates: 1804 AD — 1864 AD

Hawthorne’s narrator connects outward signs with concealed burdens. Read Hester’s moment of relief beside Dimmesdale’s inability to recognise an enemy, treating both as descriptions of these characters and circumstances.

▷ Play this voiceSearch these words ↗Place in time ↗lovelifehappinessdeathtruthcharacterknowledgemind

Life and writing

The catalogue identifies Nathaniel Hawthorne with lifetime years 1804–1864 and credits Dartmouth College for this electronic text. It notes a different, improved edition, but the selected counterparts here were checked against eBook 33 itself. This profile does not substitute the unexamined edition. The catalogue HTML ISBN identifies the linked digital text; its underlying print publisher and the composition dates of archive extracts remain unspecified.

Chapter XVIII describes Hester’s relief after she removes the embroidered letter in the forest; she then takes off her cap. The narrator’s contrast between weight and freedom belongs to that moment. Chapter X describes Dimmesdale becoming suspicious of everyone while continuing to receive Chillingworth as a physician and companion. His failure to recognise an enemy is part of their particular relationship, not a universal psychological diagnosis. Both selected extracts match this edition under limited normalization.

Reading this voice

Read the forest scene in Chapter XVIII beside the physician’s visits in Chapter X. Ask how a visible symbol and a concealed relationship shape each character’s experience. The selected narration provides local context, rather than general diagnostic or moral rules.

Subjects to explore

freedomtrustjudgement

Words to begin with

Quotations and sayings

07c. 1834 AD
There can be, if I forebode aright, no power, short of the Divine mercy, to disclose, whether by uttered words, or by type or emblem, the secrets that may be buried with a human heart. The heart, making itself guilty of such secrets, must perforce hold them, until the day when all hidden things shall be revealed. Nor have I so read or interpreted the Holy Writ, as to understand that the disclosure of human thoughts and deeds, then to be made, is intended as part of the retribution. That, surely, were a shallow view of it. No; these revelations, unless I greatly error, are meant merely to promote the intellectual satisfaction of all intelligent beings, who will stand waiting, on that day, to see the dark problem of this life made plain. A knowledge of men's hearts will be needful to the completest solution of that problem. And I conceive, moreover, that the hearts holding such secrets as you speak of will yield them up, at that last day, not with reluctance, but with a joy unutterable.
Nathaniel Hawthorne / quote
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15c. 1834 AD
Herman Melville came to see me at the Consulate, looking much as he used to do (a little paler, and perhaps a little sadder), in a rough outside coat, and with his characteristic gravity and reserve of manner.... [W]e soon found ourselves on pretty much our former terms of sociability and confidence. Melville has not been well, of late; ... and no doubt has suffered from too constant literary occupation, pursued without much success, latterly; and his writings, for a long while past, have indicated a morbid state of mind.... Melville, as he always does, began to reason of Providence and futurity, and of everything that lies beyond human ken, and informed me that he had "pretty much made up his mind to be annihilated"; but still he does not seem to rest in that anticipation; and, I think, will never rest until he gets hold of a definite belief. It is strange how he persists -- and has persisted ever since I knew him, and probably long before -- in wondering to-and-fro over these deserts, as dismal and monotonous as the sand hills amid which we were sitting. He can neither believe, nor be comfortable in his unbelief; and he is too honest and courageous not to try to do one or the other. If he were a religious man, he would be one of the most truly religious and reverential; he has a very high and noble nature, and better worth immortality than most of us.[after what would be their last meeting]
Nathaniel Hawthorne / quote
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24c. 1834 AD
Every young sculptor seems to think that he must give the world some specimen of indecorous womanhood, and call it Eve, Venus, a Nymph, or any name that may apologize for a lack of decent clothing. I am weary, even more than I am ashamed, of seeing such things. Nowadays people are as good as born in their clothes, and there is practically not a nude human being in existence. An artist, therefore, as you must candidly confess, cannot sculpture nudity with a pure heart, if only because he is compelled to steal guilty glimpses at hired models. The marble inevitably loses its chastity under such circumstances. An old Greek sculptor, no doubt, found his models in the open sunshine, and among pure and princely maidens, and thus the nude statues of antiquity are as modest as violets, and sufficiently draped in their own beauty. But as for Mr. Gibson's colored Venuses (stained, I believe, with tobacco juice), and all other nudities of to-day, I really do not understand what they have to say to this generation, and would be glad to see as many heaps of quicklime in their stead.
Nathaniel Hawthorne / quote
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