A READING OF NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE’S SELECT NOVELS

AND TALES IN NEW HISTORICIST PERSPECTIVE

THESIS

SUBMITTED FOR THE AWARD OF THE DEGREE OF

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

IN

ENGLISH

BY

RUBINA IQBAL

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH ALIGARH MUSLIM UNIVERSITY ALIGARH (INDIA)

JUNE 2011

Acknowledgements

First of all I would like to thank Almighty God without whose blessings, I am nothing. For every beautiful moments of my life, I must not fail to thank Him immensely. I dedicate this reading to my parents, my husband and the joy of my life my children.

This thesis is result of the encouragement, help, support, and kindness of many individuals and institutions given to me over a decade. The idea to research on Nathaniel Hawthorne from new historicist perspective was given to me by teacher Dr. Asim Siddiqui. Since the time of deciding the title of the thesis till the final draft, he was very supportive and responsive. I must acknowledge that though I was writing my as thesis as a teacher candidate, I found no difficulty in completion of my work as he was always there as an unassigned guide for me to give me feedback and much needed guidance.

I am immensely grateful to my well wisher the Principal Women’s College

Prof. Bilqis Naseem Waris who sanctioned my leave for Academic pursuit to give me the time I immensely needed to complete my research venture. I am indeed grateful to all my teachers in the college and my friends for their unwavering love and support. ii

My special thanks are due my teacher Dr. Shagufta Imtiaz who willingly helped me in my endeavor by reading my chapters and giving valuable suggestions.

I am greatly indebted to her for giving her valuable time to read my chapters and suggest improvements.

I must appreciate my friend Dr. Munira T. for her unconditional support and help at every stage of my research. She instilled in me the confidence that I can go ahead for the submission of my thesis by a thorough and painstaking reading of the final draft of my manuscript . My friend and elder sister Shahla

Ghauri was always by my side with her unconditional advice and support which I can never forget.

My Parents were my constant source of inspiration. They always encouraged me and never let my spirit down through their warmth and unwavering support. They motivated me in every possible way.

My siblings Hina, Midhat, Faria were always by my side with their inspiring words. Especially, my younger sister Noushina was of immense help. She willingly assisted in search of my resources on internet and gave me desperately needed moral boost which I needed more than anything else at times. During the last days of the submission of my thesis, she emerged as a redeeming figure for me iii by taking care of all my other responsibilities and gave me uninterrupted hours of study to wind up my thesis.

I cannot forget to mention the names of my daughter Sundus and son

Ayaan who were deprived of my motherly attention during my work on thesis.

Their smiles and embraces always rejuvenated me and revived my spirit after lengthy and exhaustive hours of study.

I must especially mention the name of my husband Dr. Abdul Rasheed who was always with me be it my visit to Hyderabad American Centre Library by managing his leave from the hospital or bearing patiently with my busy schedule.

I owe a special thanks to him for his being a life partner in the true sense of the word.

I am equally thankful to Osmania University Centre for International

Programmes formerly known as ASRC- American Studies Research Centre,

Hyderabad. The Library staff was very cooperative in providing research material and bibliographical details. I must acknowledge the role of American Centre

Library, New Delhi and Maulana Azad Library of AMU in collecting my reference and context materials to form the basis of my reading.

I apologize for any omission of scholarly indebtness, all of which, like the other fault of this thesis are quite unintended but wholly mine. Last but not the iv least a word of gratitude for all my well wishers, whom I have mentioned or not but I recognize their contribution directly or indirectly. I will always be indebted to all those who have supported me in my endeavor with their love and inspiring words. v

Abstract

A Reading of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Select Novels and

Tales in New Historicist Perspective

New historicist approach to literary works emerged in the 1980s in a vitriolic response to text –centered reading of New Criticism. New Historicists rejected the formalistic approach of the new critical precept that considered text an autonomous unit which should be analyzed without falling prey to what New Critics termed as “intentional fallacy” [that is relating it to the life of the author or his intention behind composition] or the “Historical Fallacy” [relating it to social, political, economic, and religious contexts].

New Historicists focused on a literary work as a product of time, place, and circumstances of its composition rather than as an isolated creation of genius. They examined the social factors, the psychological background of the author, and the influence of various books and theories upon the writer which shaped his consciousness.

They combated empty formalism by pulling historical considerations to the center stage of literary analysis against the decontextualized study of New Critics.

New Historicist approach exposes in manifold ways, how culture and society affect each other. Like earlier historical approaches, it does not focus on a literary work as reflective of the time in which it has been conceived. It reveals how the work is influenced by the time in which it has been composed. New Historicists believe that literature is one of the mediums to represent society like other narratives are. They do not suggest any single or easily identifiable historical context. They stress on the new self vi questioning historicist who views literary works as fields of contradictory forces, place of dissension, shifting interests, and occasion for the jostling of orthodox and subversive impulses. They also refute the notion of objectivity in critical interpretation and dare to make themselves the subject of study.

Hawthorne’s novels and tales have been analyzed and discussed from a range of angles and perspectives. Each of these interpretations represents a possible and valid way of reading his fiction and contributes to the bulk of criticism on Hawthorne. They enrich our understanding of him and his works. But we cannot say about any one of them that it is the one which possesses only possible explanation or definite interpretation of his works. His novels and tales operate on various levels. In the present proposed reading, four romances and some tales of Hawthorne have been selected to be read in the light of new historicist perspective.

This study will try to find out resonances between the fictional world of

Hawthorne and the socio-political, religious, and economic ideology of the 19th century, by placing his characters and stories back in the context from which they have emerged.

It opens a dialectic between the text and the world of facts.

Hawthorne has addressed some of the most vital and stirring issues of the 17th and

19th century American society in his fiction. In order to understand his fiction, it is necessary to be familiar with 17th century Puritan history and be conversant with the leading socio -political ideology of the American Renaissance. Hawthorne’s historical method is best displayed in the vivid and diversified panorama of Salem from its founding days to the present time. He is not content to represent scenes for their sake. He vii has sought for fictional representation, moments of drama, episodes of controversy, and conflicting ideologies relevant to his time.

The history of his ancestors encompasses the earlier phase of the political and social history of New England. These selected novels and tales come out of their shell and become meaningful only in the context of Hawthorne’s personal as well as national heritage in which they are shaped, containing more than hundred years of American history. Instead of deriving the direct sources of Hawthorne’s fictional world, this reading works through a series of irrefutable connections between Hawthorne’s epistles, diaries, medical journals, women’s manuals, cultural, social, economic, political, and religious history of colonial period as well as the 19th century and his fiction to get the episteme of the past and present time.

Together these writings suggested that Hawthorne could not have escaped the debate on female-right movements, transcendentalist’s doctrine of Self Reliance,

Compensation, and Circle, shifting modes of social hierarchy with the emergence of democracy in the 19th century, issues related to spirituality and Puritanism, the nexus of freedom and conscience as debated by Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson, and various reformatory movements even if he had desired. It is important to explore the attitude of

Hawthorne and people of his time towards mesmerism and animal magnetism, discoveries in the field of science and technology, feminist movements; issues raised by transcendentalism, and various utopian projects in the sudden urge to reform the society to understand their role in governing his fiction.

Hawthorne’s friendship with transcendentalists Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry

David Thoreau, Bronson Alcott, George Ripley and his relation to female activists viii

Margaret Fuller and Elizabeth Peabody, as well as his participation in the Utopian socialist venture at Brook farm cannot be overlooked. His friendship with Franklin

Pierce, a leading democrat of his time and other known democrats like Jonathan Cilley and Horatio Bridge helped in shaping his republican understanding irrespective of his repressive Puritan ancestors.

This work has been divided into eight different segments. It includes the review of the major critical works done on Hawthorne and a concluding chapter. This study also contains words of acknowledgement to the individuals and the institutions, I am indebted to.

In the first chapter “Hawthorne –An Enigma”, I have taken into account the life history of the author collected through various sources; letters, diaries, books on colonial history as well as earlier biographies to see its role in governing his outlook. In this chapter, aim is to highlight the contrastive nature of the biographical details available on

Hawthorne. At one extreme, Hawthorne has been projected as an isolated being, away from reality but on the other side, the writer emerges as man of his time. It also discusses about New Historicism and its difference from Old Historicism. The second chapter is a review of the existing literature on Nathaniel Hawthorne.

In the next five chapters iii, iv, v, vi, and vii, Hawthorne’s four novels The

Scarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables, The Blithedale Romance , The Marble

Faun and some tales have been selected for reading. According to the shifting focus of the reading, each chapter has been given a different nomenclature corresponding to the basic idea that has been dealt with in that chapter. ix

Chapter 3 is based on The Scarlet Letter and is entitled “Ideological representations in The Scarlet Letter”. This chapter takes into account the transcendentalist’s teaching in the age of enlightenment and its impact on the author despite Hawthorne’s repeated attempts to disown any allegiance to it. This text is vocal against formalized and institutionalized Christianity and celebrates the virtue of individualism through the story of an adulterous female.

Chapter 4 is named “Plurality of Meaning in The House of Seven Gables”. It presents a diverse perspective about the transitional phase of the political, social, economical, and religious history of the 19th century America. Hawthorne was a

Democrat and his democratic sympathies were natural. There was a steady growth in the collective commitment to republicanism in the 19th century. Hawthorne caught that wave of change in The House of Seven Gables. His characters Hepzibah, Jaffrey Pyncheon, and

Holgrave are not merely figments of his imagination but the projection of varied ideological forces. In writing this text, Hawthorne drew upon the issues, and rhetoric which he encountered in his present. His personal rancor against professional politicians guided the portrayal of his character Jaffrey Pyncheon.

Chapter 5 is based on the reading of his novel The Blithedale Romance. It is called “Political Correctness in The Blithedale Romance”. This novel was written in

1851-52. Hawthorne acknowledges in the preface to the novel that it is based on his four- month stay at a utopian community at west Roxbury in 1841. The character of

Hollingsworth in the novel is guided by Hawthorne’s fear of the warping effect of too exclusive devotion to some cause. Samuel Gridley Howe’s report on prison reform with its emphasis on the saving of human souls echoes Hollingsworth’s concerns. Zenobia’s x suicide is consistent with the author’s conception of the prescribed role of female. It is an outcome of her culturally determined and psychologically internalized marginality. This reading focuses on the fictional projection of the tension generated by the clash of dominant values and the values of woman’s culture. One of the most interesting angles of this study is to reveal how Zenobia succumbs to the model of conformity not under any external pressure but by rebelling against the constraints of it. In her manner of rebellion against the constraints of patriarchal society, she seems to have co-opted its strategies of dissent.

The Blithedale Romance questions the conventional antithesis between the established power and the agencies of liberation by looking at the way civilization “co- opts” and thus disdains its non-conformist agents. It reflects Hawthorne’s cultural upbringing and his personal attitude towards females because in the same cultural upbringing the responses may vary from person to person. This novel also has expressed

Hawthorne’s profound distrust of various reform movements and the Utopian projects in the 19th century of which New England had become a seed bed.

Chapter 6 deals with Hawthorne’s last published novel The Marble Faun. This novel can be better explained by studying it in context of the cultural and intellectual ideology which guided and shaped it. Hawthorne’s attitude towards Catholicism, doctrine of circle, contemporary writings about established religion as well the debate on the right of state in governing individual life are explored here. It also takes into account the writings of Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, and Edmund Burke.

In the seventh chapter which is entitled “Historical and Cultural Resonance in

Hawthorne’s Selected Tales”, some tales of Hawthorne with contemporary relevance and xi firm grounding in the American history are selected. In reading Hawthorne, this study places his tales within the “frame” of non-literary text to which a literate public had access in the 19th century. He might have read and used them as co-texts. His reference to

Blackman, witch Sabbath, Spectral evidence, and witch meeting in his tale “The Young

Goodman Brown” is in accord with the spirit of the time. In the 19th century, Populace of

Salem was intensely interested in knowing about the advent of Quakers, and witchcraft trials in the wake of renewed interest in spirituality. The age of enlightenment revived the interest of the populace in the matters of conscience, questions of moral guidance, individualism, and liberty.

“The Birth Mark” voices the sexual politics of idealization of female body apart from tackling issues of medical profession. Robin in the tale, “My kinsman Major

Molineaux” represents the essence of bucolic America. This tale along with “The Gray

Champion” indicates the progression from stability to radical change in Democratic

America. Hawthorne’s tale “The Maypole of Merry Mount” represents the conflict for power at Merry Mount and “Endicott and the Red Cross” depicts the tussle between the

Puritan magistrate and English regime. “Shaker Bridal” and “The Canterbury Pilgrims” are written in the backdrop of the augmenting demand for reform in the society in the 19th century.

The last chapter summarizes the endeavor of the preceding chapters. It is a justification of the claims which have been made in abstract as well as in preface. It reiterates the fact that Hawthorne was not a dreamy Romancer but a man conversant with the leading ideology of his time and his fiction is resonant with the cultural life of

America. CONTENTS Acknowledgements …………………………………………………… i -iv Abstract ……………………………………………………………….. v-xi. Preface ………………………………………………………………. xii-xv I. Nathaniel Hawthorne -An Enigma ……………………. 1-23 II. Review of Literature………………………………….. 24-34 III. Ideological Representations in The Scarlet Letter……. 35-82 IV. Plurality of Meaning in The House of Seven Gables…. 83-131 V. Political Correctness in The Blithedale Romance……... 132-179 VI. Poetics of Culture in The Marble Faun ………………180-207 VII. Historical and Cultural Resonance in Hawthorne’s Selected Tales …………………. ..208-262 VIII. Conclusion…………………………………………...263-271 Bibliography……………………………………………………. 272-289 xii

Preface

Nathaniel Hawthorne called his works Romance and insisted that as a romancer, he had no obligation to follow minute and factual details. A novel is presumed to aim at a very minute fidelity, not merely to the possible, but to the probable and ordinary course of man’s experience. To study his work as romance only as Hawthorne defines his kind of fiction, is to preclude the cultural and historical dimension in the study of his work.

The definition of his work as Romance is an attempt on the part of the author to repress its historicity. Hawthorne claims a lot of poetic license for himself. Though, he professes that he writes romances and his works do not correspond to the factual world, his works serve an important cultural purpose. His narrative voice is a self- conscious rhetoric construction to suppress the real Hawthorne and his ideological beliefs. Every literary work is attended by a host of outside circumstances. If a reader succeeds in exposing and exploring them, it will suffuse the work with additional meaning.

I started work on Hawthorne soon after my post graduation in 1997. The enticing presence of Hester in The Scarlet Letter amid subversive ideology of the Puritan society of the 17th century was initially my inspiration. This text was prescribed in my Post graduate course in American literature in AMU, Aligarh. I collected Hawthorne’s tales and novels from American Centre library, New Delhi and most of my critical material on

Hawthorne from Maulana Azad library, Aligarh and American Centre library,

Hyderabad. As a naïve enthusiast, exploring thematic angle was foremost in my mind at the initial stage. I had even started to work on it in the beginning but gradually in the course of my reading Hawthorne’s works, I was intrigued by their repressed historicity. xiii

There was no problem like dearth of material on Hawthorne, instead of it, I encountered another kind of difficulty: what to read and what not from the enormous body of critical and biographical works available on him amid undying enthusiasm in new scholars to further explore Hawthorne’s fictional horizon. I went through critical works on him only to find out what was left to speak and tried to relook at his work to say something new.

In the wake of latest development in the field of literary theory, I found it fascinating to attempt a contextualized reading of his works. The more travelled back into

American past and explored social, religious, economical, and political territory, the more

I was caught up with an irresistible urge to go for a parallel reading of American history and Hawthorne’s fictional world. My task became difficult in the light of the author’s constant effort throughout his career to endorse his works as product of fancy that they were conceived in a neutral territory between the real world and fairyland. It made me increasingly conscious of what Hawthorne was trying to disown by constantly asserting on the fanciful aspect of his writings and adopting techniques like allegory, images, symbolism, and emblems for the said purpose.

The bulk of critical material available on Hawthorne asserted that the most prominent themes in his Romances are sin, guilt, conscience, isolation, burden of past, original sin of our Original father Adam, ethical inclination, symbolism, allegory, and the stigma of a concealed guilt. The earlier critics over emphasized these themes and asserted that the passion for ethics prompted Hawthorne to stop his characters in the midst of action in order to probe their inner lives. He frequently reported it by means of symbol and allegory. xiv

Traditional critical approaches to Hawthorne described him as a writer who expressed himself through allegory and who found isolation a root of all evil. They found nothing in his tales that enlarged our understanding of human nature and the society in which he lived. They accused him of paralyzing the creative mind of New England.

The present work finds it impossible to relate with the traditional approaches to

Hawthorne’s works. The purpose of this thesis is to present a fresh perspective to him.

This proposed work aims to shift the focus from the conventional and hackneyed approaches to his work to show that his work is embedded in the leading social and political ideologies of his time. This thesis is a meagre attempt to bring to surface a sense of milieu in which Hawthorne wrote. Through use of seemingly insignificant details present in his cultural context, this thesis tries to unravel the inherent contradictory forces at work within that cultural milieu.

Hawthorne’s four novels and a few tales have been selected for the purpose of present reading. The selection of his tales was based on their historical relevance. It was interesting to work on Hawthorne from New Historicist perspective but at the same time it was also very challenging and demanding task. Knowing from the onset, the nature of work done on Hawthorne in the past, it was difficult to justify the historical importance of his work serving an important cultural purpose.

The present proposed reading tries to resituate his work not only in relation to other genre and modes of discourse but also in context of non –discursive practices, ranging from the essays of Emerson to a few lines from a poem of Alfred Tennyson, references to the novel of Charlotte Bronte to lines from books of social, political, and religious history to find resonance between them and the fictional world of Hawthorne. xv

The author’s representation of the society of his ancestors as well as his own was not objective rather it was guided by his personal sympathies. Hawthorne’s reading provided with a model for the integration of intellect, religious, and social commitments. The reading of his tales in the present thesis at once demystifies the claim that literature and scholarship can stand beyond the self and group interests, biases, and struggles of material existence. For the purpose of formatting this thesis seventh edition of the MLA style sheet has been used with a slight deviation. The body of the text is justified contrary to MLA 7th edition guideline.

Chapter –I

Nathaniel Hawthorne –An Enigma

“No one would try to write about him, for no one can know enough to do it”.

Sophia Peabody

[I]

Nathaniel Hawthorne [1804-1862] was writing at the time when his contemporary writers had generated a strong interest in the romantic histories of the past. The writings of Walter Scott and James Fennimore Cooper were fantastic narratives of heroic explorers. They captured the adventures of the military men passing through extraordinary scenes in their fiction. Their characters were stereotyped. Initially,

Hawthorne was impressed by their romantic histories and tried to recapture the same type of character and story in his first novel Fanshaw [1828]. The people’s indifference to this venture dampened his spirit to such an extent that he did not dare to write any extended narrative for the next two decades. Editorial problems and policies contributed to

Hawthorne’s anonymity for a very long period, denying him the kind of recognition which he deserved.

After his graduation, he stayed in Salem and spent most of his time in reading about his countries past which enlarged his consciousness of that time. Hawthorne’s social exile ended when his old acquaintance with Peabody family was re-established. Iqbal 2

Hawthorne’s courtship with Sophia Peabody who was younger sister of transcendentalist

Elizabeth Peabody became one of the reasons for his closeness to the transcendentalism.

Sophia’s sister Elizabeth Peabody opened a book store in Boston in 1839 where transcendentalist used to gather for discussions and to review new books. In the Peabody book shop, Hawthorne got the opportunity to meet the sages of Concord thoughts which laid the foundation for his joining the socialist community, Brook farm at West Roxbury in 1841. Here, he got a chance to be familiar with transcendentalist ideology which played a significant role in shaping his fictional text The Blithedale Romance [1852].

Margaret Fuller was a frequent visitor at this book store therefore; here, Hawthorne met this outspoken female activist who inspired his many female characters.

After his marriage to Sophia Peabody in 1842, Hawthorne stayed in Concord till he moved to Salem in 1846 for a job in Salem custom house. Here, his neighbors were

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Thoreau, and Ellery Channing. His stay at Old Manse in

Concord further provided him with an opportunity to learn about New England transcendentalism from a close quarter. Transcendentalists believed that all people had access to divine inspiration, hence sought freedom, knowledge, and truth. They were convinced that some institutes of the society were obstructing the path of democracy; therefore, they demanded liberty from all age long corrupt institutions which had lost their essential meaning. Their Principles were strongly connected with the democratic ideology. They worked for liberty of slaves and equality of females. Various scholars considered the impact of transcendentalist belief on Hawthorne which was the moving force of the 19th century. Bliss Perry in “The Centenary of Hawthorne” first published in Iqbal 3

The Atlantic [1904)] and later reprinted in Park Street Papers [1908] stated that

Hawthorne through his readings, friendship and association along with the intellectual environment in his time was in fact a transcendentalist. F.O. Matthiessen and Floyd

Stovall in a passage on Hawthorne in American Idealism [1943] asserted that Hawthorne accepted some of the tenets of transcendentalism. Stovall cited Hawthorne’s concern with the human soul and his distrust of intellect devoid of human affection as a few of the examples.

Henry James spoke about Hawthorne’s closeness with Thoreau. “He [Thoreau] was as shy and ungregarious as Hawthorne; but he and latter appear to have been socially disposed towards each other, . . . ” (85). In “The Old Manse”, Hawthorne wrote about the time, he spent with Thoreau: “But the chief profit of those wild days, to him and me, lay- not in any definite idea-not in any angular or rounded truth, which we dug out of the shapeless mass of problematic stuff-but in freedom which we thereby won from all custom and conventionalism, and fretting influences of man on man” (25).

In the same essay, Hawthorne spoke out his mind on Emerson, a leading exponent of this movement “It was good, nevertheless, to meet him in the wood paths, or sometimes in our avenue, with that pure intellectual gleam diffused about his presence, like a garment of shinning one; and he so quiet, so simple, so without pretention, encountering each man alive as if expecting to receive more than he could impart” (31).

Hawthorne was in agreement with some of the beliefs commonly held by the transcendentalists but the temper of his mind was skeptical. He reached at conclusion by observing life rather than a doctrine. Some of the tenets of the transcendental movement were alien to his nature, for example, abolitionism, a radical branch of anti slavery Iqbal 4 crusade. Hawthorne condemned slave trading but he could not see any wisdom in the violent views and remedies of the abolitionists. As far as his views regarding women were concern, they were conservative.

Hawthorne was expelled from the Salem Custom House through a political manoeuvring. His untoward experiences in the Salem custom House formed the moral basis for the introduction to The Scarlet Letter [1850], entitled as “The Custom House”.

His creative power was well recognized and acknowledged only after the publication of

The Scarlet Letter. After his dismissal from the Custom House, he settled in Lenox in the

Berkshires. Here, he wrote his next novel, The House of the Seven Gables [1851]. From here he moved to Roxbury, where his next book The Blithedale Romance was written.

This novel reflected Hawthorne’s distrust of all kind of reform movement along with other relevant issues of the 19th century society.

His contemporaries were James Fennimore Cooper, Simms, Longfellow, Edgar

Allan Poe, R W. Emerson, and Henry David Thoreau. During his college days, the foundation was laid for his enduring friendship with Franklin Pierce, Horatio Bridge,

Jonathan Cilley, and Longfellow. All of them were known as democrats and recognized as well known public figures. This circle of democrats unconsciously played their role in formulating Hawthorne’s democratic sensibilities.

Hawthorne wrote a campaign biography for Pierce to assist him in his political ambition to become the president of America. After attaining the presidential office,

Franklin Pierce appointed him on a political post as consulate at Liverpool. Pierce’s election as the president provided Hawthorne with an opportunity to see political world from a very close quarter and his democratic preferences became more vocal. He Iqbal 5 maintained his friendship with Pierce throughout his life along with several other worldly politicians. In 1853, Hawthorne went to England along with his family and from there to

Italy in 1857. His experiences of England are recorded in “Our Old Home”. His last published novel was The Marble Faun [1860].

