Nathaniel Hawthorne ( 1804-1864 )

• Hawthorne’s works are the fruit of the Puritan consciousness of the New England, putting his heavy burden of the sense of sin into the creation of literature. He bloomed and sprouted from the granite of New England.

• ---- Henry James

Puritans and the New World

Puritans and their religious life

Priest and his people

He bloomed and sproutedfrom the granite of NewEngland.

With Adam’s Fall, We sinned all.

Puritans then and now

Hawthorne’s Life

• 1.When 4 years old, his father died in the East Indies, leaving behind him 3 children ( Nathaniel4, Elizabeth6, and Louisa 2)

• 2. At 9, he hurt his foot and became crippled and retiring

• 3. Haunted by the fatal social and moral isolation: loss of his father, lameness, sense of the past, humiliating dependence on relatives, retired and neurotic way of life of his mother, and the indifference of the villagers and his relatives

• 4.Ashamed and proud of his ancestors ( witch hunts of 1693 )

Mother and Son

Witch hunt

Nathaniel HawthorneFather of the American A

The Scarlet Letter

• The red letter A has become an archetype for American people, a pride ( Feminism), and a shame ( religious prejudice and oppression) and a social dilemma ( men---Chillingworth and Dimmstale, and women—Hester and Pearl ).

Greek Myth

Leda and Swan

Leda and Swan

Who is the father of thechild?

How do we interpret The Scarlet Letter today?

The young woman was tall, with a figure of perfect elegance, on a large scale. She had dark and abundant hair, so glossy that it threw off the sunshine with a gleam, and a face which, besides being beautiful from regularity of feature and richness of complexion, had the impressiveness belonging to a marked brow and deep black eyes. She was lady-like, too, after the manner of the feminine gentility of those days; characterized by a certain state and dignity, rather than by the delicate evanescent, and indescribable grace, which is now recognized as its indication.

From The Scarlet Letter

What does Pearl mean to them andto us?

Who-is-who in the relationshipbetween God and man

Zeus --------Leda--------Helen

God --------Mary--------Christ

Dimmstale—Hester------Pearl

?---Hawthorne’s mother---?