In a Dark Time … The Eye Begins to See

Whenever you’ve immersed yourself in too much Emerson or Thoreau and feel yourself being uncontrollably lifted away by positive thoughts, it’s a good time to read a Hawthorne story or two. Perhaps that’s why Diane and I decided to spend a week on Hawthorne before beginning to review some modern poets again. Despite the fact [...]

Hawthorne’s “The Birthmark” explores the results of man’s attempt to attain perfection. Though never entirely clear whether Hawthorne is criticizing science’s attempts to change the world, questioning the Idealist’s attempts to attain spiritual perfection, or, even, damning the Puritan’s attempts to eliminate earthly desires, the story should serve as a warning to all who would [...]

I had planned on discussing Hawthorne’s “The Artist of the Beautiful” today, but after reading Alvin Hawkin’s page and seeing that he was expecting something curmudgeonly, I decided I’d better switch to “Young Goodman Brown,” a tale that may well explain the grouchiness of some of our most noble citizens, and might even explain Bush’s [...]

“Rappaccini’s Daughter,” Hawthorne begins, is a story first told by M. de l’Aubepine, a French writer who occupied an unfortunate position “between the Transcendentalists and those who addressed the intellect and sympathies of the multitude,” an author who interpreted the allegory according to the parallel events of his time. Indeed his love of allegory removed [...]