There is a lot of biographical information available on Hawthorne. But it is surprising to note that even after publication of such a large amount of personal records on Hawthorne, his character remains an enigma. The contradictory nature of the biographical information available on him makes the study of the details of his life an interesting reading. Austin Warren sums it up in these words:

Critics of ability and acumen urge contradictory interpretation of author’s

mind: he was, we are told, the defender of Puritanism, its opponent and

satirist; a transcendentalist, an adversary of the movement; a believer,

a skeptic, a democrat; a moralist of New England rigor and even prudery;

a prophet (albeit perhaps unaware) of the Freudian gospel; a romantic

imbued with the belief in essential rightness of human instincts and faith

in the masses; a Christian and realist with suspicion of reform and no

credence of “progress”. (112)

Henry James, one of the biographers of Hawthorne, wrote that he “had few perceptible points of contact with what is called the world, with public events, with the manners of his time, even with the life of his neighbors” (James 9) however, James recognized his historical consciousness. It nullified Henry James’s own claim of the previous line. Iqbal 6

Hawthorne’s college mate Jonathan Cilley has expressed his love and appreciation for Hawthorne in the following lines, “I love Hawthorne; I admire him; but I do not know him. He lives in a mysterious world of thought and imagination which he never permits me to enter” (Stearns 306). This statement contributes in perpetuating the myth of Hawthorne’s being a solitary figure. In the light of the preceding statement, it is difficult to understand the man who was so extensively and significantly involved in the affairs of his time.

This myth is further perpetuated by Hawthorne himself. Nina Baym in an essay entitled, “Hawthorne and His mother” writes that Hawthorne’s being a secluded person is a myth. This myth was propagated by Hawthorne himself. His denial of his mother’s role in his life was misguiding. In his early love letter to Sophia Peabody, he described his mother and sister as “recluse” and pointed to the morbid atmosphere of the house as

“castle dismal”. Baym went on to prove that so much assertion on isolation by

Hawthorne was part a of lover’s strategies. He wanted to appear to Sophia as a lonely man who was desperate for her company. On 4th Oct, 1840, he wrote to Sophia as already his wife:

Here sits thy husband in his old accustomed chamber, where he used to sit

in years gone by . . . Sometimes [ for I had no wife then to keep my heart

warm] it seemed as if I were already in the grave, with only life enough to

be chilled and benumbed . . . till at length a certain dove was revealed to

me, in the shadow of seclusion as deep as my own had been . . .so now I

begin to understand why I was imprisoned so many years in this lonely Iqbal 7

chamber, and why I could never break through the viewless bolt and bars.

(Baym 5)

The Image of a recluse was a self created legend, since we knew that he made a number of trips and enjoyed social life during this time. This reading is an attempt to demystify Hawthorne’s claim of being a solitary figure because of perverse family traits.

It provides a different perspective on Hawthorne’s personality as a man, normal in his activities and thoughts. After exploring various sources of his writing and studying his ideas, it appears that he breathed the episteme of his time. G.E. Woodberry offers a characteristic early attitude towards Hawthorne in these lines:

He took practically no interest in life except as seen under its moral

aspects as a life of the soul; and this absorption in the moral sphere was

due to his being a child of New England. It was his inheritance from

Puritanism . . . The moral world, the supremacy of the soul’s interests,

how life fared in the soul, was his region; he thought about nothing else”

(Stovall 106).

It is curious to note that the image of the author Nathaniel Hawthorne has undergone a considerable change in the last century. He appears to be better adjusted and more in tune with his fellow human beings and the life of his period in the recent studies on him by his critics and biographers. Randall Stewart was particularly instrumental in expounding this new image of Hawthorne. He challenged the erroneous traditional image of him as a secluded figure. He maintained that despite of Hawthorne’s criticism of politicians and weaknesses of political practices, Hawthorne was surely democratic with definite political and social ideology. In 1932, Stewart offered “Hawthorne and politics: Iqbal 8 unpublished letters to William B. pike [NEQ]” as a proof that the author was not passive in politics. N F Doubleday in Hawthorne’s Criticism of New England Life [1941] cited examples of The House of Seven Gables and The Blithedale Romance for asserting the point that

Hawthorne was focused on the issues of his time. His own proclamation that his tales should be read as “Romance” was misleading. Like Stewart, Robert Cantwell was also interested in correcting his image of narrow and lop-sided portrait which focused on the brooding seclusion of his subject.

Hawthorne’s close relations to the currents of thoughts in his time have been focused during the studies of the last three decades of the 19th century. The latest researchers have used his notebook to cite examples, utilized materials previously ignored or partially explored to portray a new image of him. In the new picture, he appears to be less unworldly, dreamy, and brooding than earlier critics have portrayed him.

L.S Hall, through a thorough survey of the official records, personal correspondences, and writings asserted that Hawthorne was not aloof from the happenings of his surroundings. He attempted to establish that Hawthorne was highly knowledgeable about the political, social, and economical issues of his time. In his work

Hawthorn: Critic of Society, Hall wrote about Hawthorne as an active and practical politician, an admirer of Jackson and an ardent advocate of egalitarian society. Sophia found that “although he was shy, he was by nature profoundly social” (Cowie 332).

Instead of shrinking from reality, Hawthorne was eager to maintain contact with the world because he was afraid of “walking in a shadowy world” (Cowie 332). Iqbal 9

Hawthorne’s concern with the past led him to read Increase Mather’s Remarkable

Providence and Cotton Mather’s Wonders of the Invisible World and Magnalia Christi along with Felt’s Annals of Salem, Samuel Sewell’s Diaries, and John Winthrop’s

Journal. He was the proprietor of Salem Athenaeum library from where he drew the local histories of Salem, Andover, Haverhill, Plymouth, Lynn, Scituate, Portland, and

Nantucket. He drew also volumes from the collections of the Massachusetts historical society. He studied Puritan history with persistence that some scholars along with

Hawthorne himself considered obsessive.

During his indulgent reading of New England history, Hawthorne found the role of his paternal ancestors in the establishment functioning of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

His ancestor William Hathorne migrated to the new world in 1630 soon after the new colony came into existence. His energetic and outspoken character made him an important figure of the colony. His son John Hathorne also played a significant role in the colonial history as the judge of Salem witchcraft trial. He was at the top of the official affair when the Salem witchcraft trial took place in 1692.

The life of both of his ancestors is written in prominent letters as successful administrators and jurisprudence in the Puritan chronology. It is significant to view the attitude of Hawthorne towards his ancestors. Hawthorne was persistently haunted by the memories of his 17th century ancestors. Belief in the witchcraft has always had its strong hold among the foggy and gloomy world of the North. James I brought it with him from

Scotland to England and in the course, it was transplanted into the American soil. Joseph

Story in 1828, a judge of supreme court of USA said that behind the dark saga of witches were beliefs, “which had universal sanction of their own and all former ages; . . . Which Iqbal 10 the law supported by its mandates and the purest judges felt no compunctions in enforcing” (Mather 66).

Hawthorne was fascinated as well as repelled by the prominent role of his forefather William in denunciation of Quakers and his son judge Hathorne in deciding the fate of so many so called witches in the witchcraft trial of 1st March 1692. About John

Hathorne who acted as a judge in the witchcraft delusion, Hawthorne wrote in “The

Custom House” of The Scarlet Letter: “(He) inherited the persecuting spirit, and made himself so conspicuous in the martyrdom of the witches, that their blood may fairly be said to have left a stain upon him. So deep a stain, indeed, that his old dry bones, in the charter street burial ground, must still retain it, if they have not crumbled utterly to dust!”

(8).

Early Puritans were hostile to the freedom of speech, thought, and conduct. The

Puritan strain was clear in Hawthorne’s blood as the consciousness of sin was the most important fact of his life but their fanatical temper was averred by Hawthorne of

Democratic America. Though he was basically a religious man who praised his progenitors for their energy, accomplishment, and determination but simultaneously condemned them for their ruthless acts of injustice:

I know not whether these ancestors of mine bethought themselves to

repent, and ask pardon of heaven for their cruelties; or whether they are

now groaning under the heavy consequences of them, in another state

of being At all event, I, the present writer, as their representative, hereby

take shame upon myself for their sakes, and pray that any curse incurred

by them –as I have heard, and as the dreary and unprosperous condition Iqbal 11

of the race, for many a long year back, would argue to exist – may be

now and hence-forth removed.(S L 8-9)

The period between 1825 -1837 had been traditionally labeled as the years of recluse. The traditional biographers projected a picture of Hawthorne as an isolated being who was secluded from his surroundings and aloof from its problems yet brooding over them fancifully. They portrayed him as morbid recluse but these exaggerated accounts were corrected by recent scholars. His seasonal trip to New Haven in the fall of 1828 with his uncle Samuel Manning and again his visit to New Hampshire with him belied these claims. Here, he got the opportunity to observe closely Shaker Settlement in

Canterbury which formed the basis of his two tales “Shaker’s Bridal” and “Canterbury

Pilgrims”. During this time, he also worked on a magazine in Boston with his elder sister

Ebe.

After leaving Bowdain, Hawthorne’s years of seclusion served for him as period of his apprenticeship. His long absence from Salem made him a foreigner in that place and left scant possibility of communication, “I doubt whether so much as twenty people in the town were aware of my existence,”( Mellow 37) he recounted. It provided him with an opportunity to explore the colonial past as well as to enrich his reservoir of knowledge of the literary spectrum. It was always difficult for him to define his life in

Salem. At times, he remembered it as cheerful period when he enjoyed the very best of health. His so called reclusiveness neither made him melancholic nor misanthrope. The only negative aspect of this period was that it reminded him of his frustration which he felt at not being recognized by the world. In that small chamber on the Herbert street house he, “ . . . sat a long, long time, waiting patiently for the world to know me, and Iqbal 12 sometimes wondering why it did not know me sooner, or whether it would ever know me at all –at least, till I were in my grave. and sometimes . . . it seemed as if I were already in my grave . . . ” as recorded in Hawthorne’s note book (James 50).

Julian Hawthorne in his biography of Hawthorne quoted his father as saying: “We do not live at our house, we only vegetate. Eli [Hawthorne’s elder sister ]never leaves her den; I have mine in the upper storey, to which they always brings meal setting them down in a waiter at my door, which is always locked”(as qtd in Mellow 37).Once

Elizabeth Peabody asked Hawthorne, “do you think it is healthy to live so separated ?” to which he replied:“ Certainly not –it is no life at all –it is misfortune of my life. It has produced a morbid consciousness that paralyzed my powers” (Pearson 266-68).

Elizabeth Peabody wrote about Hawthorne’s mother that most of the time she was confined to her room but at the same time found her as a woman of fine sensibility. It contradicted her own statement because she would not have formed opinion about her character if she rarely met her. On one hand, Julian Hawthorne attributed the reason of the alienated temperament of his father to Hawthorne’s mother’s unnatural behavior but at the same time, admired her for her views on education. Julian Hawthorne appreciated

Hawthorne’s mother’s role in shaping the literary sensibilities of her son by encouraging him to read poetry, romances, and allegory. It highlighted the inconsistencies of Julian’s narration (1:123-125).

Elizabeth Hawthorne recalled, how sometimes they discussed political affairs,

“upon which we differed in opinion, he being a democrat and I of the opposite party”

(Mellow 38).Hawthorne shared his literary plans and even his frustration with his mother and sister. His imposed seclusion at Herbert Street was intentional to get some Iqbal 13 uninterrupted hours of writing in which his whole family cooperated whole -heartedly. It misled to the notion of the perverted influence of his family on his personality. His sisters and mother knew of his first novel which Sophia never knew till after his death. His family even helped him in collecting the copies of the pieces printed in The Twice-Told

Tales and to prepare a manuscript for publication.

Hawthorne’s sister Ebe Hawthorne used to select books for him from Salem

Athenaeum because he could not afford time to go out. Hawthorne’s sister Ebe had an avid interest in the affairs of the Salem and the world. She used to read the newspapers faithfully and kept herself abreast of the knowledge of American political affairs. She had her firm opinion on most of the topics of the day (Mellow 38).While Hawthorne was at

Bowdain, he was in constant contact with his sister Louisa through letters as he did not want to miss even the trivial details of her life. He mentioned in one of his letters that he made an appearance on the platform with congregation in chapel, “I would send you a printed list of the performances if it were not for the postage” (Mellow 22-23). Louisa maintained her correspondence with him when he was at Brook farm and deplored the infrequency of his visit and letters like in any normal intimate filial relation (Mellow

185).

“All his notebooks display a lively interest in the everyday human spectacle and abound in comments on place, with wide variation in one” (Stout 19). Hawthorne expressed his interest in thronged streets and the bustle of human life and took interest in all nooks and crannies and every development in his time. Hawthorne and Louisa

Hawthorne “attended dancing school” (Stearns 4). They founded the Pin society and brought out several issues of the “Spectator”, a hand printed paper which featured poetry Iqbal 14 by Louisa and assorted essays and humorous editorials by Hawthorne (Stearns 4). He also worked as a book keeper at his Uncle William’s shop and earned a salary of a dollar a week to make himself financially independent. He was interested in the accelerating process of urbanization and engaged with this public issue of widespread concern.

James R. Mellow wrote in his biography Nathaniel Hawthorne in His Times that he was popular among his college friends and often asked by them to visit their home, particularly by Bridge whose family lived in Augusta. Hawthorne wrote in the spring of

1823, “I believe I shall go to Augusta, if mother and uncle R have no objections”

(Mellow 32). A habitual recluse would never look forward with excitement to spend his days among strangers in the home of his friend and would never “talk with everybody”

(Matthiessen 211). He was conscious of the real life of the 19th century. Matthiessen denied that Hawthorne was only a recreator of a dim past oblivious to the major obligation of the artist to confront actual life. He wrote “Many have remarked his tragic depth” but, “Few have realized that his thought bore an immediate relation to the issues of his own day” (Matthiessen 192).

Arlin Turner, a renowned biographer of Hawthorne wrote in the Preface to his biography on Hawthorne that, “Few, if any, of our major authors have been as extensively and significantly involved as he was in the affairs of his time”. Melville appreciated Hawthorne’s intense feeling of the “usuable truth” (Matthiessen 192) When he was nine year old he was struck in his foot by a ball, which made him invalid for more than nine years. His aunt Priscilla wrote to her brother in Maine that he realized the severity of his confinement, “more on independence day than he ever done before . . . he cannot even ride out, to witness the celebrations of that event in which he has taken such Iqbal 15 delight” (Mellow 19). It was observed by James R. Mellow that, “He developed a taste for the casual gossip of local tavern, preferring it to polite parlor discourse. He had marked preference for democracy, rather than aristocratic occasions” (Mellow 10).

Hawthorne found interest in old Almanac and newspapers as they had been written by the interests of the age itself. He wrote that, “only way to endure posterity is to live truly, for ‘your own age’ ”or that, “all philosophy that would abstract mankind from present is no more than word” (Matthiessen 195-196). Hyatt. H. Waggoner found him ordinarily cheerful and sociable. Hawthorne wrote three biographical sketches which were printed in the Salem Gazette in the late 1830s,Sir William Phipps[ Nov23)Mrs.

Hutchinson[Dec7]and Dr. Bullivant [Jan11].These sketches are evidence of Hawthorne’s awareness of his nation’s and region’s past and his familiarity with the public figures and events of the colonial time. They reflect his endeavor to understand the ideological structure of society and the mindset of people.

Elizabeth Hawthorne wrote about her brother’s attraction for public figures, political meetings, and military drills. Whenever there was public gathering he always went out. “He liked a crowd” and when General Jackson, of whom he had professed himself a partisan visited Salem in 1833 “he walked out to the boundary of the town to meet him. . . .”(Mellow 46).

It is important to begin this proposed reading of Hawthorne’s Select novels and

Tales by establishing the author as man of his time. The present reading defies the traditional approaches to Hawthorne and attempts to elucidate convincingly a belief upheld by critics like Van Wyck Brooks that he is “most deeply planted of American writer, who indicates more than any other the subterranean history of the American Iqbal 16 character” (Mathiessen 210). Paul Elmer More’s Shelburne essays on Hawthorne treats him as a missing link, establishing the continuity between such ancestors as Cotton

Mather and such writers of the present as Mary Wilkins Freeman( Brodhead 9) which this thesis endeavors to establish firmly in the forth coming chapters.

Hawthorne was a man keenly aware of the problems of his time; He had studied them, and took his own stand. This reading tries to see in the Annals of the past, the story of the living forces which struggled to express their historical identity and reality through the framework of his so called romances. This reading will be a rewarding exploration as it will help to recover a repressed personal, social, religious, and political history obscured in Hawthorne’s allegory, symbolism, and romance.

The thorough combing of the context and minute reading of the available documents of the 17th and 19th century will help in deepening our understanding of

Hawthorne’s work and guide us in comprehending the author’s intention. This reading indulges in a species of cross cultural montage in which once untraditional sources, women’s letters, author’s personal diaries and notebooks, novels, essays, biographies, news paper clippings, historical documents, pamphlets even séances are used along with public texts, parliamentary debate, religious and social writings, medical journals, literary and critical works on the author. Hawthorne was a critic and interpreter of

American cultural history and can be read most convincingly as chronicler of his time.

Iqbal 17

[II]

It is be rewarding to discuss in the very beginning the constituent of history. In a book called The New History [1912], James Harvey Robinson rejected political history for telling the stories of the great leaders and wars while neglecting the other areas of human life. He believed that the fuller account of the past can only be given if it covered economical, psychological, social as well as political life of the commoners. It should not be an account of the lives of an elite few. Before the application of New Historicism on the fictional world of Hawthorne, it is important to explain in brief, New Historicism and its difference from the earlier historical approach.

New Historicism is shaped by the Post Structuralism and Reader Response theory of the 1970s as well as Feminist, Cultural, and Marxist Criticism. It was a term first noticed in a book Renaissance Self Fashioning: from More to Shakespeare in 1980 by an

American critic Stephen Jay Greenblatt. It occurred in response to the formalistic and text centered approach to literary work. It strongly objected against the New Criticism’s emphasis on the study of a work of literature as the finished product without any reference to the life of the author, historical, social, political, and religious background of its production. New Historicist’s efforts evoked unsuspected borrowing and lending among institutions, archives, metaphors, ceremonies, dances, emblem, items of clothing, and popular stories; previously held to be independent and unrelated. Selves and texts were defined by their relation to hostile others [despised and feared] for e.g. Indians,

Jews; Blacks, and disciplinary powers such as religion and masculinity.

New Historicist is particularly indebted to a French philosopher and historian

Michael Foucault’s works such as Discipline and Punish and The History of Sexuality. In Iqbal 18 these works, Foucault rejects the repressive hypothesis of his earlier studies of the working of power. He turns to the investigation of the ways in which power operates. It does not work by repressing dissenting forces but by organizing and channeling them.

Power for the later Foucault is not merely a physical force but a pervasive human dynamic determining our relationships to others. All people exert certain power over us in so far as we defer to their needs and desires. The moment we deny the power over us we cease to acknowledge their humanity and human rights.

Foucault believed that no historical event was the result of a single force but there were various economic, sociological, and political factors responsible for its happenings.

He viewed history not as repressive power but as a combination of forces responsible for a particular event. Since one who is empowered will be empowered by discourses and practices that constitute power, for e.g. power of the judges in the Salem witchcraft trial.

Power triumphs over opposition not by negating it but by producing it according to its peculiar requirements. What passes traditionally for transgression or rebellion against power as in the case of the modern discourse of sexuality turns out to be another face of power, a mean by which power reproduces, distributes, and extends itself.

Power can also be surreptitious in a way when a dominant group exerts its influence over others. The hegemonic power refers to the use of institution to formalize power as ministers and church leaders make power seem abstract in The Scarlet Letter. It is not attached to any particular individual. The opinion of the populace at the time of

Hester’s appearance on the scaffold reveals how the ideals of hegemonic group are inculcated in public through various means, e.g. fictional text. The patriarchy in The Iqbal 19

Blithedale Romance and The Scarlet Letter is bent on maintaining forces of containment and hegemonic forces are attempting to consolidate the status quo.

According to Foucault, the constructions of the past are inevitably implicated in the present networks of power and domination and thus never seem disinterested. New historicism is attentive to the issues of power and ideology and to the ways in which these regulate and reproduce culture. Dominant discourses inhabit our consciousness, our practices and can hardly be evaded.

New Historicist avoids making any claim of universal and total meaning of a particular historical and cultural context and concentrates on the specific aspects of it. It defines literature not as a mere play of imagination, nor as a solitary caprice of a heated brain. Historicism, both old and new is always reactive against a prior idealism. New

Historicists’ prime assumption is that all cultural and social phenomena particularly the individual self like other natural phenomena can only be understood as influenced and are shaped by imperious agents, cultural traditions, institutions, race, ethnicity, relations of gender, economics, physical environments and above all by disposition of power.

New Historicism is different from Old Historicism of 1920-1950. Old historical critics viewed history as the background of literature. They were concerned with the discovery of a single political vision which they believed to be held by the entire literate class or indeed the entire population. This single vision is challenged by New Historicists who are less fact oriented because they doubted the objectivity and purity of the recorded happenings.

New Historicists are self conscious and state that an objective historical understanding is impossible contrary to the old historicist’s faith. They assert that the Iqbal 20 author and poets are not secular saints; rather they are more involved in their society than an average citizen. No one can rise above his/r own social formation, his ideological upbringing. It shifts the focus of literary research from the formal analysis of verbal artifacts to the ideological analysis of discursive practices.

They believe that all cultural phenomena bear certain relation to one another because they are thought to be expressions of an invisible cause or center. New

Historicists insist that attitudes towards concept like feminism, love, reform are the products of a culture. Our deeply held feelings are the result of certain historical events and occurrences, “This just seemed fantastically exciting to me because it meant that things that just seem given are not given, that they’re made up. And if they’re made up that means they can be changed” (Stephen Greenblatt). They assume that there is no objectivity in creation and criticism and we experience the world through language and all “our representations of the world, our readings of texts and of the past are informed by our own historical position, by values and politics that are rooted in them”(Newton

88).

Stephen Greenblatt used all sorts of obscure writings of a period in which he was interested in and from the other periods also for his New Historicist reading. He called them “literary traces”. He was able to discover irrefutable connections between events and texts that might seem inconsequential because of his ability to notice more than what appeared on surface.

The present reading of Hawthorne’s texts detect a repressed historicity behind their over highlighted aesthetic dimension. To begin with, this reading takes into account the books on New Historicism to understand the nuances of it apart from essays on Iqbal 21

Stephen Greenblatt and other New Historicist material on the internet. The present work has also used books available on American social, political, religious, and economical history in the library and on the internet to juxtapose them with the fictional works of

Hawthorne. This reading also takes into account- American journals, documents available on colonial history, works published during Hawthorne’s time in form of fiction, pamphlets, poem or any other form of documents to use them as context. It has also used

Hawthorne’s letters and note books, letters and essays of Emerson, works of Henry David

Thoreau, Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson. It has not even overlooked works of

Hawthorne’s contemporary fiction writers especially focusing on those works which have addressed similar subjects which are explored by Hawthorne.

This reading attempts to relate interpretive problems such as why does Zenobia commit suicide in The Blithedale Romance or why do Hephzibah and Clifford go to country side at the end of The House of the seven Gables to the cultural, social, historical, and political context; aiming simultaneously to understand his work through its historical context and to understand the cultural and intellectual history through his fiction.

[Note: The quote from Sophia Peabody in the beginning of the chapter has been derived from the Preface to Nathaniel Hawthorne by Arlin Turner, N Y: OUP, 1980.]

Iqbal 22

Works Cited:

1. Baym, Nina. “Nathaniel Hawthorne and His Mother.” American Literature 54.1

(Mar 1982):1-27. Print.

2. Brodhead, Richard H. The School of Hawthorne. New York: Oxford University Press,

1986. Print.

3. Cowie, Alexander. The Rise of American Novel. New York: American Book Company,

1948. Print.

4. Hall, Lawrence Sargent. Hawthorne: Critic of Society. Massachusetts: Peter Smith,

1966. Print.

5. Hawthorne, Julian. Hawthorne and His Wife: A Biography. Vol. I. Boston: University

Press, 1884. Print.

6. Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. London: Penguin Books, 1994. Print.

7. - - - . “The Old News” Mosses from the Old Manse. USA: Ohio State University

Press, 1974. Print.

8. James, Henry. Hawthorne. New York: Cornwell University Press,1956. Print.

9. Mather, Edward. Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Modest Man. New York: Greenwood Press,

1970. Print.

10. Matthiessen, F.O. American Renaissance. New York: Oxford University Press,

1941. Print.

11. Mellow, James R. Nathaniel Hawthorne in His Times. Boston: Houghton Mifflin

Company, 1980. Print.

