Poelker Hawthorne Blog

Nathaniel Hawthorne is an interesting character in the context of what we’ve read so far, particularly with regards to the Puritan legacy and reactions against it. One of his ancestors was John Hathorne, a judge during the Salem Witch Trials, the most horrifying manifestation of Puritan society’s negative side. If we look at his stories from that perspective as well as from his Romantic influence, its easy to understand his somewhat negative view of human nature.

“Young Goodman Brown” is most directly linked to the Salem Witch trials, being a fictional account of a young man who witnesses the members of Salem town participating in witchcraft and devil-worship. Here, he commits “The Unpardonable Sin” against his wife, Faith. In the story’s opening, she begs him not to carry out his sinister “errand” in the woods, even though she doesn’t know the true nature of his journey: “Dearest heart... prithee put of your journey till sunrise and sleep in your bed to-night. A lone woman is troubled with such dreams and such thoughts that she’s afeared of herself sometimes.” Hawthorne’s choice to have her call him “heart” is an obvious nod to the notion of the Unpardonable Sin as “violation of the human heart.” When Brown ignores her pleas, he violates not only her heart but himself “Dear heart.” The consequences are his own cynicism for the rest of his life, which would of course have had an impact on his family. Ultimately, he is buried in a grave without a “hopeful verse” on it, as reveals the character’s troubles as well as Hawthorne’s disbelief in the overall goodness of man.

In “The Birthmark,” we get another instance of husband-wife. This time, husband Aylmer wants to get rid of his wife’s only imperfection, a red birthmark on her cheek, a symptom of his somewhat overzealous love for science: “His love for his young wife might prove the stronger of the two; but it could only be by intertwining itself with his love of science.” His betrayal of the human heart is his conditional love of his wife, his human incapacity to love her without the vanity of his own professional passion. Lovers with other passions might heed Hawthorne’s warning. As the scientist experiments on his lovely wife, he gets rid the birthmark but at the price of the love of his life-- an obvious loss for both of them.

“Roger Malvin’s Burial” deals with the historical battle of Lovewell’s Fight, a colonist-indian battle that left many dead. The picks up after the battle, when a young man and an older man are both injured in the woods. The young man leaves the old man at the latter’s request, promising to either rescue him or bury him. He doesn’t keep his promise, but does marry the old man’s daughter. This sort of betrayal has initial consequences not only for the old man who didn’t receive his burial rights, but for the young man as well. The townspeople praise him, though he feels he does not deserve it: “The tale of Rueben’s courage and fidelity lost nothing when [the daughter] communicated it to her friends; and the poor youth, tottering from his sick chamber to breathe the sunny air, experienced from every tongue the miserable and humiliating torture of unmerited praise.” So, the young man survived, but The Unpardonable Sin brought him suffering. Later in the story, he attempts to escape the guilt he has in that society, but he and his wife are further punished when their son dies in a hunting accident on the very spot where the boy’s grandfather had been left to die an undignified, lonely death.