Iqbal 23

12. Newton, Judith Lowder, “Feminism and the “New Historicism” ” in Harold Aram

Veeser, Ed. The New Historicism. New York: Routledge, Chapman and Hall,

Inc., 1989. Print.

13. Pearson, Norman Holmes. Elizabeth Peabody on Hawthorne. Salem: Essex Institute

Historical Collections, 1958. Print.

14. Stearns, Frank Preston. The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Philadelphia: JB Lippincott Company, 1906. Print.

15. Stephens, Mitchell. “Stephen Greenblatt and the New Historicism”, West Magazine,

March 1, 1992. Web.2nd Mar. 2008. www.nyu.edu.com.

16. Stewart, Randall. Nathaniel Hawthorne-A Biography. New Haven: Yale University

Press, 1948. Print.

17. Stovall, Floyd, ed. Eight American Authors. New York: W. W. Norton &

Company. INC., 1963. Print.

18. Stout, Janis P. Sodoms in Eden. London: Greenwood Press, 1976. Print.

19. Turner, Arlin. Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Biography. New York: Oxford University

Press, 1980. Print.

20. Warren, Austin, ed. Nathaniel Hawthorne. New York: American Book Co.,

1934. Print. Iqbal 24

Chapter II

Review of Literature

American fiction writer, Nathaniel Hawthorne is one of the most studied authors in the English language. His influence has been felt by writers and critics all over the world. He is considered canonical in both his own time and in the 21st century. His short tales and four full-length romances – The Scarlet Letter [1850], The House of the Seven

Gables [1851], The Blithedale Romance [1852], and The Marble Faun [1860] significantly responded to the call for an American literature commensurate with the national culture which was developing and defining itself between the American

Revolution and Civil War.

In his introduction to the book called Critical Insights, Nathaniel Hawthorne

[Salem Press, 2009], Jack Lynch writes that Hawthorne’s works can be found in virtually every library in the English-speaking world. No responsible survey course on American literature is complete without The Scarlet Letter; no reputable collection of American short stories can omit “The Birth-mark” or “Rappaccini’s Daughter”. Hawthorne’s enduring works have established his reputation as a major writer of the 19th century

America and the most prominent chronicler of New England and its colonial history.

As a forefather of American literature, there are a variety of critical viewpoints and an array of critical approaches to Hawthorne’s fictional corpus. Earliest critical works on Hawthorne are available in the form of a biography of Nathaniel Hawthorne by

Henry James [1896] and reviews of Hawthorne’s Twice Told Tales by Edgar Ellen Poe in April, May 1842 , and “Hawthorne and His Mosses” by Herman Melville. Iqbal 25

Traditional literary approaches to Hawthorne’s work were centered on the moral and philosophical aspects in his works. Randall Stewart in Nathaniel Hawthorne –A

Biography focused on his belief “in the educative value of sin” and “the idea of the fortunate fall” (263-264). In the collection of essays edited by A.N Kaul, Donald A.Ringe in “Hawthorne’s Psychology of Head and Heart” [1950] spoke about the dichotomy of head and heart in Hawthorne’s works. Ringe worked out on an interesting dimension in his reading by revealing that the isolation of Hawthorne’s characters was born out of an unopened heart whose key was sin. F.O. Mathiessen also discussed about the psychology of head and heart in his critical reading American Renaissance (337-351). Austin

Warren in a chapter entitled “Moral slant” in his biography Nathaniel Hawthorne endorsed that the starting point of Hawthorne’s tales was essentially a moral idea “from earliest of Hawthorne’s published stories onward the theme of guilt is prominent” (54).

These critics asserted that The Scarlet Letter focuses on sin and its retribution, The

Blithedale Romance is about the study of guilt and emblem, The House of Seven Gables is about sin of past and perpetuation of evil, and The Marble Faun explores aspects of guilt more than any other of his novels.

Hubert Hoeltje stressed on Hawthorne’s moral universe in his book, Inward Sky and Spiller in The Oblique Light[1970] , Reverend Leonard J. Fick in The Light Beyond

[1955], and Lyle Elazier in Decadence and Rebirth [1977] related the idea of

Hawthorne’s tales to fatality of universal sin and sense of moral responsibility for the fall. The theme of concealment, retribution, guilty conscience, and isolation had led to their psychological consequences, which supported psychological approaches to Iqbal 26

Hawthorne’s works. It was assumed that because the writer was haunted by a sense of personal guilt, hence his stories were replete with instances of sin and isolation.

Formalistic approach to Hawthorne’s work directed readers to the world of his imagery, symbolism, allegory, and emblem in complete detachment from his life and perspectives. John W. Schroeder in “That Inward Sphere” dwelled on Hawthorne’s allegory, images, and symbolism along with Charles Fiedelson. David E. Smith also discussed religious allegory in his work in John Bunyan in America [Indiana: 1966].

With the evolving changes in perspective and methodology of criticism, the critical consensus on Hawthorne has considerably changed in recent decades. In biographical and critical studies of the recent dates, Hawthorne emerges as a well connected person with active involvement in social, political, and religious movements in his time. His historical acumen ship has been recognized at par with any contemporary chronicler of his time. The new critic Joel Pfister in The Production of Personal Life

[1991] demystifies the claim of earlier critics who find Hawthorne’s works as product of isolated genius without any relation to his surroundings. This book rereads Hawthorne in historical perspective and reconstitutes a new image of him. Chapter 2 of this work

“Historical Birthmarks” discusses why human bodies in Hawthorne’s fiction and his culture are stereotyped as unstable and disordered. Its chapter 3 “Plotting Womanhood” relates feminization to the social process and is benchmark writing on Hawthorne and the social construction of femininity in The Blithedale Romance. It explains Hawthorne’s role in the ideological process of feminization. Its chapter 5 is on The Scarlet Letter, chapter 6 is on The House of the Seven Gables and chapter 7 is about The Marble Faun.

All these chapters present a historical reading of Hawthorne’s works. Iqbal 27

David B. Kesterson in “Margaret Fuller and Hawthorne” enlightens us on

Hawthorne’s relationship with one of the most unconventional woman of his time. Nina

Baym’s article “Hawthorne and his Mother” (American Literature) throws new light on his relationship with his mother.

Other perforce reading was Hawthorne: Critic of Society by L. S. Hall. Especially

Chapter VII of this book “The Social Ethics” offered a decisive refutation of the earlier views that Hawthorne’s works were allegorical romances, a byproduct of solitary existence. Hall had gone through official records, personal correspondences, and

Notebooks to assert that Hawthorne was well braced with knowledge of contemporary society and politics.

Stoehr Taylor’s book Hawthorne’s Mad Scientists [1978] was published by

Archon Books. It contains a comprehensive detail of pseudoscience and social sciences in the 19th century. His chapter 2 “Mesmerism” is a detailed historical documentation of the nefarious practice in the field of science in the 19th century. In his time, Hawthorne saw that the society had engulfed in the fascination of science and its preoccupation with self led to dehumanization of human society. Taylor cites letters of Hawthorne to his would be wife Sophia Peabody as an example to ascertain Hawthorne’s familiarity with mesmerism as well as his dislike for such wayward practices. Taylor’s chapter 10 “Mad

Scientist” highlights the waning of interest in science and technology in the wake of distrust in its application after seeing the use of atom bomb on human beings in the 19th century.

Gender and Morality in Anglo –American Culture1650-1800 by Ruth Bloch Iqbal 28

[California: 2003] provides the background information of the case of Richard

Bellingham and the irony underplaying the whole affair. Francis J. Bremer and Tom

Webster’s Puritans and Puritanism in Europe and America (Web) and Cott, Nancy, ed.

Root of Bitterness: Documents of the Social History of American Women [ NY: 1972] relate experiences of Anne Hutchinson and Ann Hibbins of the 17th century to Hester

Prynne of The Scarlet Letter. These books provide an insight into the discrepancies prevalent in the Puritan regime between ideology and practice. Frederick Newbery “Red

Hot ‘A’ and a Lusting Divine” published in New England Quarterly [1987] is a well informed and well written article which has helped in awakening an unprecedented interest in the colonial history.

Amid the corpus of available critical texts on Hawthorne, it was difficult to select any particular work and say it was the source in writing this thesis. The selection of resources was very exhaustive and time taking exercise. The nature of the present thesis made it mandatory to give equal importance to texts from other disciplines to place

Hawthorne’s fiction in the context of thoughts and happenings in the time of its composition as well as the time they had talked about.

The contextualized reading of Hawthorne’s fictional world made it essential to take into account his biographical sources. Various exhaustive and interpretive works on his life were available. For this purpose besides taking into account Henry James full length reading on Hawthorne, Edward Mather’s Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Modest Man.

[NY: 1970] and Edward Charles Wagenknecht’s Nathaniel Hawthorne: Man and

Writer[ NY: 1961] became the source for exploring background. Iqbal 29

Henry James’s critical biography Hawthorne published over a century ago is an essential text in American cultural history. It had been written for the English Men of

Letters Series and since then achieved canonical status among students of American literature. It is an insightful study of his predecessor. James assessed Hawthorne as a greatest imaginative author America had produced. He gave extended consideration to each of Hawthorne’s novels and a selection of his short stories in this full length critical reading. He defined Hawthorne as a moral realist who had a few perceptible point of contact with the world around but at the same time recognized his historical consciousness in his chapters, “Early Years”, “Early Manhood”, and “Early Writings”.

His chapter “Brook Farm and Concord” gives an engaging account of Hawthorne’s stay at Brook Farm and an indispensible connection between the character of Zenobia in The

Blithedale Romance and female activist and transcendentalist Margaret Fuller. His chapter 6 “The Three American Novels” is about his larger fictional works, chapter 7

“England and Italy” is about his European stay and the last chapter “Last Years” concludes with his death.

In Edward Mather’s biographical work Nathaniel Hawthorne, especially chapter six “Of Puritans, Quakers, and Witches” was instrumental in understanding the role of

Puritans in deciding the fate of dissenters: Quakers and witches in the 17th century

America. Chapter 15 of the same book “The Expulsion” and Chapter 16 “Decapitation” are political in nature. They narrate the whole episode leading to the expulsion of

Hawthorne from the Salem Custom House and Hawthorne’s fight with the administration for his reinstatement as the surveyor of the Salem custom House. Wagenknecht’s book Iqbal 30 explores Hawthorne’s relationship with Margaret Fuller. He defines Hawthorne’s attitude towards career oriented females as “negative”.

Frank Preston Stearns’s The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne [1906] gives an exhaustive detail on Hawthorne’s ancestral history, witchcraft trials and his ancestor’s role in that episode. It provides a detailed account of Hawthorne’s Brook Farm venture, his Concord stay and his affinity with transcendentalists and transcendentalism.

Stearns draws at length at the similarity between the character of Zenobia in The

Blithedale Romance and the real life female activist Margaret Fuller. He records

Hawthorne’s bitter political experience at Custom House and political manoueuvring of

Charles Wentworth Upham to oust him from his post of surveyorship.

But the book which was instrumental in projecting a new picture of Hawthorne as a man of his time was James R. Mellow’s Nathaniel Hawthorne in His Times [Boston:

1980]. This book succeeds in rescuing Hawthorne’s image from the dungeon of isolation.

It reveals him as a man normal in his activities and well connected with his family and the society of his time. Contrary to the commonly held belief of his estranged relation with his mother and sisters, this book reiterates that his relation with his mother was very cordial, affectionate, open and dependable by citing examples from Hawthorne’s epistles to his mother. Refuting the perverse impact of his so called abnormal family on his personality, Mellow portrays his sister Ebe as a well read person who was keenly aware of the political life of her time. He even raises fingers on dubious intention of Hawthorne behind propagating himself as victim of unhealthy family traits. Mellow also focuses on

Hawthorne’s skeptical attitude towards revolutionary activities and dissects the probable Iqbal 31 model for Judge Pyncheon’s character in The House of Seven Gables in real life political figures Daniel Webster and Nathaniel Silsbee.

In order to study Hawthorne’s Novels and Tales in New Historicist perspective, it was essential to understand New Historicism and its application on fictional works.

Horald Veeser, ed. The New Historicism .[ NY: 1989] contains some excellent essays on

New Historicism by some outstanding New Historicists, Louis Montrose, Catharine

Gallagher, Stephen Greenblatt, Thomas Brook and Frank Lentrichhia. The introduction to the book begins with pronouncement of Stephen Greenblatt, “I began with the desire to speak with the dead” in his essay “Shakespeare Negotiations”. Greenblatt’s essay focuses on the work of art as a ground for manipulations of critic’s ideas as well as many other thoughts undertaken in the construction of the original work. He expounds that the creative pieces are the result of negotiation between a creator and the institutions and practices of a society.

Louis Montrose in “The Poetics and Politics of Culture” asserts that reading and writing of the texts, their process of circulation, analysis and teaching are being reconstructed as historically determined and determining modes of cultural works.

Brook Thomas in “The New Historicism and other Old Fashioned topics” elaborates on the difference between old historical method and this present return to historical analysis. He asserts that New Historicism gives representation to the groups excluded by previous histories. Frank Lentrichhiain “Foucault’s Legacy –A New

Historicism” also discusses at length on the difference between the old and new method of historical application in literature. All these essays have discussed in detail the various components of new historicist practice and even do not fail to point out its drawback. Iqbal 32

The Profile of Stephen Greenblatt by Mitchell Stephens, published in West

Magazine [1st Mar, 1992] entitled “Stephen Greenblatt and New Historicism”[Web] was an eye opener. It made such complex topic as New Historicism an easy and interesting reading by giving a friendly account of Greenblatt’s New Historicist practices.

Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson[New Delhi:1965] with an introduction from

Shiv Kumar contains essays on History, Self Reliance, Compensation, Spiritual Laws,

Love, Friendship, Prudence, Heroism, The Over soul, Circles, Intellect, Art, The Poet

,Experience, Character, Manners, Gifts, Malice, Politics, Nominalist and Realist, New

England Reformers, Plato: or the Philosophers, Nepoleon; or the man of world.

Emerson’s essays Self Reliance, Circles, Compensation, Circles, and New England

Reformers were important to understand the ideology behind Transcendentalism which shaped the consciousness of Hawthorne.

To find out resonance between the ideas expressed in Hawthorne’s selected novels and tales and in the other discourses, numerous books were available on social, political, economical, and religious history of ideas in the library; the detail of all cannot be given here. It will need separate book to discuss all of them in detail. This review of

Literature presents merely a summary of the whole venture.

The books of chronology helped in understanding the role of Hawthorne’s surroundings in shaping his thoughts and character which had gone into the making of his fiction. Henry Bamford Parkes The United States of America –A History presents an exhaustive account of a transitional phase in American political and social history in the

19th century. Iqbal 33

Allan Nevins and Henry Steele Commager’s book, A Short History of the United

States, 5th ed. [NY: 1966] explores the power structure in the 17th century patriarchal society and the role of ministers in governing individual life. It also provides with detailed information on mesmerism and its influence on people in the 19th century, besides giving details of Seneca Fall convention1948, and female suffrage. Charles M.

Andrew’s book The Colonial Period of American History gives a short biography of

Anne Hutchinson and explores how her independent outlook threatened the subversive community of Massachusetts Bay Colony. It also gives an account of Thomas Morton

Gent’s Merrrymount establishment and his tussle with the authority.

James Truslow Adam’s work The Americans [N Y: 1944] highlights the atrocities in the name of religion in the mid 17th century. He applauds Roger William for his liberal attitude and focuses upon the irony behind Puritan undemocratic practices. Nelson

Manfred Blake in A Short History of American Life [NY: 1952] gives a comprehensive account of the sweeping changes in the American society with the emergence of bourgeois society and sidetracking of nobility in Jackson’s time. This book celebrates democratic principles and nullifies aristocratic privileges. He also expresses his views on female liberty and condemns those practices which push women to the periphery.

Sophia Hawthorne, ed. Passages from the French and Italian Note-Books,

[Boston: 1883, Web] served as a handbook to guide the journey from Hawthorne’s fiction to his personal experiences and observations.

Maule Family Newsletter –Vol-viii, No.2,March 1988, Review of better that 100 witches should live by Eric Longway at http://www.jembook.com and Rosemary Ellen

Guiley “The Encyclopedia of witches and witchcraft,” [NY:1989] provided with Iqbal 34 essential material on the witchcraft trial of 1692 and an authentic account of the historical Maule. The Quakers: “Hostile Bonnets and Gowns” from The Colonial

Gazettte mayflowerfamilies.com, Interactive communication [1988] gave a factual account of the strife between Quakers and the Puritan magistrates.

The present reading will focus on Hawthorne as a shrewd and large-minded writer who had read widely and pondered deeply about the human condition and American identity. He had written about his own society and its antecedents, but it turned out that he also wrote about ours. His works are cultural colloquy. The recognition that literary texts are man-made, historically produced objects, whose value has been created and recreated by men and women out of their particular needs, suggests a need to study the interests, institutional practices, and social arrangements that sustain the canon of classic works. It also opens the way for retrieval of the values and interests embodied in the texts which the literary establishment for a variety of reasons has suppressed. Iqbal 35

Chapter III

Ideological Representations

in

The Scarlet Letter

The Scarlet Letter is an American text that communicates the core beliefs, values, and aspirations of the American culture. Its democratic aesthetics emerge from the historical and cultural contexts in which this work of creative imagination is conceived.

It encompasses an ever widening circle of history and culture through selection of events and characters. This tale is wrapped up in thick description- historical, cultural, and epistemological hence, entails a plurality of perspectives.

Despite Hawthorne’s avowed and declared attempt to liberate his tale from every day context, he paid careful attention to the historical setting in his novel The Scarlet

Letter. He was a widely read person and conducted extensive research in historical sources before writing this novel. The historicity of the novel is established by placing the tale between the years 1642 to 1649. This tale owes as much to the 17th century

Puritan history as to the 19th century American society. For the Puritanical history,

Hawthorne took extensive background information from the “Journals” of Winthrop and his The History of New England from 1630-1649[1825-1826] and Caleb H. Snow’s A

History of Boston [1825] and also from Joseph Felt’s The Annals of Salem from Its First

Settlement [1827]. These readings shaped his opinion regarding the impact of Puritanism on the life of the common man in the 17th century New England. Hawthorne frequently manipulated individual cases of historical entities to discuss his ideologies framed in the

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19th century America amidst its uproar for democracy, gender equality, republicanism, and assertion on individual integrity and dignity. He even did not miss volatile issues like female rights and liberty.

The present proposed work explores various documents and events of the period in which this tale unfolds, besides taking into account the time when this tale is penned.

This reading attempts to bring out a new interpretation through a kind of meaningful juxtaposition of various documents of Hawthorne’s time and the colonial period with the text of the novel. Apparently, incongruous events and texts seem to be connected and turn out to speak to each other in the course of this reading.

Be it the case of Governor Bellingham and his sister Ann Hibbins, Anne

Hutchinson, Governor William or Mary Batchellor of the seventeenth century Boston, doctrine of transcendentalism or woman suffrage movement of the 19th century America- all these historical personages, events, and ideologies went into the making of this novel.

This fictional projection of relevant episodes and issues of the past as well as present by

Hawthorne established him as a great chronicler, a widely read person. He was extensively familiar with both the past and present of his country and its people.

Historian Carr writes, “the facts of history never come to us in pure form, since they do not and cannot exist in a pure form: they are always refracted through the mind of the recorder” (22). History is a historian’s experience and his understanding of the past from present perspective; hence a new history emerges through the interaction of the past and present. The same is the case with Hawthorne’s tale of a fallen woman of the 17th

America in The Scarlet Letter. It raises issues relevant in the context of present day

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America. Hawthorne had read Annals of Salem by Felt but he also read Nature by R.W

Emerson. These facts and experiences of the past and present led to the creation of The

Scarlet Letter.

[I]

Hawthorne was a man of the 19th century who lived in an age of intellectual and social revolution. It was the time when fiction adopted a function earlier performed by other modes of composition. He projected fictionally two significant and debatable issues of the 19th century society in the character of Hester Prynne. At the time of writing this cultural text, the subject of Self Reliance and the burning questions of Female Liberty and

Equality were preoccupying the mind of the populace in the wake of Seneca Fall

Convention of 1948. It is not difficult to detect the present author’s obsession with

Puritan history and his perception of continuity of thought from past to present in this tale.

The Scarlet Letter is a story of America’s progressive movement from aristocratic

Puritanism to democratic Jacksonianism. Hawthorne could discern the seed of this tale in the letter “A” which he found in the Customs House of the 19th century. Hawthorne was a shrewd student of history and an outspoken critic of some aspects of the American scenes, if not a spokesman of a particular time. He tested the political, hierarchal, religious, and societal thought structures of the past from the present perspective in the present text.

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Hester is a young English woman who is married to an old English scholar Roger

Chillingworth, unsuitable for her age and temperament. Chillingworth is an aged man in comparison to his young wife and the match between them is a kind of economic arrangement; he contracted it with her legal guardians. Hester is passionate, untamed like wild forest, and beautiful whereas he is physically deformed by birth with a humped shoulder. In order to quell his inferiority complex, he immerses himself in studies to attain intellectual gift to veil his misshapen physique. He is a bookworm of great libraries who has spent the best years of his life appeasing his hunger for knowledge. Hester’s marriage with Chillingworth is without any passion and emotional ecstasy. She was given to this exceptionally cold and frigid man whose energies were directed towards scholarly pursuits.

Several years before the action of the novel unfolds, Hester was living with her husband Roger Chillingworth in Amsterdam. She is sent to the colonies by her husband in advance with a promise to join her shortly as soon as his business venture settles in

Amsterdam. Hester lives all alone for two years or less in Boston while her husband remains in England. His intended arrival was further delayed due to a grievous mishap by sea and land as he was in the captivity of Indians over a year. She desperately waits for his arrival but receives no news of him. This vibrant, energetic woman of impulsive and sensuous nature is left alone in her youth by her husband; which makes her vulnerable to passionate errors. She falls in love with the young minister of the parish, Arthur

Dimmesdale and even gives birth to his child.

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Apart from her loneliness, it was the physical and mental incompatibility between

Hester and Chillingworth which led to the breaking of the marriage vow by Hester. It brings their relation into the domain of social psychology. Hester is not satisfied with her loveless marriage. “Be it sin or no” says Hester Prynne, bitterly, as she still gazes after him, “I hate the man!” (SL150). She marvels at, “how she could ever have been wrought upon to marry him!”(SL150). She still bears him in her memory as a frigid man whose preoccupation with his study has made his eyes dim and blear, pouring over bulky and voluminous books of learning.

Chillingworth was more accountable for this misalliance because he knowingly went ahead with this marriage. He confessed before Hester that it was his folly because he deluded himself with the idea that his ugly exterior would become insignificant in front of his intellectual accomplishment. In spite of knowing the incompatibility of their match, he thought to attract his young partner’s fancy through learning. It was sheer folly of this passionless man as he realized later, for, “What had I to do with youth and beauty like thine own!”(SL 63). He lacked the practical wisdom to foresee the outcome of such mismatch was “the bale –fire of that scarlet letter ’’ (SL 63). He told Hester that he was a lonely man and desired a young woman to warm his house with her presence. He hoped that his female partner would relieve his cramped scholarly loneliness and would bring him the genial gift of simple bliss. It was his natural right to dream of such domestic happiness but he destroyed his chances of it through a wrong choice. He admitted that both of them were wrong but he was the first wrong doer. He committed the mistake of forcing a young woman into a false and unnatural relation with an old man, physically

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deformed, and emotionally cold. He spent most of his time in his study throwing his young wife into a dungeon of loneliness. He realized later:

Let men tremble to win the hand of woman, unless they win along with it

the utmost passion of her heart! Else it may be their miserable fortune, as

it was Roger Chillingworth’s, when some mightier touch than their own

may have awakened all her sensibilities, to be reproached even for the

calm content, the marble image of happiness, which they will have

imposed upon her as the warm reality. (SL 150)

Hester considers it a crime that she ever endured his closeness and reciprocated his overtures in spite of feeling no love for him. She finds Chillingworth’s offense fouler because he forced her to consider herself happy with him while she was not. He willfully won her in a contract from her guardian without seeking her consent. She was compelled to accept this mismatch alliance as she was left without choice. He took this relationship with her for granted which proved lethal for their alliance.

The historical time setting of the novel is established by suggesting the various actual events which have taken place in history during the period in which the author unravels this tale. Hawthorne gives reference to the upcoming popular election in the chapter, “The Governor’s Hall”, death of Governor Winthrop in the chapter entitled,

“The Minister’s Vigil”; in the another chapter, “The New England Holiday” there is a reference to a new man who is going to rule over them -and it can be no other than John

Endecott. Hawthorne’s oblique reference to Anne Hutchinson, a historical figure of the

17th century Puritan society in the very first chapter of the novel, “The Prison Door”

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establishes her as an important historical personage of the novel, underlying the apparent story of Hester Prynne. While looking at the rose bush at the prison door, the author writes, “It had sprung up under the footsteps of the sainted Ann Hutchinson, as she entered the prison door” (SL 41, Italics mine). In the chapter called “Another view of

Hester”, Hawthorne again equates Hester with Anne Hutchinson. “She might have come down to us in history, hand in hand with Ann Hutchinson, as the foundress of a religious sect. she might, in one of her phases, have been a prophetess. she might, and not improbably would, have suffered death from the stern tribunals of the period for attempting to undermine the foundation of the Puritan establishment”( SL 140, Italics mine).These lines bring the underlying association of fictitious Hester with Anne

Hutchinson of reality as an important focal point of this reading.

Anne Hutchinson was originally of Salem who was a religious radical. She openly preached religious freedom and invited the ire of the orthodox. She proclaimed that the utmost duty of an individual was towards the promptings of an inner supernatural voice.

She believed that the salvation of an individual depended on the presence of the Holy

Ghost within and not in following any dogmatic theology. She was a non –conformist like Hester who took prominent part in religious and political matters of Massachusetts

Colony from 1636-1638. She expounded a doctrine akin to what later in Emerson’s day was called Transcendentalism. She advocated minimizing the role of the clergies in the matters of religion. Her openly avowed religious views provoked keen antagonism among the orthodox as she attacked the religious polity of Massachusetts Bay Colony as

“covenant of works”. She advocated a “covenant of grace” based on a direct personal

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apprehension of divine grace and love and formed her own ideas about the meaning of the Bible. She started to hold meetings to discuss sermons. This was alarmingly unconventional, since Anne was taking on a role reserved for males only. Instead of taking directions from male counterparts, she was disseminating her thoughts freely. She refuted the role of minister or church in religion in interpreting the words of God and emphasized that each individual might know the truth and gain salvation through a direct contact with God. She focused that each person was a law unto himself or herself

(Bragdon and Cutchen 28).

In the 17th century Puritan society, women occupied the position of limited authority. In the patriarchal structure, her gender jeopardized her existence in two ways.

Anne Hutchinson not only refuted the unquestionable power of the ministers but also tested the boundaries of female independence. As a dissenter, she openly questioned the authority of the male ministers and poured down her accusation on the head of states and religion. Due to her radicalism, the Puritan establishment found her the epicenter of disharmony as she posed a challenge to the New England patriarchal social structure. She broke the rules of paternalistic society by resisting control over female voice in religion.

For this transgression, she was brought to trial for the crime of sedition and contempt of the magistrates.

She was sentenced to banishment and later excommunicated from the church for heresy after refusing to make a public recantation. After her expulsion from the colony, she fled to Rhode Island and later to Long island along with her young children. “In

1643 a band of Mohican Indians attacked her home, killing her and all but one child.

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Pious Puritans hailed Anne’s unhappy ending as proof that her unwomanly and poisonous ideas offended God” (Bragdon and Cutchen 28).

The expulsion of Anne Hutchinson from the colony was inevitable in those times when, “religious freedom was wholly inconsistent with public safety . . . unity of faith was the star that had guided these people over the deep; and a diversity of sects would either have scattered them . . . , or, perhaps, have excited a diminutive civil war among those who had come so far to worship together” (Mather 57).

In his “Introduction to the sketch of Anne Hutchinson”, Hawthorne wrote a short essay on the public women of the 19th century. He referred to the social changes which were sweeping across the whole continent and expressed his apprehension regarding the newly evolved concept of public women in the female sphere. This new woman was challenging the old social paradigm by advocating female rights and redefining and reformulating the role of woman on the societal horizon. Hawthorne dissected this new role and found it dangerous for posterity. It was the time when Margaret Fuller and

Elizabeth Peabody were bringing a phenomenal change in the society through their speeches and writings. At that time, Hawthorne wrote about Anne Hutchinson that she had stood ‘loftily’ before her male judges whom “her doctrines have put in fear”. The

“deepest controversies of that day”, Hawthorne noted, was to, “find here a woman, whom all their trained and sharpened intellect are inadequate to foil” (Person 108).

Anne Hutchinson’s matter was partly religious and partly political. Her magnetic temperament, an indubitable courage, and intellectual virility were considered not virtue but an innate flaw in her character in a society that looked upon a woman as an inferior

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creature of feeble mind. Anne’s counterpart in the 19th century America was Margaret

Fuller. Anne Hutchinson was “deemed by the elders and magistrates something of a firebrand, an impudent dame whose tongue had got the better of her discretion and one who was in great danger of becoming a menace to the community” (Andrews 477). Like

Hester Prynne, she revolted against the orthodoxy and emphasized on individualism, independence, and self sufficiency, hence she was considered a dangerous person in the

Bible Common wealth. In their assertion on individuality and freedom from religious authority, Hester and Anne Hutchinson posed serious threat to the ecclesiastical power which was manipulating every event at that time to retain power in their own hands.

On the broader spectrum, this tale entails the conflict between private mind and public institution. In the Puritan society, power was vested in an aristocracy of iron willed despotic rulers of the church which lasted with gradually declining vigor until 1691.The unyielding prosecuting spirit of the ministers led to one of the shameful episodes of the

American history, the witchcraft trial of 1691. About witchcraft trial Charles Wentworth

Upham and Abbot, along with the historian Bancroft wrote that it was a conspiracy of the ministers who used religious fear to regain political power. Hawthorne was neither a blind admirer of Puritanism nor a thorough critic of it. He used the Puritanical moment of history merely to illustrate the truth of all moments. Hester anticipates in her radicalism this Quaker woman Anne Hutchinson who usurped the male prerogatives and pulpit.

Hester is intellectually strong and emotionally resourceful person whose very existence questions those who argue about the mental imbecility of females. She forces the Puritan community to acknowledge her own definition of freedom and individuality.

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Hester Prynne suffers social ostracism and banishment like Anne Hutchinson for her assertion on the freedom of an individual and for defying tyrannical authority of church rulers. Anne Hutchinson and Hester were concerned with social reform and the role of women in the society. They functioned as counselor and comforter to women and were associated with the idea of revolution. They incarnated emancipation and were punished for their defiance against the conventional power. They were feared by the religious authority as their rebellious impulse against the subversive Puritan authority could incite people and ignite democratic sentiments. As a result of this apprehension, both of them were banished from the society. Regarding the settlement of Massachusetts Bay Colony,

Baldwin wrote:

It was an experiment in theocratic government- that is, a government

by God-with its principles drawn from the divinely inspired precepts

of the Bible as interpreted by the learned Calvinist clergy of the

colony. There was a strong distrust of the ability of the common people to

govern them-selves. “Democratie” was feared and hated as devilish device

to give the ignorant and emotional rabble control of government and thus

promote licentiousness and economic chaos. (30)

Religious leaders were not so much concerned for their sin but were alarmed by their liberal attitude. Their punishment was an attempt to underdetermine the dissenters’ power against the established system of the government. The absolute authority of the magistrates as guardians and defenders of faith was undisputed. Theocracy wanted to control the life of the community and went against those who asserted on the need to

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separate church and state. In those days, individual lapses were the concern of the society and state, therefore, Hester’s personal deviance was matter of public punishment.

“She assumed a freedom of speculation, then common enough on the other side of the

Atlantic, but which our forefathers, had they known it, would have held to be a deadlier crime than that stigmatized by the scarlet letter” (SL 139). There was no place for passion, self reliance, individualism, and independence in that society. Hester became a radical thinker who was convinced that a new truth will be revealed when, “the whole relation between man and woman” will be established “on a surer ground of mutual happiness” (SL 223).

Hester’s alienation from the community puts her in the position to make acute observation on her community particularly the treatment of womankind. She is intellectually as strong as her lover and her husband. She even comes to think in term of feminist rhetoric and one can hear in her voice -not only Hester but Miss Peabody and

Margaret Fuller talking forcefully about the equality of sexes. The same dark question often penetrates Hester’s mind regarding the fate of womanhood, “was existence worth accepting even to the happiest among them?” (SL 140). As a woman, she is conscious of her rights as a mother and wins the battle for the custody of her child through a successful argument with the Holy authority of the colony. She considers her child as a gift from

God, irrespective of her moral fall.

I will not lose the child! Speak for me! Thou knowest – for thou hast

sympathies which these men lack –thou knowest what is in my heart,

and what are a mother’s rights, and how much the stronger they are

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when that mother has but her child and the scarlet letter! Look thou to

it! I will not lose the child! Look to it! (SL 95)

About the colonial period Hawthorne writes in “The Old News”:

Some of our fathers, also, appear to have been yoked to unfaithful – if

we may trust the frequent notices of elopements from bed and board.

The pillory, the whipping-post, the prison, and the gallows, each, had

their use in those old times; and, in short, as often as our imagination

lives in the past, we find it a ruder and rougher age than our own, with

hardly any perceptible advantages, and much that gave life a gloomier

tinge. (135)

Such lines reflect that the unfaithfulness of the female was not a rare episode in the Puritan society of the 17th century which Hawthorne selected as the subject of this tale. The contextualized study of this fictional narrative reveals the fact that in mid-17th century New England; even Puritan divines were implicated in cases of adultery.

Hawthorne’s fictional tale of an adulterous woman of the 17th century Boston sent us back to the record books in search of individuals and events which through the force of his art, Hawthorne made us experience as historically real. Hester’s passionate and physical involvement with the church divine, the pastor of her own parish Arthur

Dimmesdale compelled us to find a parallel in her tale and Mary Batchellor’s narrative.

Through his reading of Winthrop’s History edited by James Savage, Hawthorne was familiar with the name of Mary Batchellor and Stephen Batchellor and their incompatible marriage. He found the seeds of his principal characters Hester, Arthur

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Dimmesdale and Chillingworth in their lives. James Savage narrated the tale of an ecclesiastical figure Stephen Batchellor who arrived in Massachusetts Bay on 5 June

1632 at the age of seventy-one. During his stay in Massachusetts, he became the subject of two controversies in the 1630s which Winthrop describes at some length:

Mr. Stephen Batchellor, the pastor of the church at Hampton, who had

suffered much at the hands of the bishops in England, being about 80

years of age, and having a lusty comely woman to his wife, did solicit

the chastity of his neighbor’s wife, who acquainted her husband

therewith; whereupon he was dealt with, but denied it, as he had told the

woman he would do, and complained to the magistrates against the

woman and her husband for slandering him. The church likewise dealing

with him, he stiffly denied it, but later, when the Lord’s Supper was to be

administered, he did voluntarily confessed the attempt, and said that he

did intended to have defile her, if she would have consented. The church

being moved with his true confession and tears, silently forgave him, . . .

. (Newberry 256-264)

After this episode, he behaved in a very unpredictable manner. Sometimes, he appeared very penitent and would suddenly start begging the apology from the community. Ecclesiastical figures were moved by his tears and confessions. As a result, he silently received their forgiveness however, soon after this; he extenuated himself from any of the charges and asserted that he was innocent and started accusing others.

Looking at the scandalous nature of the episode, the religious body consulted with the

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elders and ordered for his expulsion from the community as he was bringing a bad name for the religious figures. His dilemma of confession reminds us of Dimmesdale’s conflict regarding confession and repentance.

Hawthorne appeared to have read the first edition of Alonzo Lewis’s History

[1829] which contained detailed information on marital trouble of Batchellor couple. In the first edition of Alonzo Lewis, excommunication of Batchellor in 1641 had also been recorded for his irregular conduction. The second edition of Alonzo Lewis’s History of

Lynn [184] included a lengthy biographical sketch of Mary’s husband and Mary’s adultery. It seemed Hawthorne consulted both the edition Of Alonzo Lewis who was known figure in Boston and Salem as the “Bard of Lynn” in the 19th century. In 1651,

Batchellor returned to England and remarried and lived another ten years. Batchellor was remarried at the age of ninety in 1650 to Mary, after the death of his wife of his previous wife. His second marriage drew the attention of the community like the second marriage of the Governor Richard Bellingham of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. In both the cases, besides the age difference between husband and wife, the violation of marriage rules by religious figures caught the attention of the society. Batchellor was fined ten pounds for not publishing his intention of marriage, according to law (Newberry 256-264). In the

17th century American colonies, there were legal restrictions on informal marriages that exceed the pre 1754 English ecclesiastical law.

Violation of procedural rules was prohibited, and administered by civil

authority than by ecclesiastical court. Marriage laws especially in New

England were enforced more rigorously. The authorities found reduction

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in number of irregular marriages. Coupled were fined between five and

twenty pounds for the crime of disorderly marriage.

(Bloch 84-85)

Through the reading of the contextual sources of the present tale, it becomes apparent that the circumstances and dilemmas of Hawthorne’s characters are not solely fictional. He certainly drew upon the real life characters of the Reverend Batchellor and his ill-fated wife Mary. The historical analogy between the characters and the destiny of the two episodes, one fictional and the other actual could not be ignored. Batchellor’s wife Mary became pregnant from an extra-marital union and her adultery made him a cuckold (Newberry). Batchellor’s advanced age, the age difference between him and his young and wayward wife, and his wife’s extra –marital affair are more applicable to

Chillingworth. But Batchellor’s church associations and attempt to seduce another man’s wife relates his experiences to Dimmesdale.

Batchellor’s attempted adultery followed by his repeated confessions and denials suggest the major dilemma tormenting Dimmesdale throughout The Scarlet Letter.

Knowing at the outset that he should confess yet fearing that he will be excommunicated,

Dimmesdale cannot bring himself to reveal his role in Hester’s sin of adultery until the climactic scaffold scene after seven years. The case of attempted seduction by Batchellor was brought before Richard Bellingham in 1641 when he was the governor. Bellingham presided over the General Court to judge indictment against Batchellor’s conduct. Not long before it, he had already given staid Puritans a terrible shock by secretly marrying a woman Penelope Pelham, niece of Lord de la war in 1641 without any public

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announcement. Hawthorne was undoubtedly acquainted with the fall of these Puritan divines- Bellingham and Batchellor. The implication being that adultery committed by

Reverend Dimmesdale was inspired by an actual episode from the colonial history.

Penelope was betrothed to a young man who was a very close friend of

Bellingham. In the course of his friend’s wooing, Bellingham saw a great deal of the youthful Penelope and became intensely interested in her. Bellingham was forty nine at that time and she was half of his age. Just about the time that the neighbors expected to hear of the formal betrothal of Penelope to her young lover, the governor himself stepped in and wooed the maid. He later betrayed his friend by marrying her.

Against the charges of stealing the woman from his young friend, he defended his marriage by saying that she was not absolutely promised to the other gentleman. Instead of making a public announcement of his intention to wed as law required, he performed the ceremonies of second marriage himself as reported by Winthrop. This marriage created a sensation because along with the age of his bride, his self conducted ceremony was a novelty. Besides that, he had lost his wife recently, scandalized public opinion by wedding someone who was herself already engaged to someone else, “It was apparently her prior engagement that prevented Bellingham from securing the necessary permission”

(Bloch 84-85).

He was prosecuted for his misconduct but due to his exalted status was saved from persecution. He sat as a judge at his own trial; hence, the proceedings came to naught. It served a bad example for the community because it sent a message that penalties were meant for ordinary couples. The court was in an indecisive state. It was unwilling to

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command him publicly to go off the bench but it found him unsuitable for the post of the judge when he was by law an offender to the court. Finally, the court asked him to step down from the bench himself by taking up the charges brought against him. Bellingham refused to disqualify himself and he subsequently, sat on the bench when the Reverend

Batchellor’s case came before the court.

Hawthorne was amused by the ironical situation involved in this episode. In his story of adulterous Hester, he consciously twisted the historical facts and allowed the unworthy Bellingham to preside over Hester’s public humiliation. Bellingham was sitting on the judgment seat as a governor in the opening scaffold scene of The Scarlet Letter.

Looking for historical validity, we found that the trial of Hester Prynne took place in June

1642. At that time, Winthrop was the governor of Massachusetts. He became governor in

May of that year. Hawthorne twisted historical facts knowingly to show that as in the case of Batchellor, so also in the case of Hester Prynne, the historical Bellingham was unqualified to judge. By making a man of scandalous reputation as a judge of Hester’s moral conduct, he reflected the hypocritical standard of the Puritan religious establishment. It highlighted the sham and prudery involved in the whole episode.

In the second chapter of the novel “The Market Place” Hester is standing on the scaffold before the community in a state of disgrace for the commission of adultery. She is carrying a three month old infant on her arm and wearing a letter “A” on her breast.

This letter is the scarlet token of her infamy, fantastically embroidered with gold thread on her bosom. This mode of punishment had its historical antecedent. In the colonial period, wayward women faced the threat of being physically tortured as well as socially

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stigmatized by a burning letter “A”, which symbolized adultery. Hawthorne knew that adultery was a capital offense in Massachusetts Bay and branding was used to punish diverse crimes in the early 17th century New England. In three separate sources,

Hawthorne could have read about a woman with letter “A” branded upon her.

Hawthorne’s perusal of Felt’s Annals of Salem might have acquainted him with a case of an adulterous female who after receiving thirty strokes had to stand in the market place of

Boston; wearing a paper with the words thus “I stand for my adulterous and whorish carriage.” Felt wrote about a province law that “the wearing of the colored letters, the initials of the offenses, was a common punishment’’ ( qtd in Doubleday 106).

At another place, Felt wrote about a young woman whose doom it was to wear the letter “A” on the breast of her gown. Snow wrote of a man in 1634 who was condemned to wear a red letter “D” around his neck for drunkenness. Goodwife

Mendame was sentenced to wear an “AD” on her sleeve. Felt described that offenders being branded with the initial letters of the words for their offenses. Regarding the province law of 1694, Felt wrote:

Among such laws passed, this session, were two against Adultery and

Polygamy. Those guilty of the first crime, were to sit an hour on the

gallows, with ropes about their necks, - be severely whipt not above 40

stripes ; and forever after wear a capital A, two inches long, cut out of

cloth coloured differently from their clothes, and sewed on the arms, or

back parts of their garments so as always to be seen when they were

about . . . . (qtd in Doubleday 106)

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The striking feature of Mary Batchellor’s case was the mode of her punishment.

She was condemned to wear an embroidered scarlet color letter “A” on her breast that stood for adultery. A disgruntled woman in the scaffold scene in The Scarlet Letter would like to see Hester suffer like Mary Batchellor: “The magistrates are God-fearing gentlemen, but merciful overmuch –that is a truth” and added “At the very least, they should have put the brand of a hot iron on Hester Prynne’s forehead” (SL 44). The resemblance between the character of Mary Batchellor and Hester Prynne was so striking that it was difficult to resist the temptation to draw at length about the similarities between the two characters. It appeared that Charles Edward Banks in his History of

York, Maine [[1935] recognized the connection between Hawthorne’s novel and this case for he referred to Mary Batchellor’s branding in a section titled “The Scarlet Letter”.

Hawthorne was acquainted with the punishment of Mary Batchellor. In the first volume of Collections of the Maine Historical Society, he could have read an account of the sentence passed on George Rogers and Mary Batchellor. Hawthorne had a personal interest in Maine’s history because he attended Bowdoin College soon after Maine’s admission to statehood. His father’s family had claims to land there, and his mother’s family lived there. It was probably during his research about the past and Maine history; he came across the reference to Mary Batchellor’s sentence. The case of the woman branded for adultery has first appeared in the records of York, what is now Maine. Dated

15 October 1651, the entry reads:

We do present George Rogers for, & Mary Batchellor the wife of Mr.

Steven Batchellor minister for adultery. It is ordered by ye Court yt

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George Rogers for his adultery with mis Batchellor shall forthwith have

fourty stripes save one upon the bare skine given him: It is ordered yt

mis Batchellor for her adultery shall receive 40 strokes save one at ye

First Towne meeting held at Kittery, 6 weeks after her delivery & be

branded with the letter A. (Newberry 256-264)

Hester’s free will is at odds with the Puritan society of that time. She is unaffected by the public gaze of cold sympathy on the scaffold. The spectators pitilessly condemn her for her moral transgression in a society- where law and religion are identical and private conducts are a matter of public discipline. She refuses to divulge the name of her accomplice, the father of her child in spite of the repeated query of the holy authority.

Her paramour is an idol of virgins, a glorified saint. She does not desire his humiliation in the eye of the same congregation that worships him like a saint. Instead of disclosing the name of her tempter; she says that her child will have a heavenly father not any earthly one. She takes up the burden of ignominy all alone and is severely condemned, for “This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die. Is there not law for it? Truly there is, both in the Scripture and the statute-book” (SL 44).

In the History of New England, John Winthrop also narrated the case of James

Britton and Mary Latham who were executed for adultery in March 1644. Winthrop mentioned that Mary was matched with an ancient man for whom she had no affection. In the case of Mary Latham and James Britton which Winthrop described at length in his book, when Britton appealed to the General Court for his life, they refused to grant it.

Some of the magistrates spoke in his favor and questioned the letter “A” by saying

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whether adultery was death by God’s law but their argument went in vain. Hawthorne was also aware of the case of Salem’s Hester Craford who was ordered to be severely whipped for her relation with John Wheg. She even became pregnant. In the trial of

Hester of reality John Hathorne acted as a judge. Hawthorne’s family association with

Hester and her trial for lapse in the moral conduct definitely not passed unnoticed of

Hawthorne’s attention.

The search for Hawthorne’s literary borrowings in The Scarlet Letter and its historical sources, the origin of the letter “A” and an adulterous figure in the Puritan history who may has served as the prototypes of Hester Prynne leads to numerous examples scattered all over the historical pages as has already been discussed in this section. By 1838, when an early version of Hester appeared in “Endicott and the Red

Cross,” Hawthorne was aware of the 1694 law enacted in Salem that condemned a woman convicted of adultery to wear a capital “A” sewn conspicuously on her garments.

[II]

Hester not only projects the cultural voice of the 17th century but also the 19th century crescendo of democracy and individualism inspired by transcendentalist ideology. Hester typifies romantic individualism as a byproduct of the early 19th century

Renaissance and transcendentalism. It was an age of extreme Romanticism and individualism which believed in showing to the world and God ones real self. Emerson in his essay on “Self Reliance” (1841) asserted on the importance of being true to one’s own

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nature. This was the lesson imparted by The Scarlet Letter in these words. “Be true! Be true! Be true! Show freely to the world, if not your worst, yet some traits whereby the worst may be inferred!” (SL220).

Hester does not try to conceal her emotions in fear of encountering the venomous stabs of public censure. Her attitude is rebellious and challenging to the domineering establishment of the Puritan colony. She openly accepts her liaison with a man other than her husband whom she loves. She does not try to shed her responsibility as a mother and unashamedly accepts Pearl as a daughter born outside wedlock. Hester is not afraid to fight for her rights as a mother and fearlessly pronounces “‘God gave me the child!” cries she. She further says, “He gave her in requital of all things else, which ye had taken from me. She is my happiness!-she is my torture, none the less! Pearl keeps me here in life!’’(SL95).

She is penalized in exaggerated and gigantic proportions for her crime against moral code of the society through the scarlet letter. Her sin seems insignificant in comparison to her punishment in the wake of transcendentalist ideology of boundless individualism. As a transcendentalist thinker, Hester believes in the integrity of an individual and respects the sacredness of the sanctuary of the heart. “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of our own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world” (Emerson 30). Transcendentalism highlighted the individual and his/her needs with a focus on free expression of feelings. Hence, like a person ingratiated with the individualism of Renaissance, Hester feels no hesitation in telling her husband

Chillingworth, in the very beginning of their relationship that she does not love him and

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nor feigns any. Like Emerson, she believes that, “truth is handsomer than the affectation of love” (Emerson 31).

Hawthorne had not idealized the character of Hester rather showed her as a fallible human being. Her great strength is her honesty, self reliance, and moral courage which are undesirable in subversive Puritan establishment. Hester makes no attempt to plead for the diminished responsibility for her moral transgression. She could have escaped to a land where she would have not been recognized as an adulterous woman to lead a life free from continuous torment. It is testimony of the strength of her character that she refuses to turn herself into such a moral imposter. She lives on the outskirt of the town within the verge of the peninsula in a small thatched cottage along with her daughter Pearl as an outcaste.

A figure of the 19th century, Hawthorne showed his borrowing for the tale- if not borrowing at least influences which shaped this story. Hawthorne’s treatment of Hester’s character is a result of his democratic conviction and influence of the teachings of transcendentalism. Though the narrative framework of the novel is about an adulterated reality, Hawthorne’s Democratic convictions quintessentially project Hester as a rebel, questioning all shibboleths and defying ruthless, dominating, and suppressing ideology of formal theology. Hester exemplifies the American idealism which is resolute, fundamentally idealistic, irrepressibly buoyant individualism. She believes in a religion based on individual conviction and personal faith which can withstand any form of questioning. Hawthorne was writing at a time when Americans were mesmerized by transcendentalist ideology and lost the awe of the masses for the clergies and rulers as

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divine agents’. People were out rightly endorsing egalitarian principles through their speeches and actions. The awareness of individual rights owed its inculcation to transcendentalist belief in Self reliance.

The leading spokesman of the movement called transcendentalism was Emerson who was Hawthorne’s neighbor at Concord. This New England movement flourished from 1835 to 1860. Emerson’s contact with Hawthorne would have definitely influenced

Hawthorne. According to transcendentalist findings, one’s salvation depended on his/r inner striving towards spiritual communion with the divine spirit. It was similar to the

Quaker’s inner light where intuition was an act of individual. It was originally a religious movement with its roots in Romanticism and in post Kantian idealism. It was also influenced by the literature of Coleridge, Goethe, Wordsworth, and Victor Cousin. It imbibed the philosophy of the inalienable worth of individual at the time when the vigor of Calvinism was in its passing phase. It focused on the role and importance of the individual conscience, and valued intuition in the matters of moral guidance and inspiration. In his introduction to The Scarlet Letter, entitled as “The Custom House”,

Hawthorne confessed the influence of Emerson on him, “after living for three years within the subtle influence of an intellect like Emerson’s”( 22).

In his story “The Old Manse” also, Hawthorne has written about the impact of

Emerson’s personality on those around him: “But it was impossible to dwell in his vicinity, without inhaling more or less, the mountain atmosphere of his lofty thought, which in the brains of some people, wrought a singular giddiness new truth being as heady as new wine . . .” (31). In the Epilogue to Beaumont and Fletcher’s Honest

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Man’s Fortune, it is written, “Man is his own star; and the soul that can render an honest and a perfect man commands all light, all influence, all fate, nothing to him falls early or too late. Our acts our angles are, or good or ill, our fatal shadows that walk by us still”

(Emerson 25). Hester represents the spirit of self reliance in a society which is bent on crushing individualism. Hester follows her instincts and impulses in her relationship with the minister and gives unobstructed expression to the dictates of her heart away from social conventions, ethical, and universal code of conduct.

For transcendentalists, subjective institution was a reliable source of truth and empirical investigation. They believed that God displayed his presence in every aspect of the natural world not just during isolated times. Hawthorne proceeded to identify the spirituality of transcendentalism with liberty and democracy. Transcendentalism could be properly understood in the context of Unitarianism, the dominant religion in Boston during the early 19th century and a parent religion of transcendentalism. Unitarianism developed during the late 18th century as a branch of liberal wing of Christianity during the first great awakening of the 1740s. It rejected the concept of the innate depravity of man and the doctrine of trinity and highlighted the role of the intellect and reasoning to attain divine wisdom and to discern what constituted ethical conducts. Unitarianism ushered in a new era of the exercise of reason and free conscience.

The heresy of Transcendentalism for which early Puritans hanged people was pantheism, mysticism and the potential of human mind to communicate with God. Its democratic learning found every individual divine and capable of contacting divinity

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through introspective contemplation. William Ellery Channing in his landmark sermon,

“Unitarian Christianity” [1819] sounded its characteristic theme:

Our leading principle in interpreting Scripture is this, that the Bible is a

book written for men, in the language of men, and that its meaning is

to be sought in the same manner as that of other books . . . with these

views of the Bible, we feel it our bounden duty to exercise our reason

upon it perpetually, to compare, to infer, to look beyond the letter to the

spirit, to seek in the nature of the subject, and the aim of the writer, his

true meaning; and, in general, to make use of what is known, for

explaining what is difference, and for discovering new truths. (21)

Transcendentalism was an outcry of the heart against the materialistic pressures of a civilization. Its main attraction was its message of confident self identity, spiritual depth, and social justice. Its belief in the inner light led to an emphasis on the authority of the self and testing ethics by conscience. Emerson’s “Nature” was known as a “Gospel of transcendentalism” which propagated to discard institutionalized religion. It had at its core a philosophy of naked individualism which aimed at the creation of a new America; and a self reliant and independent man.

One of the basic premises of Transcendentalism was the belief that individual virtue and happiness depended upon self realization through reconciliation of two universal psychological tendencies i.e. the expansion of the self to embrace the whole world and secondly, a self asserting tendency –a desire to withdraw and remain unique as an egotistical self. Hester emerges in the tale as an exemplification of both the tendencies.

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She leads an isolated life like an enigma yet devotes her life completely to the selfless service of the needy. She turns into a counselor of people in their sorrows and miseries, particularly of womankind who seek her help and advice in their matters. On the other hand, she never allows anyone to infringe on her right as an individual.

Hawthorne did not identify himself with transcendentalist and voiced his objection against some of the tenets of its philosophy. But something to the extent of the transcendental philosophy can be traced in his writings which even he cannot deny. This letter of Emerson to Caroline Sturgis written in Sep, 1842 shows the eagerness of

Emerson to share his views with Hawthorne, “Our walk had no incidents. It needed none, for we were in excellent spirits, had much conversation, for we were both collectors who had never had opportunity before to show each other our cabinets, so that we could have filled with matters much longer days . . . ”( Whicher 214).

Another transcendentalist, Thoreau in his essay “Civil Disobedience” posed the sovereign rights of conscience against the claims of the state, “Speak your latent convictions, and it shall be universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost, . . .” (Emerson 27). Hester is a non conformist who obeys the command of her heart. She is intellectually emancipated from the narrowness of her age. She follows the transcentalist ideology which states, “To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men- that is genius” (Emerson 27).

Hester refutes all external obligations and draws from her inside, the inspiration for her conduct because,

The world’s law was no law for her mind. It was an age in which the

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human intellect, newly emancipated, had taken more active and a wider

range than for many centuries before. Men of the sword had overthrown

nobles and kings. Men bolder than these had overthrown and rearranged

-not actually, but within the sphere of theory, which was their most real

abode –the whole system of ancient prejudice, wherewith was linked

much of ancient principle. Hester Prynne imbibed this spirit. (SL 139)

Hester Prynne is not ashamed of what she has done because she believes that, and even assures Dimmesdale that “what we have done has a consecration of its own” (SL

166). It is one of the most moving utterances of romantic individualism. She represents some of the definite aspects of Emerson’s teachings like, “Nothing is sacred at last but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve yourself to yourself and you shall have the suffrage of the world . . . The only right is what is after my constitution; the only wrong is what is against it” (Emerson 30). Hester and Dimmesdale are passionately in love with each other and that is the only truth for them. Arthur Dimmesdale also acknowledges it when he speaks about the sin of Chillingworth: “We are not, Hester, the worst sinners in the world. There is one worse than even the polluted priest! That old man’s revenge has been blacker than my sin. He has violated, in cold blood, the sanctuary of a human heart.

Thou and I, Hester, never did so!”(SL166).

Hawthorne’s distinction in American literature is because of his ability to project the issues of his time experimentally through his characters. He modifies them to conform to the perplexing and harsh facts. The character of Dimmesdale apart from being a representative of the ecclesiastical power is also an illustration of the doctrine of “Self

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reliance” and “Compensation”. He is an esteemed minister of Boston, an unmarried pastor of Hester’s congregation. According to the parishioners, he is capable of imparting spiritual strength by Angelic administrations. He loves Hester Prynne but lacks courage to acknowledge it in public. He is not innately a bad character hence; his living conscience torments him day and night for his concealment. He accepts and says “were I am an atheist-a man devoid of conscience –a wretch with coarse and brutal instinct-I might have found peace” (SL 162).

He is afraid of losing respect as a dignitary of the church, if he tells about his alliance with a fallen woman. He prefers to keep the hollow mockery of his good name as he dreads public exposure and condemnation contrary to the teachings of transcendentalist movement which says, “A man is to carry himself in the presence of all opposition as if everything were titular and emphemeral but he. I am ashamed to think how easily we capitulate to badge and names, to large societies and dead institutions’’

(Emerson 30). Even at the very beginning, when Dimmesdale admonishes Hester to tell the name of her paramour, he faintly hopes for his redemption through Hester’s disclosure. He says, “Be not silent for any mistaken pity and tenderness for him; for, believe me, Hester, though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so, than to hide a guilty heart through life”(SL 57). But Hester does not reveal his name and he falls into an abyss of hypocrisy. It takes him seven years to gather that courage to accept his relation with

Hester and Pearl.

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In spite of being a church divine, he seems to be more preoccupied with worldly power, name, and fame. He deceives not only society but also himself. For Dimmesdale the greatest torment is the acknowledgement that his libidinous wishes are really his and not just a temptation from the devil. With sin of concealment, it also involves sin of pride. While Hester suffers in isolation, the minister enjoys the height of popularity in his sacred office.

Ralph Waldo Emerson believed that man should be upright and vital and should speak the truth irrespective of the circumstances because, “every secret is told, every crime is punished, every virtue rewarded, every wrong redressed, in silence and certainty” (60). Dimmesdale cannot understand a simple truth that “if you “commit a crime, and the earth is made of glass” (Emerson 68). He fails to respond to Pearl’s insistence that he should take her along with her mother in the public square.

Dimmesdale demonstrates a kind of moral irresponsibility which makes his own retribution impossible. A kind of disintegration takes place in him and respect and veneration become a torture for him. People deem the young clergy as a miracle of holiness, the mouthpiece of heaven’s messages of wisdom and it is this very divinity which gnaws at his heart. The only truth that continues to give Dimmesdale a real existence on this earth is the anguish in his inmost soul, and the undisguised expression of it in his countenance, “A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into his work and done his best. But what he said or done otherwise shall give him no peace. It is a deliverance which does not deliver. In the attempt his genius desert him; no muse befriends; no invention, no hope” (Emerson 28). He hates falsehood more than anything

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else hence, he starts hating his miserable self and finally he is swallowed by his own guilt. Dimmesdale’s unblemished reputation among his congregation bruises his soul more than any open public criticism. “Of penances, I have had enough! Of penitence, there has been none! Else, I should long ago have thrown off these garments of mock holiness and have shown myself to mankind as they will see me at the judgment seat”

(SL 163).

Dimmesdale’s whole mental energy is directed at repressing the public revelation of his fall. He suffers from an excess of self. This self is formed out of his human desire to be adored as a pious and learned minister. He is afraid to renounce his worldly recognition and respect. In the forest meeting, Hester and Dimmesdale plan to run away from the Puritan establishment. He enquires about the scheduled departure of a ship, they are planning to board. Hester informs him that it will be after four days and this news provides excessive delight to him. He considers the departure date very fortunate because on the third day, he has to preach the Election Day sermon. This occasion comes in a lifetime in the life of a New England clergy and enhances his reputation tremendously.

He considers that it will be a suitable time and mode of terminating his profession. He is more conscious of his worldly reputation at the cost of sacrificing the truth of his heart.

“At least they shall say of me” says Dimmesdale “that I leave no public duty unperformed, nor ill – performed!”(SL184). Here, the egoistic obsession of him becomes vocal.

Dimmesdale envies the contentment and mental peace of Hester who wears the scarlet letter, a token of shame openly while he is crushed under the burden of his good

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name. Gradually, Hester becomes conscious of the deep injury which she has inflicted on her lover by not disclosing his name in public. She realizes that she is his accomplice, not only in sin of adultery but also in his sin of hypocrisy by concealing the name of her tempter. It does Dimmesdale more harm than good, and she finds him on the verge of lunacy. In her attempt to retain the good name of the minister, she consciously turns into his greatest foe. She contracts a bargain with her former husband that if he does not tell the world the identity of her lover, she will not disclose his identity to Dimmesdale. She subjects him to a fiendish pursuit of her husband. Emerson writes, “Thou shalt be paid exactly for what thou hast done, no mores, no less.-Who doth not work shall not eat. -

Harm watch, harm catch. -Curses always recoil on the head of him who imprecates them

-if you put a chain around the neck of a slave; the other end fastens itself around our own.-” (64). Dimmesdale shrieks with horror when he comes to know about Hester’s role in the whole affair, “Woman, woman, thou art accountable for this! I cannot forgive thee!” (SL165).

Afterwards, Hester repented that she resorted to deception when truth was her most essential virtue, irrespective of adverse circumstances. Dimmesdale is not punished by the society, yet, he could not escape the consequence of his sin, “Nothing can work me damage except myself; the harm that I sustain I carry about with me, and never am a real sufferer but my own fault” (Emerson 72). Dimmesdale’s heightened ministerial power becomes hurdle in his seeking expiation. It is ironical that the spiritual sermon of

Dimmesdale gives strength to everybody but himself. The novel depicts a tussle of ideology between the Puritan mind of the 17th century and the rational independent mind

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of the 19th century. “The absolute balance of Give and Take, the doctrine that everything has its price –and if that price is not paid, not that thing but something else is obtained, and that it is impossible to get anything without its price- . . . ”(Emerson 67) and

Minister pays calm of his conscience as price for buying his good name.

At the end, he gathered tell the community that he was an accomplice of Hester in her transgression. He died soon after confession with the hope for God’s forgiveness. It is ironical that his acknowledgement of sin is misinterpreted by his congregation. Instead of making his confession crystal clear, his vague pulpit confession embellishes his image of godly man in the public eye. His confession is understood as a parable to impart a lesson to the people of the community, that “in view of Infinite purity, we are sinners all alike”

(SL 220). People marvel, “The saint on earth! Alas, if he discerns such sinfulness in his own white soul, what horrid spectacle would he behold in thine or mine!”(SL 122).

Hawthorne’s version of Arthur Dimmesdale’s tale is an example of that stubborn fidelity with which people upheld the character of a clergyman in the colonial time. It suggests how the blind creed of fallen men in their worship of power will find godliness in them even in exposure of hypocrisy and falsehood. All Puritan communities looked to their minister as an intellectual as well as religious mentor and to the meeting house for the greater part of their social intercourse. The clergy were vigorous, aggressive men, strong not only in learning but also in community leadership and regarded with awe by their followers.

Hawthorne depicted the same kind of authority in the hands of Church leaders as moral mentors of the parishioners in this novel. He was a very astute observer of political

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and social fact and noted that “Even the political power –as in the case of Increase

Mather –was within the grasp of a successful priest” (SL 203). It was the time when respect and veneration which was attached to the ecclesiastical profession was such that people preferred it over any other political ambition. Once the religious instinct was in their hand, power to govern ultimately was invested in them. At that time, talent mattered less than the inherited privileges, “Bradstreet, Endicott, Dudley, Bellingham, and their compeers –who were elected to power by the early choice of the people, seem to have been not often brilliant, but distinguished by ponderous sobriety rather than activity of intellect”( SL 202 ).

The doctrine of “Compensation” was also an offspring of transcendentalist’s philosophy of optimism with its belief that every action carried its reward or punishment.

The punishment in front of the eyes of the world was not a testimony of the doctrine of

Compensation. This had been projected not only in the character of Dimmesdale but also through the character of Roger Chillingworth who was never punished in front of the society but met his doom. Chillingworth is an aged man who sacrifices young Hester on the altar of learning. He leaves Hester all alone in her youth and goes in the pursuit of intellectual accomplishment, only to see her on his return on the scaffold for the trial of adultery. He returns the same day when Hester is brought on the public platform for her sin.

Instead of encountering the dishonor that besmirches the husband of a faithless woman, he prefers to conceal his identity. Since he suspects Dimmesdale, as the lover of

Hester and father of the child Pearl, he indulges in a fiendish act to torture and punish

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him. His outrage at his wife’s infidelity is normal but the repression of his identity and forceful prevention of the natural outburst of hatred at the market place is unnatural.

After discovering Hester on the scaffold, he is caught with some powerful emotion but he instantaneously controls it and willfully pushes it to the depth of his nature. It is this willful denial that becomes the cuckold’s problem.

Chillingworth is a wronged husband who begins his revenge upon the minister with a sense of justice but it gradually passes from a dark ambition to a fiendish passion to ruin the minister’s soul. He explores with dark passion, the hidden secret in

Dimmesdale’s soul which turns unbearably torturous for the conscience stricken priest. In his American Notebook [1838-1844] Hawthorne has written: “the unpardonable sin might consist in a want of love and reverence for the human soul; in consequence of which the investigator pried into dark depths...from cold philosophical curiosity….It was violation of man’s right over his soul and mind” (qtd in Fick 67).

Chillingworth becomes the medical adviser of the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale. As a physician, he is not interested in his physical disease but in his soul. He combines the power of intellect with cold curiosity and sinister motives and probes deeper into the minister’s heart and derives pleasure from his pain and sufferings. He wants to keep him alive to torture him spiritually and psychologically. The physician who has wished to disclose the secret of the identity of Pearl’s father at the beginning, later desires to keep his victim away from confession to overrule any possibility of regeneration for

Dimmesdale. In his fiendish pursuit, he is transformed into a fiend himself. With willful maliciousness, he consummates torture of Dimmesdale for seven years.

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He spoke rationally when he had said to Hester that between her and him the scale hanged fairly balanced but he could not accept it inwardly. There was no reason for contemplating revenge, if there was no sense of injustice involved in their relation. It meant his nature was perverted at a later stage with the realization of his absolute power over Dimmesdale. Nine years ago, he was an earnest, thoughtful, and quiet man who bestowed several years of his life in pursuit of knowledge and advancement of human welfare. He was innocent, peace loving, and an affectionate man; but his revengeful thought made him an agent of Satan. He becomes incapable of human affection and forgiveness. He works out his revenge under the pretext of magnanimous forgiveness,

“In asmuch as he carries the malignity and the lie with him he so far decreases from nature” (Emerson 71). In usurping the office of that power which brings retribution, he subjects himself to that very power of the devil.

At the time of the death of the minister on the scaffold, when Chillingworth saw the naked breast of the minister, there was a wild look of wonder, joy, and horror in his eyes as noticed by the author. Hawthorne perceived:

With what a ghastly rapture, as it were, too mighty to be expressed only by

the eye and features, and therefore bursting forth through the whole

ugliness of his figure, and making itself even riotously manifest by the

extravagant gestures with which he threw up his arms towards the ceiling,

and stamped his foot upon the floor ! Had a man seen Roger

Chillingworth, at the moment of his ecstasy, he would have had no need to

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ask how Satan comports himself when a precious human soul is lost to

heaven and won into his kingdom. (SL117)

Chillingworth died within a year of Dimmesdale death. The man who made the very principle of his life to pursue a systematic plan of revenge on the minister after his death, a void was created in his life. He was left without any task to support his existence on earth. He left all his property for Pearl by his last will.

[III]

Though The Scarlet Letter is not labeled as historical novel but the projection of the Puritan society, its beliefs, references to witches and witchcraft, and superstitious attitudes of people lend authenticity to the factual aspect of the novel. Through the realistic setting and ideology of the 17th century, America, Hawthorne has shown the genuine picture of that time. It is a successful depiction of Puritanism and its role in influencing people’s life. After winning her case with the authority for the custody of

Pearl when Hester comes out of the governor’s mansion, she meets Mistress Hibbins, governor Bellingham’s sister. Mistress Hibbins has been declared a witch by the community in the novel. The reference to Mistress Hibbins, a historical figure who was hanged in 1656 in Boston as a witch brought the suggestive presence of witchcraft in the novel. She appeared on the spectrum of the novel more than four times, not without a purpose. She came to Massachusetts Bay Colony from England in 1634 along with her husband William and her brother Richard Bellingham and his family.

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Ann Hibbins was a strong minded and fearless woman who went against the church to assert her right as an individual. In 1640, she was embroiled in a bitter dispute with a fellow member of the Boston Puritan church. He was a carpenter and worked in her house in the absence of her husband. She was supervising his work and found it dissatisfactory. Hence, she accused him of negligence and dishonesty but her allegations against the carpenter were taken as accusing male authority for deception. She was admonished for not letting the issue to be dealt by her husband. The elderly members tried to settle the affair in a way which was not acceptable to the dignity of Hibbins’ character. Her demeanor was described as unwomanly because she refused to withdraw her case. She was excommunicated from the church in 1641. After her husband’s death, she became an outcast in Boston in spite of her husband’s social standing and prestige.

Witchcraft trials were the result of the intolerance and superstition of people from

1648-1656 but these trials were also one of the ways to eliminate anyone who was undesirable in the eye of the community. Ann Hibbins executed as a witch because of people’s dislike for her. They found an opportunity to retaliate against her, as “she initiated a one –woman crusade against Boston carpenters in general” (Bremer and

Webster 124). She vehemently denied the charges leveled against her but her stubborn denial was considered against the spirit of the time and beyond the limit of the accepted behavior of females. The 17th century society was outraged to see her fighting on her own behalf and considered her argumentative speech as an act of condemning male authority,“ . . . it seemed, these quiet paragon risked being drowned by a new breed of

“Masculine women” who eagerly “buried silence to revive slander” ”(Kemensky 21). To

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the seventeenth century populace “such women’s “tongues” made them “deformed”

“manlike” even “monster” ”(Kemensky 21). She was executed for witchcraft in 1656 for her supposed involvement with the devil.

By taking into account the tale of two remarkable women of the 17th century

Boston: Anne Hutchinson and Ann Hibbins and their fate in the Puritan administration,

Hawthorne reinforced a patriarchal structure and highlighted the attempt of power to retain authority in its own orbit. “In both the cases, Puritan order worked to reinforce the importance of hierarchical family structure. They disparaged any attempt of women for public platform and public speech and hence drove their congregations to unprecedented gender based segregation” ( Kamensky 96).

The outspoken personalities of women were as unpopular in the 17th century

Boston community as in the 19th century transcendentalist America. They were ostracized and treated as lepers until they learnt to govern their tongues. Anne Hutchinson and

Hibbins rejected the norms which their companions accepted silently. The upper class regarded the moral precepts and the terror of religion as necessary to keep the masses in order. Talking against religion was considered similar to an unchaining of a tiger, the beast once let loose may worry his liberator,“ As a result the gentry in general clung to the old forms, fought for the right of the church to associate itself in political control, and even upheld much of the old theology though they might not believe in it themselves.(Baldwin 52). John wise wrote in his book, The Churches’ Quarrel

Espoused:

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. . . Also the natural equality of men among men must be duly favored; in

that government was never established by God or nature, to give one man

a prerogative to insult over another . . . Honor all men the end of all good

government is to cultivate humanity, and to promote the happiness of all,

and the good of every man in his rights, his life, liberty, estate, honor etc;

without injury or abuse to any. (qtd in Adam 179)

It was the time when even trivial matters like the custody of the child of a fallen woman was focus of the legislators and state. The issue of the ownership of a pig led to a fierce battle in the legislative body of the colony and even brought modification of the framework of the legislature itself. In those times, transcendentalist Hester affirms about the new time, when truth will have another meaning, and the relationship between the male and female will be on a surer ground of mutual happiness. She tells people that the apostle of the new revelation will be a woman, a destiny appointed only for male. In her anticipation, The Scarlet Letter emerges as a classic tribute to the belief on the ideals of individualism based on a theory of civic heroism; and on the ideals of progress, based on a theory of community in process.

Politicians in 1850s, named this high and glorious destiny as “manifest destiny”.

Emerson named America as a country of tomorrow where a nation of individuals will exist for the first time. Hawthorne was neither a proclaimed destinarian nor an

Emersonian but he imbibed deeply from both these cultural sources. He believed in

American democracy and depicted Hester as a figure of historical process by showing her return in the community at the end of the tale. Hester’s faith in the future rests on the

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concept of process as progress and that concept is embodied in the community to which she returns. The novel depicts the central ideological dilemma of liberal America in

1850s– between self engrossing individualism, the primacy of the inner spirit and conforming to social welfare, a certain socio-economic system of interwoven relations.

The cultural level of meaning is highlighted when Hester is displayed as an intellectual, free thinker, an independent and self supporting mother; a sort of proto- feminist. But the cultural context of the novel involves a critique of such non- conformist behavior. In the beginning, Hester is segregated through her crime by overstepping the regulations of society but at the end she is shown as coming back within the fold of society, as mother and daughter stand together, “an object to remind him of the image of

Divine Maternity . . .” (SL 48). The image of divine maternity was translated in 1850 into the so-called cult of motherhood. It envisioned woman’s redemptive role for the republic which in some way informs Hester’s vision. Everyone forgave her for her moral lapse.

People started to admire her for her various good deeds and charitable works.

Owing to Hawthorne’s democratic convictions, the suppressive societal paradigm of the Puritan establishment is challenged by this new woman Hester. Her philosophy is not inadequate but her unwomanly attempt to formulate her own philosophy makes the writer apprehensive. His projection of Hester’s transformed character at the end of the novel depicts the author’s disapproval of her liberating and revolting stance. He avoids total identification with it owing to his Puritan heritage. As a complete objectivity on the part of historian is no more achievable, hence the tale and characters are guided by the author’s upbringing and outlook. The intellectual dimension of Hester presents the

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concept of thinking woman which was feared by the majority in the 17th as well as the

19th century. In Old Manse, Hawthorne wrote: “for her, on whose feminine nature had been imposed the heavy gift of intellectual power, such as strong man might have staggered under, and with it the necessity to act upon the world-” (29) and categorized intellectual asset of females as unwomanly possession.

Hester’s responsibility as a mother makes her a conformist. She is quick to acknowledge her sisterhood with the race of men. The scarlet letter stands for sin of hers and her attachment to Pearl signifies her acceptance of the consequence of her sin and her ethical obligation. Oriental, passionate and voluptuous Hester takes up a life of renunciation and service. It can only be a genuine regard for virtue that “had brought back the poor wanderer to its paths” (SL 136).Whatever resources she has, she exhausts to help the needy to confer favors on the wretched and pauper. She gives food and provides clothing to the poor even if they throw a gibe in requital for her help. In response to all the bitterness of the community, no one is as devoted as Hester, “. . . when pestilence stalked through the town” (SL 136). Indulgence of Hester in charity and her effort to make clothes for the poor, gradually wins her a positive stance of the community, “so, perchance, the torture of her daily shame would at length purge her soul and work out another purity than that which she had lost; more saint like, because the result of martyrdom”( SL 68). Like Anne Hutchinson, Hester comforts and counsels people in the time of need as best as she can. “Mrs. Hutchinson speedily became popular; she nursed the women in their illness and sympathized with them in their distress. They feel into the habit of assembling in her house to listen to her repetition of the minister’s

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sermons and to share the good things which she set before them” (Channing 369-370).

Hester becomes the self ordained sister of mercy, so helpful and sympathetic that people starts to regard the letter “A” as “able” because of the strength of her female character.

Hester bestowed all her superfluous means in charity, on wretches less

miserable than herself, and who not unfrequently insulted the hand that

fed them. Much of the time which she might readily have applied to the

better efforts of her art, she employed in making coarse garments for the

poor. It is probable that there was an idea of penance in this mode of

occupation, and that she offered up a real sacrifice of enjoyment in

devoting so many hours to such rude handiwork.( SL 70-71)

Like Anne Hutchinson, she emerges as a rebel and as a self reliant woman who is not embittered by the difficulties of the circumstances. She blossoms into a better human being through her sufferings. People look forward to Hester’s explanation in the matters of heart and discuss matters pertaining to individual rights with her.

A tendency to speculation she discerns, it may be, such a hopeless task

before her. Though it may keep woman quiet, as it does man, yet makes

her sad. As a first step, the whole system of society is to be torn down

and built up anew. Then, the very nature of the opposite sex, or its long

hereditary habit which has become like nature, is to be essentially

modified before woman can be allowed to assume what seems a fair and

suitable position. Finally, all other difficulties being obviated, woman

cannot take advantage of these preliminary reforms until she herself shall

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have undergone a still mightier change; in which, perhaps, the ethereal

essence, wherein she has her truest life, will be found to have evaporated.

A woman never overcomes these problems by any exercise of thought.

(SL140-141)

At the end, all her passions are cooled and her life turns from passion to thought.

In education and upbringing of her daughter, she becomes a conformist but retains her integrity which is the positive side of her character. She does not meet the fate of Zenobia because she has never betrayed her utmost principles and always remains true to her own self. Besides, her motherhood is also her redeeming factor. This shows the text as part of a cultural learning, a text which emerges in a given atmosphere, generates the same kind of atmosphere through its writings. These experiences and attitudes are learnt not inborn.

Hester, towards the end, leaves her radicalism and embraces a compromising stance by prophesying that woman who will lead the future reform movement and will talk about women’s right must be less, ‘‘stained with sin” less “bowed down with shame” than her.

She, finally, comes to abide by the rules of society. She, “came to have a part to perform in the world”, which she has initially rebelled. She lives ultimately a subdued life. It is important to note that, “Persons who speculate the most boldly often conform with the most perfect quietude to the external regulations of society. The thought suffices them, without investing itself in the flesh and blood of action” (SL 140).

Various available documents of history of the 17th century social and political life recorded that women were devoiced forcefully and openly through declared law or system or by written articles of law. Men were at the center, pushing women forcefully at

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the margins. Women were relegated in a silent role in the history of that period. Most women appeared to be satisfied with a destiny of housewife, child bearer, and passive silent saint. Westerkamp wrote:

Many ministers and magistrates had concluded that women were not

merely inferior to men, but essentially evil, or at least congenitally

inclined toward evil. Women were burdened with a range of character

flaws that could be summarized as passionate and uncontrolled, incapable

of reason, supremely credulous, and, thus, easily led astray. They needed

the controls of subservience for their own protection as well as that of

society, any dissatisfaction that women felt and expressed merely proved

their incapacity to reason and judge. (35)

Hester’s inner transformation saves her from complete expulsion from community like Anne Hutchinson or ill fate similar to Ann Hibbins. Through her devotional practices, she reinforces patriarchal goals and assumptions. She seems to be governed by unwritten laws within religious and social institutions.

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Works Cited:

1. Adams, James Truslow. The American. New York: Charles Scribner’s sons,

1944. Print.

2. Andrews, Charles. M. The Colonial Period of American History. Vol.1. New Haven:

Yale University Press, 1934. Print.

3. Baldwin Leland D. The Stream of American History. Vol.2. 4th ed. New York: Van

Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1969. Print.

4. Bloch Ruth .H. Gender and Morality in Anglo–American Culture 1650-800.

California: University of California Press, 2003. Print.

5. Bragdon, Henry W, and Samuel P. Mc Cutchen. History of a Free People. New York:

Macmillan Publishing Company, 1981. Print.

6. Bremer, Francis J., and Tom Webster. Puritans and Puritanism in Europe and

America. California: ABC-CL10., Inc., 2005.Web. 14th Nov. 2009.

7. Carr, E.H .What is History? Ed. R W Davies. 2nd ed. London: Penguin Books: 1961.

Print

8. Channing, Edward. A History of the United States. Vol.1. New York: Macmillan Co.,

1933. Print.

9. Channing, William Ellery. “Unitarian Christianity”(1819) in James, Barbour, and

Thomas Quirk, eds. A National Literature and Romantic Individual in

Romanticism. New York: Garland, 1986. Print.

10. Doubleday, Neal Frank. Hawthorne’s Early Tales. Durham: Duke University Press,

1972. Print.

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11. Emerson, RW. Essays. New Delhi: Eurasia Publishing House, 1965. Print.

12. Fick, Reverend Leonard J. The Light Beyond. America: The Newman Press, 1955.

Print.

13. Hawthorne, Nathaniel. London: The Scarlet Letter. London: Penguin Books, 1994.

Print.

14. Hawthorne, Nathaniel. “The Old News,” Mosses from the Old Manse. USA: Ohio

State University Press, 1974. Print.

15. Kamensky, Jane. Governing the Tongue: The Politics of Speech in Early New

England. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. Print.

16. Mather, Edward. Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Modest Man. New York: Greenwood

Press, 1970. Print.

17. Nevins, Allan, and Henry Steele Commager. A Short History of the United States.

5th ed. New York: Alfred. A. Knopf, 1966. Print.

18. Newberry, Frederick. “A Red-hot ‘A’ and A Lusting Divine.” The New England

Quarterly 60. 2 (June 1987): 256-264.Print.

19. Person, Leland S, jr. Aesthetic Headaches. Athens: University of Georgia

Press, 1988. Print.

20. Westerkamp, J. Marilyn. Women and Religion in Early America1600-

1850. New York: Routledge, 1999. Print.

21. Whicher, Stephen E, ed. Selections from Ralph Waldo Emerson, an Organic

Anthology. Boston: The Rioverside Press, 1957. Print.

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Chapter-IV

Plurality of Meaning

in

The House of Seven Gables

As the people of the colonies became more numerous and more

prosperous, they began to acquire a new outlook. Belief in the need

for hereditary class distinctions and for authoritarian government

became weaker, and men began to acquire faith in the capacity of the

average man and in his right to freedom and economic opportunity.

This growth of democratic sentiments was strongest in the newly settled

regions of the back country. Along the eastern seaboard, on the other

hand, traditional European attitudes were more deeply rooted, and

wealthy families continued to defend aristocratic principles. The

resultant conflict between the new spirit of democracy and the

traditional belief in aristocracy was one of the main factors in

American political development both before and after the revolution.

(Parkes 58)

The House of Seven Gables [1851] is a historical document of a transitional phase in mid 19th century America. This text captures the social and political changes in

New England after the revolution. Apparently, it seems to be a tale of the glorious past and an inherited curse of an aristocratic Pyncheon family of New England as the author writes, “that the wrong- doing of one generation lives into the successive ones, and, divesting itself of every temporary advantage,’’ (preface to The House of Seven Gables) Iqbal 84 but it is not simply a story of a curse. The tale originates in the history of the Puritans of

Massachusetts Bay Colony in the 17th century and it has an influential bearing on the

19th century democratic America.

This tale traces the succeeding generations of Maules and Pyncheons from the

17th century to the 19th century America and their entwined fate. The focus of the present reading of this text is not the theme of perpetuation of evil from generation to generation and the way it becomes an alienating force for its characters. The aim of the present thesis is to present this novel as an important social and political discourse, registering its cultural presence among other discourses of the 19th century.

The novel seems attuned to contemporary America of Hawthorne’s time, making significant use of the growing class conflict, decline of nobility and emergence of democratic ideology, mesmerism, questions pertaining to gender role, and growing assertion on the power of individualism. It also provides the author with an opportunity to salvage his political commitments. Hawthorne’s personal commitments and democratic credo shaped this text and helped to disseminate the same ideology through this discourse.

In the preface to the novel, Hawthorne explained the difference between a novel proper and romance. He defined this text as “Romance” without any fidelity facts.

However, his treatment of the tale was not in accordance to what he professed in the preface. He wrote here:

The personages of the tales –though they give themselves out to be

of ancient stability and considerable prominence –are really of the

author’s own making, or, at all events, of his own mixing; their virtues Iqbal 85

can shed no luster, nor their defects rebound, in the remotest degree, to

the discredit of the venerable town of which they profess to be

inhabitants. He would be glad, therefore, if-especially in the quarter to

which he alludes –the book may be read strictly as romance, having a

great deal more to do with the clouds overhead than with any portion

of the actual soil of the County of Essex.( Lenox, January 27, 1851)

It was a deliberate attempt on the part of the writer to suppress any possibility of reconstruction of an ideology, the episteme of the time which he breathed. He consciously tried to disown any possible allegiance to a particular political thought.

But, in spite of this denial, Hawthorne draws a lively and vivid picture of Salem Street with its hawkers, peddlers, butchers, and bankers etc. He has placed this novel in contemporary America, with its rail road, omnibuses, and telegraphic invention and captured the nerve of the commercial America with its changing facets. His gimlet eyes do not fail to notice the torrent of change with political processions and public manouevring for enticing the commoner in the wake of the upcoming election of governorship in the new democratic regime. In this increasingly commercial America of the 19th century, republicanism and plebeianism were on forefront and gentility receded to the background. Issues of common men gained momentum while elite and ruling classes were confined to their own respective spheres, brooding over their glorious past which vanished.

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[I]

The House of Seven Gables attempts to establish a link between the 17th century feudal culture and the 19th century classless society in America through Hawthorne’s study of the consecutive generations of Pyncheons and Maules. Hawthorne has deliberately etched a contrast between aristocratic Pyncheon family of New England and the principles of the rising democracy. The democratic principles are projected through the characters of Holgrave, uncle Veneer, and Phoebe. In the 19th century

America, the aggrandizement of Plebeian classes swept away the societal paradigm of hierarchy. The novel projects Hawthorne’s continuing preoccupation with the colonial past of New England and its constant influence on his characters grounded in pre - revolutionary ideals of English aristocracy amid the social and political upheaval in the

19th century.

The central character of the novel Hepzibah Pyncheon is an aristocratic hucksteress. She is a lone inhabitant of the house of Seven Gables, built by her forefather Colonel Pyncheon. This house represents past values and traditions which are facing serious threat in the new social infrastructure. Hepzibah is a spinster but a proud matriarch who is conscious of her duty and responsibility to maintain the continuity of her family lineage and heritage. The proper maintenance of her ancestral house is beyond her improvised means still she agglutinates to the ancestral house tenaciously. She is a symbol of hollowed and fallen gentility who foolishly upholds its values in the world, voicing the creed of equality. The ancestral values that have molded Hepzibah’s life allow her to see herself as the guardian of the house of seven gables, and a respiratory of Pyncheon family’s lore and tradition. Her life is Iqbal 87 circumscribed by a code of decorum, sense of decency and propriety, governed by the aristocratic ideology. Her preoccupation with the past forces her to live at the margins of Salem’s social life without any social contact and financial support.

Hepzibah is a convincing portrait of a genteel poor, who is too aristocratic to go into trade and too proud to accept the acts of charity. In spite of her isolation and poverty, she is rigidly conscious of her pedigree hence, becomes insignificant in a world drifting towards technological advancement and material accumulation. She avoids confronting changes in the modern world therefore, loses her place on both social and psychological fronts. She is slow to realize that without money her values are impotent in this growing materialistic world. The aristocratic values emphasize the excellence and privileges of a few and leads to a hazardous and isolated existence, cut off from united Struggle of the social life. Hepzibah’s life style is indicative of a deteriorating effect of the social snobbery, implicit in an aristocratic way of life.

With the arrival of her only brother Clifford from prison, she is left with no other option but to earn her bread. Thereafter, she speculates about commercial trading with the world to sustain herself and her brother. In an unprecedented move to support her, she opens a cent shop in the family mansion for business transaction. It is a turning point in the history of the nobility as it marks the end of an epoch; the beginning of another. A cent shop is a modern equivalent of a corner confectionary. Hepzibah keeps

“penny toys” and “ginger bread” for sale on her shop’s counter. The patrician lady is transformed into a plebeian woman to meet the challenges in new times. It is a correct move in the democratic era where individual talent is valued not inherited names. This Iqbal 88 departure from antiquated aristocracy towards freedom and democracy is hailed by her tenant, the new man Holgrave:

I look upon this as one of the fortunate days of your life. It ends an

epoch, and begins one. Hitherto, the life-blood has been gradually

chilling in your veins, as you sat aloof, within your circle of gentility,

while the rest of the world was fighting out its battle with one kind of

necessity or another. Henceforth, you will at least have the sense of

healthy and natural effort for a purpose, and of lending your strength-be

it great or small-to the united struggle of mankind. This is success –all

the success that anybody meets with! (HSG 43-44)

Hepzibah’s neighbor Uncle Veneer is a practical Yankee with acute common sense. His character is governed by a realistic ideology. He had lived through the time of revolution and his practical wisdom encapsulates the social transformation from monarchy to republicanism in these words, ‘‘those old gentlemen that grew up before the Revolution used to put on grand airs. In my young days, the great man of the town was commonly called king; and his wife, not queen, to be sure, but lady. Now –a-days, a man would not dare to be called king, if he feels himself a little above common folks, he only stoops so much the lower to them’’( HSG 57). The vision of equalitarian society is not welcomed by those who have enjoyed the privilege of hierarchy in the past, for e.g. Hepzibah.

Hawthorne displays his sympathies for Hepzibah’s predicament by exploring her concept of gentility, ‘‘A lady who had fed herself from childhood with the shadowy food of aristocratic reminiscences and whose religion it was that a lady’s Iqbal 89 hand soils itself irremediably by doing aught for its bread-this born lady,... ”(HSG 38).

She does not want to soil her hand by manual work and desires to keep her hand “white and delicate” amid Laissez-faire economic philosophy. This philosophy emphasizes on the general well being of every individual.

She appears to be a misfit in the present state of society and seems to linger in the borrowed time of hierarchal privileges. The displacement of the feudal civilization has led to compulsive readjustment in the community; hence, it becomes obligatory for

Hebzibah to face reality. Her business transaction furnishes her with an opportunity to surrender her condescending approach to commonalty. But the raging battle in her heart and soul at this new move and her nervousness at the shop counter communicate her failure to grasp the lessons of the egalitarian community. She longs desperately to die and to be buried in the family tomb with her ancestors, instead of confronting the world which, ‘‘is too chill and hard,-and I am too old, and too feeble, and too hopeless!’’(HSG43).

She retains her old stateliness and craves for the special treatment like a “lady”.

She recoils from expressions of sympathy and says wistfully, ‘‘I was born a lady, and have always lived one –no matter in what narrowness of means, always a lady!’’(HSG

44) There are various instances of her so called generosity or rather social snobbery scattered all over the novel. She sells biscuits to her tenant Holgrave but refuses to take money. Her aristocratic upbringing does not allow her to accept money from a friend for providing him with food. She desperately desires to clutch on to her old status by shutting her eyes from the changes sweeping all around, ‘‘Let me be a lady little longer’’ (HSG 44). Iqbal 90

She generously returns money of a child who gives it to her when she sells “Jim crow” [ginger bread] to him. These episodes reflect her sense of superiority which she is not able to suppress. Her pride to belong to gentility is a hurdle in a successful business transaction. Like a selfish individual, she zealously safeguards the interest of her family and denies new trends and mores. Her old gentility is, ‘‘contumaciously squeamish at sight of the copper coin...’’ (HSG 48). She feels as if the sordid stain of the copper coin will never be washed away from her palm. Her lady like sensibilities are seriously infringed upon by the familiar tone of people who address her as their equal or even inferior. She repudiates the sentiments of democracy through her inward dislike of those people by whose penny she hopes to sustain herself. She unconsciously flatters herself with the idea - that there would be a gleam or a halo of some kind about her person - which will insure an obeisance to her sterling gentility.

She had always looked down upon “‘the lower class” and always regarded them with pitying complacence while enjoying her unquestionable superiority. Like a corrosive disease, her arrogance ate away her normal bond with humanity and it ostracized her from the rest of the humanity. Her helplessness and inner conflict is highlighted by a scowl on her face which is a result of her near sightedness but it gives her a harsh look. Hepzibah’s old friend Uncle Veneer gives her practical advice in the salesmanship to get success in the world full of polished exterior, cultivated grace, and glossy packaging. He insists on making her presentable, ‘‘Put on a bright face for your customers, and smile pleasantly as you hand them what they ask for! A stale article, if you dip it in a good, warm, sunny smile, will go off better than fresh one that you’ve scowled upon!’’(HSG59). Iqbal 91

Even after painfully debunking her old idea of nobility, she is far from feeling parity with the common masses. She feels miserable that her commercial transaction, which is such a breathless episode in the history of Pyncheon nobility, is merely another insignificant episode in the life of a common man in New England. Her inflated ego is pricked by the casual attitude of people towards her fall. The comment of the two men from the labor class, Dixey and his friend represents the attitude of the community towards her fall. They find her “sour tempered” hence, incapable of succeeding in that

“overdone” business. Dixey compares her with his wife and in a preemptory statement announces Hepzibah’s prospective failure in the business. They find nothing remarkably singular in her fate. Monetary requirements have compelled aristocratic families towards commercial speculation in those changing times as has been stated in the novel, “. . . we might point to several little shops of a similar description; some of them in houses as ancient as that of the seven gables; and one or two, it may be, where a decayed gentlewoman stands behind the counter, as grim an image of family pride as

Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon herself ’’ (HSG 40).

Amid the clarion call for an alternative regime, Hawthorne knew that Hepzibah was not an exclusive study of an unfortunate soul whose hereditary glory had diminished in the changed time. Hawthorne called the country “republican” and pointed out at the transitional phase of the time by referring to the “fluctuating waves of our social life”. The American Revolution was decisive both for American political development and its social evolution. Nelson Manfred Blake wrote about this time:

. . . Socially the revolution weakened the old aristocracy and laid the

basis for readjustment of classes. Thousands of the gentry fled the Iqbal 92

country; those who remained were forced to share prestige with new

men, thrust up in the social upheaval. Landholding was disrupted by

confistications and new laws of inheritance... New opportunities were

opened for the merchants and speculators. Artisan and journeymen

became discontented with their traditional status. Old institutions and

modes of thoughts were widely challenged. (124)

The novel suggests the recognition of economical and historical progress as democratic principles advanced and aristocratic lineage declined. Common man was no longer under the influence of hereditary name and wealth. Hepzibah was hurt by these changes which were a very antipode to her abstract idea of elite society. She was clueless with regard to the “new notions” and nor did she wish to comprehend them.

. . . by the slight and idle effect that her setting up shop –an event of

such breathless interest to herself - appeared to have upon the public, of

which these two men were the nearest representatives. A glance; a

passing word or two; coarse laugh, and she was doubtless forgotten,

before they turned the corner! They cared nothing for her dignity, and

just as little for her degradation. (HSG 46)

Many 19th century genteel practices reflected an aspiration towards a life of leisure and luxury as had been enjoyed by the English aristocracy. Women were involved in the roles which evolved within the cult of domesticity. They were charged with the role of enacting these prescribed roles. These fallen aristocratic families had a tendency to copy, “the beliefs and way of life of English gentry” (Parkes 61). In New

England, where family name and history had strongly influenced one’s place in the Iqbal 93 social fabric and one’s sense of pride, it was difficult for Hepzibah to abandon those ideals. The title of gentleman and lady were meaningful in the pre revolution era and conferred privileges on those who bore it. But after the revolution, these titles of nobility became meaningless and illusory on the ground of false pretensions of superiority.

The revolution in short, had given the American people an independent

place in the family of nations. It had given them a changed social order,

in which hereditary wealth and privilege counted for less, and human

equality for more; in which the standards of culture and manners were

temporarily lowered, but those of equality were raised. (Nevins,

Commager 111)

Hepzibah belongs to the upper class whose superior position was fixed by law and custom in the colonial time. “Early colonial laws forbade any but upper class men to wear silver buttons and any but upper class women and daughters to wear silk dresses’’(Bragdon 23 ). Hepzibah still wears a black silk gown. She is full of pride for being the proprietor of old and invaluable china cups. They are as ancient as the custom itself of tea-drinking. They belonged to her great, great, great grandmother, who was a

Davenport of a good family. Hepzibah flaunts her old silver crested tea-spoons, and antique china tea –set to drink tea when her cousin Phoebe arrives at her place. By these possessions, she is flattering herself with ideas of gentility and tells Phoebe with pride,

“they were almost the first tea-cups ever seen in the colony” (HSG 68).

All the while, when she is busy in perfecting the scheme of her little shop, she still cherishes an unacknowledged idea that some harlequin trick of fortune will Iqbal 94 intervene in her favor. She thinks about a rich uncle who will suddenly declare her as his heiress or the great claim to the heritage of Waldo County may finally be decided in favor of Pyncheon. All these fantasies of miraculous rescue through arrival of a mysterious and hidden fortune mark the unreality of her existence. “The Eastern Land

Claim, occupying central importance in the plot of Seven Gables, translates the

Hawthornes’ never realized right to nine thousand acres in Maine deeded to their ancestor, in 1666, by an Indian Sagamore” (Warren 89).

Young reformer Holgrave confronts her with the unreality of her fabricated existence in these words, “These names of gentleman and lady had a meaning, in the past history of the world, and conferred privileges, desirable, or otherwise, on those entitled to bear them. In the present –and still more in the future condition of society- they imply, not privilege, but restriction!’’(HSG 44).

Her pride is undemocratic, an aristocratic arrogance which is a sin against democracy. It makes her a pariah in the shifting paradigm of the society. In this transitional phase, plain people had started taking more active interest in politics and insisted, “ that leadership and office holding should no longer be restricted to the wealthier and well educated classes”(Parkes 237). The forces of egalitarian society worked incessantly which gave rise to trading, manufacturing, and a host of other opportunities for the middle class to rise in the world. Hawthorne retained a working class perspective through various means, “He ignored the more aristocratic society of

Salem in favor of limited companionship with the less literate but perhaps wiser citizens, especially one William pike, a carpenter’’(Cowie 330). He was not politically but by conviction a democrat. “Between 1789 and 1861 the economic framework of Iqbal 95

American society was radically altered. The advance of the frontier and the growth of the cities were twin forces working against the continuance of aristocratic privilege and towards increase of political democracy” (Blake 232).

Andrew Jackson’s win as the president of the United States in 1828 was instrumental in bringing change in the community. This natural –born leader was a self made man who was orphaned at the age of thirteen. He was without the advantage of wealth and education enjoyed by the earlier presidents. His victory was celebrated as the triumph of a common man. Since his presidency roughly coincided with the various democratic reforms such as manhood suffrage; his election became a symbol of the growing power of the common men in politics. Jackson expressed his ideas in favor of leveling tendencies and declared that everyman was a king in theory. The judges, who were earlier appointed by the governors, were now elected by the common man.

The common men took in their own hands the nomination of the state-officials.

It was a privilege which was earlier exercised by the members of the legislature. It revealed an aggressive and self- assertive spirit of common men. They suddenly awoke to a consciousness of their rights and their strength for mobilizing political and social infrastructure. At the time of revolution, American political leaders held the democratic contact theory of the government. According to this theory, all political authority or sovereignty belonged to the ordinary men. It emphasized that the Commonalty had the right to elect government of their choice, to select their officers, to carry on the government, and to determine what power their officers should exercise. The father of

American constitution, Thomas Jefferson stated the theory of equality and freedom in his “Declaration of Independence” on 4th July 1776. He said: Iqbal 96

We hold these truths to be self evident. That all men are created equal;

that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights;. . .

That, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men,

deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that,

whenever any form of the government becomes destructive of these

ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute

a new government, . . . .(Baker, Commager 975)

Hawthorne was a Jacksonian democrat and a lifelong admirer of Andrew

Jackson which was against his family allegiance. His experience in England made him realize the values of egalitarian ideology more forcefully. Hawthorne’s friends Horatio

Bridge, Jonathan Cilley and, Franklin Pierce were all Democrats. Hawthorne’s close association with the democratic ideology went into the making of this novel and his preference for the emerging social order. In this novel, he appears more outspoken in his affirmation of democracy and condemnation of an aristocratic society. Jefferson believed like Adams, “that there was a natural aristocracy based on virtue and talents, but there was also, he said, an artificial aristocracy based on wealth and birth alone”

(Blake 238).In Jacksonian era there was no title and hereditary class distinction which commanded respect in the eye of people. To win respect from the public, money and personal success were necessary. It was at that time, the concept of Bourgeoisie society was emerging. The lower middle class was quickly becoming middle class through their individual efforts. It was a clear sign of the growth of democracy and the end of feudalism that almost everyone belonged to the middle class. Iqbal 97

The characters of this novel are the emanations; the active agents of a culture circumambient ideology. Holgrave, Phoebe and Uncle Veneer advocate democratic principles endorsed by the author. Hawthorne has used fiction as a lens through which a certain portrait of his experiences is brought into focus through the characters and happenings. By reading this tale and inner life of Hawthorne’s character, we can reconstruct the original ideology which has given birth to this tale.

In spite of Hawthorne’s avowed disingenuousness regarding historical accuracy, his characters are representative of a definite thought structure. These characters reflect the tension and acceptance of the altered ideologies. The setting of the time and place in the novel is such that the characters of the novel emerge as recognizable social, historical, and political figures of 17th and the 19th century. After Jackson’s victory, there emerged a belief that power should be decentralized and the function of the government should be as limited as possible with the maintenance of order, safety, and opportunity. The base of the government should be self respecting individual of moderate means not the affluent class. Everyone should be given equal opportunities according to his abilities and nature. All these issues have been reemphasized through fictional projection of the characters and their destiny in The House of Seven Gables.

Hawthorne attempted to make a point that it was the moral necessity for all human beings to establish an original relation to the universe. Thoreau and Emerson demonstrated the same through their philosophy. Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine reiterated that every generation should be allowed to set up its own laws and contracts.

As Hall wrote, ‘‘Paine thought that to escape the infelicitous prejudices of the past it was necessary for men to think as though they were the first man who thought’’(166). Iqbal 98

Hawthorne was able to perceive the progressive movement of the society towards equalitarian ideal. He has juxtaposed Hephzibah’s genteel helplessness against the demurely charming self reliance of her niece Phoebe who is a little offshoot of

Pyncheon race in consanguinity with Hepzibah. She is a native of rural New England.

In chapter IV, “A Day behind the Counter”, Phoebe emerges as a foil to her aristocratic legacy. She has come to live under Hepzibah’s guardianship after her mother’s second marriage. She appears to be spirited, active, and dynamic within her chosen domestic sphere. She is fresh and unconventional yet orderly and “obedient to common rules”

(HSG 61). She knows how to earn her bread because she has ‘‘not been brought up a

Pyncheon. A girl learns many things in a New England village’’ (HSG 66). The antithesis between aristocracy and democracy comes to the surface when Hepzibah laments that Phoebe is an excellent shop keeper but not a lady. It is a fair parallel between new Plebeianism and old gentility. Hepzibah’s initial responses to Phoebe are governed by the standards according to which she has lived in the past- establishing a formal distance between them.

Phoebe can manage kitchen, run school and shop with equal dexterity. She has no presumptions nor is she conscious of her superior ancestry. Phoebe possesses plebeian capabilities and easily adjusts in the new circumstances. She has already worked as school mistress for the little children in the district school and proves herself a better shopkeeper and housekeeper than her elderly cousin. Even Hepzibah acknowledges and appreciates her ability as a shopkeeper. Phoebe is a descendent of gentility but believes in individual talent and worth. Hepzibah is compliant to her every Iqbal 99 advice and suggestions to increase the influx of trade and gain profit, “without hazardous outlay of capital” (HSG 70).

[II]

Apart from helping to bridge the gap between the labor class and gentility,

Phoebe is a model of conformity. She is a self-contained woman without any discordant element in her personality. She can shock no canon of taste and is admirably in keeping with the ideals of conformist society. She never strikes any note of dissonance as it is written, ‘‘it would be preferable to regard phoebe as the example of feminine grace and availability combined in a state of society, if there were any such, where ladies didn’t exist’’( HSG 71). Phoebe’s identity is governed by the way, she is perceived by the male oriented society. She is a reservoir of cultural values and victim of adulation.

She has internalized stereotypical forms of female behavior and conducts herself as she is expected to. Amy Schrager Lang opines the same, and says that Phoebe exhibits, ‘‘all the virtues of middle class feminity” (37-38). Minrose Gwin observes, ‘‘since white women were victims of adulation rather than violence, they often internalized stereotypical forms and attempted in great earnestness to become what they were expected to be’’(405). Phoebe has unconsciously assimilated the expectations associated with her gender. Her inner strength makes her fit for the type of role she has to play in the life of her lover Holgrave. She is governed by a set of values where woman’s sense of self and her concepts of success are shaped in accordance with her ability to conform to societal expectations. Iqbal 100

Phoebe is in love with Holgrave, the tenant of Hephzibah. Hawthorne’s young and energetic character Holgrave becomes a kind of spokesman for the principles of the egalitarian society. He is a young citizen of New America with no hereditary possessions but lively intelligence to his credit. He is not born a gentleman but a protean in his capabilities. He is only twenty two year old but has already worked as country school master, salesman, editor, peddler, dentist, mesmerist, and daguerreotypist, not restricted him to a single craft.

Holgrave is comfortable in a society that rewards men and value them for their professional skill and marketable strategies. After the revolution, the apogee of self- sufficient and the self-made man of American mythology was born. It was known as an era of “American boundlessness”. Ethos of manly striving was taking form in the culture at large which had been exemplified through the character of Holgrave. With the emerging economic scenario, Holgrave is willing to try his luck in any profession that promises reward. He is quite modern in his outlook and does not hesitate to make himself presentable as a commodity in the growing materialistic and competitive world.

As a transcendentalist and reformer, he has spent some time in the community of

Fourierists and his prophetic vision is full of promises for a better future:

. . . we are not doomed to creep on forever in the old, bad way, but that,

this very now, there are the harbingers aboard of golden era, to be

accomplished in his own lifetime. It seemed to Holgrave –as doubtless

it has seemed to the hopeful of every century, since the epoch of Adam’s

grandchildren–that in this age, more than ever before, the moss- grown

and rotten Past is to be torn down, and lifeless institutions to be thrust Iqbal 101

out of the way, and their dead corpses buried, and everything to begin

anew. (HSG144)

Holgrave, the daguerreotypist is inspired by the radical doctrine of individualism which is directed against the established order in the government, economics, and religion. His character projects the young New England liberal of 1850.

Individual rights were foremost in constitutional thinking at that time. Holgrave internalizes and acts out the conflict men felt in the 19th century America between the aggressive, domineering ideology of Jacksonian democracy and heroism and comparatively selfless- ideal of Christian gentility. He desires to slough off the second hand arrangements of the defunct past and to work out a new relation to the world. It was a prime individual responsibility according to the best theories of democratic individualism and enlightenment, “Jefferson repeatedly declared himself a rebel against the past. He believed that each generation should be allowed to make laws to suit itself and should be free of the public debts incurred by its predecessors. If any act shall be hereafter passed to repeal the present or to narrow its operation, such act will be an infringement of natural rights” (Peterson 112-124). The failure to fulfill this responsibility was sinister to the intellect and the heart. It was the result of democracy which generated self reliance.

Holgrave’s works as political and social reformer are closely scrutinized by

Hawthorne. The author was critical of any organized philanthropy as it narrowed down one’s perception at the expense of broader human sympathies. Holgrave is radical in his outlook who asserts on the need to reform capitols, state-houses, court –houses, city- halls, and churches but is not allowed to use his energy for any philanthropic scheme. Iqbal 102

His energy is diverted within the periphery of conjugal bliss through his marriage with

Phoebe.

Holgrave is an expert in mesmeric art. His temptation to overpower his lover

Phoebe through mesmerism enabled the author to discuss mesmerism, the popular 19th century practice in psychology. Hawthorne was particularly interested to study it in the context of male-female relationship. Mesmerism trod closely on the heels of phrenology. Monsieur Poyen, a French Creole from one of the west India Islands had come to America [Boston] and introduced this new science to the American public. His lectures were succeeded by experiments and the publication of his successful cases.

Mesmerism came to America in two waves. The first subsided almost before

Hawthorne was born and left without making any noticeable influence. The second wave had begun in the mid 1830s, and reached in an ultra scientific phase with its merger in phrenology and phrenomagnetism in the early 1840s.

In both his novels The Blithedale Romance and The House of Seven Gables,

Hawthorne borrows heavily from mesmerism. Holgrave narrates the story of Alice which is linked to magnetic art and definitely in the negative light owing to

Hawthorne’s dislike for this nefarious art. Alice’s father Gervayse Pyncheon was a greedy man like his ancestor Colonel Pyncheon. He was looking for some document which was essential to establish his claim to a large territory at the eastward. He summoned a carpenter who belonged to the Maule’s ancestry to disclose the secret of the document. He was informed that the day colonel Pyncheon died due to apoplexy in his private room, certain papers belonging to him were spread out on the table. The Iqbal 103 carpenter’s father was possibly present in the same room at that time because he was doing some work in that room.

This carpenter of the present time was looking forward for an opportunity to take his revenge upon Pyncheon family. He came to know that the property on which the house of seven gables was erected originally belonged to his forefather. It was illegally snatched from his ancestors by Colonel Pyncheon through the abuse of his power. The carpenter put a proposal before Gervayse Pyncheon. He asked for the house of seven gables in exchange of the information about the territory. He insisted a meeting with his daughter Alice Pyncheon as that the information regarding the document can be obtained only “ through the clear, crystal medium of a pure virgin intelligence, like that of fair Alice’’(HSG 160). In his greed, Gervayse Pyncheon suppressed his conscience and fatherly affection to enter into this bargain. It led to a mesmeric control of the carpenter over Alice. She appeared to be doing everything in a trance. The same had been mentioned in one of the sketches of Hawthorne, ‘‘The Hall of Fantasy’’ published in 1843 in ‘‘The Pioneer’’, when the narrator and his guide pass out of the “hall” at the end of the sketch, they meet, “the spirit of several persons, who had been sent thither in the magnetic sleep”(294).

The most common means of subjugating the will of the somnambulist was through the eyes of the mesmerist. When these mesmerists fastened on their eyes on their victims, they engaged them in a test of mental and spiritual power, the outcome of which was usually beyond the control of a helpless female. The carpenter asked Alice,

‘‘. . . to fix your [her] eyes on mine!”(HSG162). Alice complied with his command without any estimate of the power pitted against her. She was under the triumphant Iqbal 104 gaze of the carpenter and a dim unattainable distance was created between her and the rest of the world. Neither the loving touch and kisses nor the violent shrieks and jerks could arouse her from that slumber.

The carpenter converted her mind into a kind of telescopic medium through which he could obtain a glimpse into the spiritual world. ‘‘The mesmerist’s power over the will of his somnambulist shocked and intrigued the public more than any of the mysterious feats of clairvoyance, telepathy, and psycho kinesis’’ (Taylor 54). When the carpenter waved his hand, she awoke from that trance and forgot all her visionary experiences as well as her real self. Thus afterwards, till the time of her death, she remained a bonded slave of the carpenter. It was not a fanciful idea which Hawthorne was entertaining here but it was based on his first hand experience of this spiritual science as ‘‘Reports of insanity induced by magnetic and spiritualist experiments were common, especially after 1850 ’’ (Taylor 59).

The debate at that time was whether one could force his subject to do anything immoral through magnetism. Defenders of mesmerism like John Bovee Dods refuted these allegations and said that it could not be possible that the person could do anything against his/her will but hastened to add, ‘‘ if he will at the same time use physical resistance’’(Taylor 54) against the command of the mesmerist.

Alice lacked that power to resist the command of the carpenter. The power of

Maule was implicitly sexual because Alice lost her dignity and could never marry afterwards. Maule tested the power of an entrepreneurial manhood that viewed women as commodities to be marketed and displayed in public. The carpenter would say

‘‘Alice laugh!”And even if it was a prayer time or a funeral, Alice would break into a Iqbal 105 wild and hysterical laughter. ‘‘Alice be sad! ’’-and at the very instant a tear would roll down her cheeks, quenching all the mirth around her. ‘‘Alice dance!’’ and she would dance like a rustic in a state of merry making, with hig paced jig and hop-skip ringadoom. Alice did all without any power for resistance and felt being humiliated, abased and below than a worm (167).Commager and Nevins wrote:

Mesmerism vulgarly culminated in an exhibition of what was called,

absurdly enough ‘psychology’ or ‘biology’ a process of hallucination by

which a number of susceptible persons selected by a lecturer from his

audience were made to believe and to do the most ridiculous things

–to fancy they were swimming, or flying or drinking, at the will of

the operator, and to dance, sing, declaim, and do many things they never

thought of doing in their normal condition. (417)

The heyday of animal magnetism was 1840s, just before the publication of

Hawthorne’s The House Seven Gables and The Blithedale Romance. Matthew Maule mesmerized Alice Pyncheon to learn the location of a lost document and Westerwelt in

The Blithedale Romance overpowered Priscilla to enhance his theatrical reputation.

Dr.Robert H.Collyer was a well known mesmerist in the 1840s. The popular mind was much engrossed in this new science. Hawthorne might have seen Collyer performing in magnetic feats in Boston or Salem and used him as a model for prof. Westerwelt in The

Blithedale Romance. Collyer was busy in public lectures on phrenology, mesmerism, phrenomagnetism, and psychography throughout New England from 1839 to 1843. He was successfully engaged in Boston from May through July 1841 and moved to Salem Iqbal 106 in August. At that time, Hawthorne was at Brook farm, and might have seen Collyer on one of his visits to the city just like Coverdale.

Hawthorne had a great distrust for this radical branch of science. It is reflected in his letter to his would be wife Sophia Peabody. Sophia was interested in animal magnetism, which was practiced by one Mrs. Park. She wrote a letter to Hawthorne and expressed her desire to meet Mrs. Park for the treatment of her constant headache which had paralyzed her normal life. Hawthorne did not relish that idea and replied on

18, October, 1841:

I am unwilling that a power should be exercised on thee, of which we

know neither the origin nor consequence, and the phenomena of which

seem rather calculated to bewilder us, than to teach us any truths about

the present or future state of being. If I possessed such a power over

thee, I should not dare to exercise it; nor can I consent to it being

exercised by another. Supposing that this power arises from the

transfusion of one spirit into another, it seems to me that the sacredness

of an individual is violated by it ; there would be an intrusion into thy

holy of holiest – and the intruder would not be thy husband ! Canst thou

think, without shrinking of thy soul of any human being coming into

closer communion with thee than I may? -than either nature or my own

sense of right would permit me? I cannot. And dearest, thou must

remember, too, that thou art now a part of me, and that surrendering

thyself to the influence of this magnetic lady, thou surrenderest more

than thine own moral and spiritual being – allowing that the influence is Iqbal 107

a moral and spiritual one. And, sweetest, I really do not like the idea of

being brought, through thy medium, into such an intimate relation with

Mrs. Park! (Taylor 42-43)

Hawthorne believed that man’s body is holy of holies “which is strictly his own, into which no one except his creator can enter’’(Brennan 270). He was highly critical of mesmerism and all its related branches in which a power was exercised over man to penetrate his deepest being. He was aware about the interest of Sophia’s sister

Elizabeth in mesmerism so he wrote to Sophia, “Thy sister Elizabeth would like nothing so much as to proclaim thy spiritual experiences, by sound of trumpet”

(Taylor 44). His knowledge of the eccentricities in the Peabody family made him aware of the danger to which Sophia was susceptible to. Therefore, in a very straight forward manner, he wrote to Sophia in 1841, “-do not let an earthly effluence from Mrs. Park’s corporeal system bewilder thee, and perhaps contaminate something spiritual and sacred’’ (Taylor 43).

Hawthorne equated this intrusion into other’s soul with unpardonable sin. He believed that the unpardonable sin might consist in a want of love and reverence for human soul; in consequence of which, the investigator pried into its dark depths, not with a hope or purpose of making it better, but from cold philosophical curiosity. Prof.

Randall Stewart wrote:

The exercise of such a (mesmeric) power is fundamentally wrong

because it violates the sacredness of personality. Only a person utterly

lacking in love and reverence for the human soul, one in whom the

intellect has been overdeveloped and emotional nature has undergone Iqbal 108

atrophy, would be capable of thus preying upon a susceptible nature. In

this ‘separation of the intellect from the heart’ and the consequent drying

up of human sympathies, Hawthorne finds the unpardonable sin. (qtd in

Fick 135)

Hawthorne found in mesmerism the 19th century version of witchcraft. There were accusations of sexual immorality against the mesmerists. His uneasy fascination with the sexual implications of magnetic power was noticeable in The Blithedale

Romance, “At the bidding of one of these wizards, the maiden, with her lover’s kiss still burning on her lips, would turn from him with icy indifference; the newly made widow would dig up her buried heart out of her young husband’s grave, before the sods had taken root upon it . . . ’’ (556).

Hawthorne’s mesmerists were men of strong intellect and ambition and his female characters like Phoebe, Alice, Priscilla, and Zenobia were subjugated by the power of these wizards. His female characters suffered heavily in their bondage - especially in reputation, since a sexual threat was pervasively if vague attendant on this subjugation. He could not refrain from warning young females and even married ladies

-not to trust themselves alone with practical magnetizers. Mesmerism might be viewed as a dangerous addition to the material medica, much in the way that shock therapy is regarded today (Taylor 59). He viewed mesmerists as one for whom “human character was but soft as wax in their hands; and guilt, or virtue, only the forms into which he should see fit to mould it”(BR 556). He stressed upon the seductive power of the mesmerist over his young female subjects. He cited instances of the miraculous power of one human being over the will and passions of another; insomuch that Iqbal 109

“settled grief was but a shadow beneath the influence of a man possessing this potency, and the strong love of years melted away like vapor”(B R 555-556).

Holgrave refrains from using his hereditary power over Phoebe to subjugate her out of his respect for Phoebe’s free and virgin spirit. He is aware of his power over

Phoebe. It is equally dangerous and disastrous as that the carpenter of his legend has acquired and exercised over the ill fated Alice. This power of an individual to get control over other through mesmeric art was exercised more frequently during 1830s and 1840s. Even modern Psychology could not regard it as altogether fabulous. Hawthorne discovered a pervasive desire for the power behind the use of this science in the overwhelmingly materialistic society. People were so devious, selfish, and materialistic that they did not hesitate in using human body and mind as a tool.

. . . the mysterious power of the Maules is seem to be what the 1830s

and 40s knew as mesmerism or hypnotism. “Modern psychology, it may

will endeavor to reduce these alleged necromancies within a system

instead of rejecting them as altogether fabulous,” writes Hawthorne of

the theory that in the dream world the Maules ruled the Pyncheons.

(Warren 95)

Holgrave’s initial temptation was strong to seduce Phoebe through his mesmeric art but he resisted that because of his respect for women and their individuality. His integrity never allowed him to violate the inner most of a man and he carried his conscience in all circumstances. It forbade him to control the destiny of Phoebe though Iqbal 110 she belonged to the Pyncheon lineage, his hereditary rivals. His love for Phoebe was his greatest strength and redeeming power.

[III]

By showing Holgrave, a successor of Maule ancestry who was involved in the witchcraft trial of 1691, Hawthorne found an opportunity to discuss about the social, religious, and political motives behind the persecution of the so called witches in the

17th century Boston. Holgrave’s ancestor Matthew Maule is shown a victim of witchcraft delusion in which Phoebe’s ancestor Colonel Pyncheon acted as a judge.

Matthew Maule’s name had historical association with the name of an important member of early Salem, Thomas Maule who left an indelible mark through his freeways on the history of the 17th century New England.

He was an outspoken Quaker who lived in Salem, Massachusetts during the trials of witchery. He vehemently attacked self –styled church and state elite for their intolerance and fanaticism. Through his writings, historical Maule assaulted the Puritan ministers for the execution of witches. He questioned the reliability of alleged confession of people, who were accused of being witches and doubted the validity of

“Spectral evidence”. Maule brought forth his view regarding witchcraft trials in “Truth

Maintained and Set Forth in 1695”. He was tried for seditious libel because he accused the ministers of Salem for preaching lies and instructing in the doctrine of the devils.

He was whipped for creating national upheaval at the time when even minute disregard for the authoritative opinion was regarded a sin. Iqbal 111

Maule understood the danger of creating a state where theology monopolized expressions and behaviors. His condemnation of the authority was seen as attack on the

Salem government itself. He was arrested but acquitted because evidence against him was insufficient. His acquittal was seen as the triumph of common man against coercive mandate of theocracy. He used his common sense against repressionists to prove him innocent. He objected not to the fact that the Puritans considered themselves the only religious privy to the will of God for he himself exhibited an attitude of superiority on the same matter; but to the arrogance of a theocracy that imposed its interpretation of God’s will on everyone, within its reach(James Edward

Maule).

More than a century later, Hawthorne used his name for his novel The House of

Seven Gables. It was not so important whether the house of seven gables was actually the house of Thomas Maule or not; what mattered that the historical Maule of the 17th century was a commoner who became the conscience of the community during the witchcraft delusion. He was a severe critic of religious persecution and fought for the freedom of expression like Maule’s successor Holgrave in the 19th century. Holgrave’s ancestor Matthew Maule was hanged on the charges of witchery. It highlighted the underlying relation between the two figures -one fictional the other real. Hawthorne’s forefather, John Hathorne was one of those magistrates who presided over the trial. The novel gave Hawthorne a platform to indulge in speculation regarding the truth of his great grandfather who added a significant chapter to American history.

The tale of this novel revolves around an aristocratic Pyncheon family which is supposed to be overshadowed by a curse launched against one of its member by a Iqbal 112 commoner Matthew Maule. The land on which grand and antique mansion seven gables is constructed, belongs to Holgrave’s ancestor Matthew Maule. This property was desirable in the eyes of a prominent man Colonel Pyncheon. He asserted a plausible claim to the ownership of this piece of land; and a large tract of land adjacent to it on the strength of a grant from the legislature. Matthew Maule, though a commoner was not ready to leave what he considered his right to hold. He succeeded in retaining that land for several years and refused to sell it. Colonel Pyncheon was a ruthless and greedy man and he was not ready to give up easily what he desired to obtain. In the late 17th century, the sense of community was beginning to disappear.

The people in Salem were not the newly arrived settlers anymore who were willing to live according to the ideals of the community.

During the later part of the 17th century individual financial gain was valued higher than common good. There was nothing like making others conditions our own anymore. People were not equal anymore in their struggle to settle down and to survive in an uncivilized environment; instead social distinctions were established so that there were beggars as well as rich merchants. In those days well-off person’s influence had greater hereditary weight. The chronicles showed that the sway of class and wealth had held firmer ground in Salem than any other New England town in that time. The wealthy and powerful Colonel Pyncheon contrived to implicate Maule in sin of religious heresy. He behaved in selfish and ruthless manner as one of the judges of the

Salem witchcraft trial and hanged him on charges of witchery. The end of Maule brought a new perspective that how economic motive entered even in the charge of witchcraft. The historian Croce wrote, . . . history consists essentially in seeing the past Iqbal 113 through the eyes of the present and in the light of its problems, and the main work of the historian is not to record but to evaluate for if he does not evaluate how can he know what is worth recording?(Carr 21-22).

Like a historian, Hawthorne studied the event of the past from present perspective and found that the execution of Matthew Maule for sin of witchcraft brought us a lesson from history that: “The influential classes, and those who take upon themselves to be people, are fully liable to all the passionate error that has ever characterized the maddest mob” (HSG 15). Colonel Pyncheon was foremost in those who cried to purge the land from witchcraft. There was an individual acrimony in the zeal with which he sought the condemnation of Matthew Maule. After the death of

Maule, Colonel followed his original design and built his house over that piece of land which originally belonged to the executed Maule; and which he was eying since the time Matthew was alive. The factual authenticity to the novel was further established through reference to King William during the construction of the house of the Seven

Gables.

In the mid 17th century, theocratic rulers became merciless in the persecution of

Quakes. The possession of too great power intoxicated their brain. They inflicted cruel bodily and mental sufferings on dissenters without any compunction. Power, if remains unrestrained make a person atrocious; be it the case of colonel Pyncheon of the 17th century or Jaffrey Pyncheon of the 19th century. Once the Puritan establishment was convinced that their rules of polity and conduct were according to biblical guideline; they rigorously followed their course in enforcing the law of conduct as they liked.

They did not deter from their course even if it meant harsher punishment which might Iqbal 114 savor inequity in order to destroy sin, idolatry, and error in every circumstance. In the process as, ‘‘many very human motives played an important part in interpreting the law of God and personal likes and dislikes, hypocrisy, prejudice, and passion got badly mixed with the higher and more spiritual impulses that were actively at work purging the church of its error’’ (Andrews 430-431).

Hawthorne’s contemporaries interpreted witchcraft trial as an example of religious hysteria whereas he could see with a modern foresight how Colonel

Pynchon’s religious conviction easily accommodated his questionable personal motive.

He did not act as a man of conscience and integrity in the trial of Maule. Even Matthew

Maule could detect his selfish motive and cursed Colonel from the gallows that “God will give him blood to drink” (HSG 16).

Hawthorne had read widely in the 17th century history and took information of that period from Cotton Mather’s Wonders of the Invisible World. In this book, Mather recorded his eloquent belief in this phenomenon. Robert Calef’s More Wonders of the

Invisible World [1700], which was published in reply to Cotton Mather’s book, a record of the trial of Sarah Good had been given. This trial was held on 30 June 1692. Sarah

Good was convicted for conversing with the devil. In her trial, one of the magistrates

Noyes, urged her to confess her witchery:

“You are a witch, and you know you are!” to this the dying woman replied:

‘‘You are a liar,-I am no more a witch than you are a wizard, and if you take away my life, God will give you blood to drink!’’ (Calef 209).

In the 17th century, belief in the supernatural element was a normal phenomenon. Judges, clergies, educated class, statesman as well as illiterate folks were Iqbal 115 convinced about the reality of witches and devils. One of the ancestors of the writer acted as magistrate at those proceedings made Hawthorne’s biographical information important. It is significant to relate the curse of Matthew Maule from the gallows to a curse inflicted upon Hawthorne’s ancestor John Hathorne. He apparently found this idea in his own family annals. According to some historical documents, his witch hunting ancestor incurred a malediction from one of the victims as a result, the prosperity of the race faded away. John Erskine wrote about John Hathorne: ‘‘As a judge he presided at several witchcraft trials, and a curse was laid on him and his blood by one he condemned to die. During his life the family lost the title deed to the land in Maine where afterwards the town of Raymond grew up, and papers were recovered only when the claim had become valueless” ( 183).

Hawthorne used both these incidents - inherited curse and a lost deed of land in the present tale. He was a shrewd student of history who knew that the Puritans of the

17th century New England were as aristocratic in their ways as the feudal society of

Europe. Hawthorne perceived the sharp cleavage that existed between the various social groups in the 17th century society. In the very beginning of the tale, when

Colonel Pyncheon threw a party to celebrate the grand construction of the house of the seven gables, the hereditary class distinction became prominent. There was apparent disparity in the reception and treatment of the classes. Two servants were entrusted with the responsibility to observe the invited guests and direct them to the festive place accordingly. They pointed some of the guests to the neighborhood of the kitchen and ushered others into the statelier rooms. They were hospitable alike to all but still with a scrutinizing regard to the high or low degree of each. This was the 17th century societal Iqbal 116 spectrum which was oblivious to the principles of egalitarianism. The following lines indicate the root cause of shifting societal paradigm from the 17th century to the 19th century in which the present tale unfolds:

Most English men of the early seventeenth century still thought largely

in medieval terms, accepting hereditary class distinction and religious

intolerance as in accord with the will of God. But the concepts of a fine

society were already germinating in English soil. Wherever English men

settled in the other parts of the world, they carried with them the seeds of

liberty.(Parkes 13)

[IV]

In the 19th century, one of the successors of Colonel Pyncheon is Jaffrey

Pyncheon who appears to be an atavism of his ancestor in his brutality, avariciousness, and lack of compunction for the weaker section. He uses common men as tools to realize his ambition in the equilateral society. He is politician who appears to be a modern face of old witch hunters. His contemporaneity provides Hawthorne with a context to indulge in speculation regarding professional politicians in the 19th century

America. A discourse of history is constituted by multiple consciousnesses hence; it can mean different things to different readers. This novel provides a plurality of perspectives through different characters and different time periods. Apart from past associations, present becomes more vocal in the delineation of a shrewd- political figure of the 19th century America. Iqbal 117

Jaffrey Pyncheon is a cousin of Hepzibah and Clifford Pyncheon. The study of his character becomes meaningful in the context of the biographical information available on the present author. Hawthorne’s dislike for the professional politician after his unfortunate experience at Salem custom house underlines Jaffrey’s character in negative light. In sketching out the hypocritical character of judge with his calculated smile and purposeful charities; his gradual rise to public eminence, his political ambition of becoming the governor of Massachusetts; Hawthorne was taking revenge upon his political opponents. He intended to raise his finger on his political enemies

Daniel Webster, Charles Wentworth Upham, and Horace Conolly; and borrowed heavily from their characters. Jaffrey appears to be a composite creature, having all the grey shades of the political personages. Hawthorne’s tale “The Great Stone face” also offers a brief vignette of the politician.

Judge Pyncheon is model civil servant whose zeal for public services is a façade. He is a man of eminent respectability and is acknowledged by church and the state. Except for daguerreotypist, Hepzibah, and his few political opponents, nobody doubts his sincerity in doing public good. He holds offices of trust and is recognized for his charitable works. He is consciously working out on his public image to project himself as an ideal candidate in public eye for the upcoming election for governorship.

In this election, he depends on popular opinion for his success. The purity of his character as judge, his faithful public services, his zeal as the president of Bible society, his unquestionable integrity as treasurer of a widows and orphans fund are result of an admirable arrangement of his life. It is a portrait displayed meticulously before the world. His scrupulousness in drawing public attention by bowing his head, a lifting of Iqbal 118 the hat, a nod, and a motion of the hand, to all irrespective of their class has been questioned. His smile of broad benevolence is his weapon to win favorable opinion of the commoners in the newly emerging democratic set up.

He has real estate in town and country; numerous bank accounts; insurance share, United States stock, yet he covets more. He looks forward to weightier public honors. His ambition is a more powerful talisman than the witchcraft. Judge Pyncheon is a portrait of dissonance and discordance. Hawthorne’s contempt for professional politicians is reflected in his comment about politician in the novel The House of Seven

Gables, which can not to be ignored:

. . . practiced politicians, every man of them, and skilled to adjust those

preliminary measures which steal from the people, without its

knowledge the power of choosing its own rulers. The popular voice, at

the next gubernatorial election, though loud as thunder, will be really but

an echo of what these gentlemen shall speak, under their breath, at your

friend’s festive board. (215)

Hawthorne was embittered by the loss of his political office in the Salem custom House as a surveyor when Zachary Taylor was elected as the president of

America. His appointment was cancelled on political grounds. The new president belonged to Whigs who were dominating every sphere at that time. In spite of all the assurance of the new government that qualified people would not be removed from their office position, he became the centre of party struggle. He was ousted from office on 8th june1849 for his association with members of democratic republic. Captain Allen

Putman became the new surveyor. Hawthorne defended his appointment by saying that Iqbal 119 his selection was not politically motivated and he never acted as politician since his appointment. He even wrote a letter to clarify that he made local democrats angry by not helping them from his post. He pleaded in vain that his fate should not be left in the hands of the politicians whom he considered “thick skulled” and “no- hearted ruffians”

(Mellow 293).

It had been affirmed in other sources that Mr. Charles Wentworth Upham served as a model for Jeffery Pyncheon. This was done by Hawthorne to take revenge upon him for his inimical influence in removing him from the Salem custom House.

Upham was an influential Whig and a member of Congress who through his intrigue helped in Hawthorne’s removal from the office. In view of high local support for

Hawthorne, Upham and other Whigs intensified their assault on him. Charles

Wentworth Upham, the former-minister turned politician was the chief villain in the whole episode, “who has proved himself a liar and a most consummate hypocrite for he always professed himself the warmest friend ’’ (Mellow 294).

Soon after his removal from the custom house, Hawthorne was occupied by one vengeful thought to settle his score with him. After knowing Upham’s role in the whole episode, he wrote to Horace Mann, his wife’s brother –in –law about Mr. Upham that

‘‘I shall do my best to kill and scalp him in the public prints; and I think I shall succeed’’ (Mellow 302). Hawthorne gave only surprisingly oblique remark regarding

Upham who was also a priest. He wrote, ‘‘that stubborn fidelity with which a man’s friends-and especially a clergyman’s –will sometimes uphold his character; when proofs, clear as mid –day sun shines, on the scarlet letter, establish him a false and sin stained creature of the dust’’ (Mellow 307). Iqbal 120

Notwithstanding some external differences between the character of Upham and

Judge Pyncheon, Hawthorne found their moral basis identical. Hawthorne’s view regarding the matter was brought before the wide audience through his introduction to

The Scarlet Letter, entitled as “The Custom House”. Hawthorne wrote about his political enemies as “slang whangers’’ and “Vole distributors” (Mellow 293).

Hawthorne came to know that his friend Horace Conolly betrayed him by joining hands with his political enemies. He was very close to Hawthorne in the past but started to attend Whigs political causes after eyeing political opportunity on the other side. All these episodes embittered his perception of professional politicians.

Throughout that period of political manoeuvring, he maintained a calm posture of aggrieved innocence as one who was thoroughly wronged by the politicians yet who could not prove his innocence. Hawthorne confessed:

. . . it stirs up a little of the devil within me to find myself hunted by

these political bloodhounds. If they succeed in getting me out of office, I

will surely immolate one or two of them. Not that poor monster of a

Conolly, whom I desire only to bury in oblivion... But, if there be

among them (as there must be, if they succeed ) some men who claim a

higher position and ought to know better. I may perhaps select a victim,

and let fall one little drop of venom on his heart, that shall make him

writhe before the grin of the multitude for a considerable time to come.

(Mellow 293-294).

As a shrewd politician Hawthorne anticipated his dismissal since Zachary

Taylor was elected the president of America. He even wrote a letter to his friend a Iqbal 121 prominent Whig and lawyer George Hillard to use his influence and forestall a move by

Salem’s Whigs against him. In spite of all his clarification against the charges leveled against him and all his attempts to generate favorable public opinion, he was removed from the office. He wrote:

I do detest all offices; all, at least, that are held on a political tenure,

and I want nothing to do with politicians. Their hearts wither away, and

die out of their bodies. Their consciences are turned to India- rubber, or

to some substance as black as that and which will stretch as much. One

thing, if no more, I have gained by my Custom-house experience –to

know a politician. It is a knowledge which no previous thought or power

of sympathy could have taught me; because the animals or the machine,

rather, is not in nature. (James 65-66)

The character of the judge in the present novel is an American materialist. We see the principles of aristocracy and democracy are in conflict in the American society of the 19th century in the fortunes and aspirations of Jaffrey Pyncheon. Jaffrey has attended splendid banquets and has poured out his eloquence as the guest of honor, “to ears yet echoing with Webster’s mighty organ tones” (HSG 214). Reference to Daniel

Webster in the novel cannot be ignored. Daniel Webster was a senator from

Massachusetts Bay Colony. Various critics found in the character of the judge, a few traits suggesting Daniel Webster for whom money and respectability were everything.

Like him, judge is also a public figure. Jeffrey is a financial magnet who has amassed great wealth yet covets for more. Webster was the greatest orator of his day who was well known for his eloquence. Hawthorne praised Webster for his charismatic Iqbal 122 personality who was a marvelously gifted statesman but he was wary of certain traits in his character and defined his life as “vague and empty” (Mellow 292). Hawthorne registered his dark suspicions regarding a flaw in Webster’s character by writing,

“that whatever he might choose to say, his auditors had no choice but to believe him; wrong looked right, and right like wrong”( Mellow 292). Hawthorne’s contemporary

R.W Emerson said about Webster that, “The word liberty in the mouth of Mr. Webster sounds like the word love in the mouth of a courtezan” ( Mellow 292).

Jaffrey Pyncheon has headed many magnificent banquets like Webster in the course of his eminent political career. He is a great and eloquent speaker like Webster.

He studied law and served a part of two terms in Congress. He was a distinguished figure in both the branches of the state legislature. He is well publicized in the newspaper as, the Christian, the good citizen, and the gentleman. Jaffrey’s repeated offer of luxury to his cousin Hepzibah and Clifford are refuted by Hepzibah because she suspects his motive and finds him having, “a heart of iron”.

It is not without significance that the ruthless and unscrupulous Jaffrey implicates Clifford Pyncheon in a crime that he has not committed. Clifford is persecuted for the murder of his uncle in spite of being innocent. At the time of his uncle’s death he was present in the chamber. It gave an opportunity to Jaffrey to manipulate the situation and evidences in such a way that he was presumed guilty of a murder. His uncle died because of apoplectic stroke but the judge twisted the fact to project it as murder to suit his selfish end. In spite of being innocent, Clifford suffered like Hawthorne in the hands of professional politicians. Iqbal 123

This case of an innocent being implicated had also another historical association. Hawthorne would have been definitely familiar with “The White Murder

Case” through his reading of Felt’s Annals of Salem. In 1681, Nicholas Manning the brother of Hawthorne’s great, great maternal uncle Thomas Manning was accused by his wife for incest with his two sisters- Anstis Manning and Margaret Manning Polfery.

After the accusation Nicholas Manning fled into the forest, and returned after eight years. His sisters were convicted and fined on the testimony of two servants. Here are the excerpts from the Annals: “1681, March 29. Two females, for incest, are sentenced to be imprisoned a night, whipped, or pay 5£, and to stand or sit, during the services of the next lecture day, on a high stool, in the middle alley of Salem meeting-house, having a paper on their heads with their crime written in capital letters (Tuttleton).The sisters were unjustly punished for a crime in which they had no role.

Jaffrey was instrumental in proving Clifford a murderer and later on he used his political influence to release him from prison. At this juncture, the judge appeared to be his greatest well wisher yet he secured his release with a sinister motive. He was eager to know the whereabouts of the incalculable wealth of his uncle Jaffrey. He was convinced that Clifford knew about some map or documents which would guide him to unexplored territory and a vast treasure of wealth, which was his uncle’s property.

His uncle was supposed to be immensely rich. It was his eccentricity to invest in distant and foreign lands under other names than his own, which was familiar to capitalists only. According to his last testament, all his property was bequeathed to the judge. But Jaffrey’s wayward ways compelled his uncle to transfer the ownership to

Clifford. After his uncle’s death, Judge changed his uncle’s second will by supplying Iqbal 124 the older testament in place of the new. Still he was not satisfied with the amount, he received. He was assured that a large amount was still unknown and Clifford knew about it. Judge Pyncheon threatens Clifford to send him to a public asylum by proving him insane, if he does not share the secret with him. Hepzibah confronts Jaffrey, and asks‘‘. . . why should you do this cruel, cruel thing? So mad a thing, that knows not whether to call it wicked! Alas, cousin Jaffrey, this hard and grasping spirit has run in our blood these two hundred years! you are but doing over again, in another shape, what your ancestors before you did, and sending down to your posterity the curse inherited from him ’’ (HSG 188).

The mental illness of Clifford and a threat of confinement by Jaffrey Pyncheon brought to the surface, one of the cruelest abuses of the 19th century. It was the treatment of the mentally ill as criminals. This drew the attention of so many reformers, especially a school teacher from Massachusetts, Dorthea Dix. She visited a jail in 1841 and proceeded to visit nearly all the jails in her native state in a short period. In 1842, she wrote a report to present it to the legislature. It described the conditions of those who were mentally ill and were imprisoned in jail. She persuaded the state legislature to provide more humane treatment for the feeble minded. Their miserable condition improved after her effort. She wrote, “I proceed, gentlemen, briefly to call your attention to the present state of the insane persons confided within this common wealth in cages, closets, cellars, stalls, pens! Chained, naked, beaten with rods, and clashed into obedience ...” (Commager and Nevins 420).

Just before, Jaffrey was going to attend a dinner with some political friends; he died due to hammohreage owing to a familial trait. This dinner was very important for Iqbal 125 him as his candidature for the upcoming gubernatorial election was going to be declared. After the death of Jaffrey, Holgrave showed the document for which Jaffrey contrived Clifford’s imprisonment. While constructing the seven gables, the son of executed Maule carved a recess in the wall and concealed the document in it. It was the

Indian deed, a folded sheet of parchment signed by several Indian saga mores. This document was essential for Pyncheon to claim the right over the whole eastern territory.

They discovered it only after it lost its significance. It was what, ‘‘Pyncheon sought in vain, while it was valuable; and now that they find the treasure, it has long been worthless” (HSG 247). It was a fate similar to the fate of Hathornes who lost the title deed to the land in Maine during Judge Hathorne’s life, “where afterwards the town of

Raymond grew up, and the papers were recovered only when the claim had become valueless” (Erskine 183).

[V]

The critical crux of the novel opens for the readers at the end. Hepzibah,

Clifford, and Phoebe decide to leave the old mansion which stands for spurious values.

They go to the country seat which, “suggested comfort, refinement, and hospitality...”

(Leopold and Link 558). The Aftermath of the revolution was a turbulent phase in

American history. There was decisive changes for American political development and social evolution, “Old institutions and modes of thought were widely challenged”

(Blake 124). It weakened the foundation of old social order and, “laid the basis for readjustment of classes. Thousands of the gentry fled to the country” (Blake 124) like Iqbal 126 the characters of the present novel. Hence, in their migration to country from town, there was nothing new. It was an expected move in that turbulent time, yet it focused on the escapist nature of Hepzibah who after all did not learn the lessons of republicanism.

Those who stayed in the city were forced to share prestige with new men, thrust up in the social upheaval. Instead of confronting the wave of change and adjusting in new social order, Hepzibah preferred to snug in a country seat. The focal point of the novelist in the concluding chapter is the inner transformation of the character of

Holgrave. The proclamation of Emerson regarding the reformers becomes significant here:

They mix the fire of the moral sentiment with personal and party heats,

with measureless exaggerations, and the blindness that prefers some

darling measure to justice and truth. Those, who are urging with most

ardor, what are called the greatest benefits of mankind, are narrow, self

pleasing, conceited men, and affect us as the insane do.( Leopold and

Link 325-326)

These public pronouncements of Emerson, who was the leading figure of the transcendental movement, concurred with Hawthorne’s apprehension regarding reformers. Hawthorne ridiculed the reformer’s lack of conscience at the cost of conscientiousness. He believed that as long as a man’s heart was corrupt, little could be accomplished by a change of beliefs or institutions. In spite of Hawthorne’s avowed dislike for the reformers, he saved Holgrave from his bitter virulence. His ambivalence towards the character of Holgrave was the result of his respect for Holgrave’s faith in democratic ideology and individual dignity; his egalitarian principles; and his faith in Iqbal 127 the worth of common man. Hawthorne’s underlying desire to change his radicalism and reformist outlook was displayed through Holgrave’s association with the conformist

Phoebe.

This change in Holgrave was unexpected and shocking even for Phoebe who was earlier appalled by his lawless energy. Holgrave sacrifices his radical ideas in favor of conventional relation under the mesmeric power of love. He tells Phoebe. “You are my only possibility of happiness!’’ (HSG 240) and tells her, “You will make me strive to follow you, where it is pathless” (HSG 240). The alteration in his radical outlook is visible in these words of Holgrave:

The happy man inevitably confines himself within ancient limits. I have

a presentiment that, hereafter, it will be my lot to set out trees to make

fences,- perhaps, even, in due time, to build a house for another

generation,-in a word, to conform myself to laws, and the peaceful

practice of society. Your poise will be more powerful than any

oscillating tendency of mine. (HSG 240)

The same man, who earlier desires to overthrow the entire establishment of the society, now wants to conform to the laws of society. It refers to an internal transformation pre-requisite for any kind of change in the society rather than any coercive mandate of external law. Holgrave looks forward to Phoebe’s assistance and guidance. ‘‘You must be both strong and wise! For I am all astray, and need your counsel. It may be, you can suggest the one right thing to do’’ (HSG 236). Hawthorne redefines Holgrave and depicts an inner transformation of his heart by showing him non-vengeful towards Pyncheon unlike his ancestors. It reveals Hawthorne’s longing Iqbal 128 for an internal change in man and repudiation of radical principles that inspire any reform movement. Hawthorne finds that the revolutionary temper jeopardizes peaceful existence in society. Holgrave proves himself a good human being by resisting his erotic power which can give him mastery over Phoebe’s free spirit.

His union with the conventional Phoebe served two ends. Apart from the aforesaid goal, it also resolved the possibility of any enmity in the future between

Pyncheons and Maules through their marriage. The ending of the tale had a close association with the author’s ancestral history, “but it was not until 1838 that Nathaniel

Hawthorne was told the story of Philip English. The daughter of Philip English was supposed to have married one of John Hathorne’s sons. If this were true, then the blood of curser and accursed had mingled in the second generation’’ (Turner 21), the same had been projected at the end of tale The House of Seven Gables through the union of

Holgrave and Phoebe.

Iqbal 129

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23. Nevins, Allan, and Henry Steele Commager, eds. A Short History of United

States.5th ed. Newyork: Alfred. A. Knopf, 1968. Print. Iqbal 131

24. Parkes, Henry Bamford. The United States of America –A History. Rev.2nd

ed. Calcutta: Scientific Book Agency, 1967. Print.

25. Pearson, Norman Holmes. The Blithedale Romance in The Complete Novels and

Selected tales of Nathaniel Hawthorne. New York: The Modern Library, 1937.

Print.

26. Peterson, Merrill D.“Jefferson and Religious Freedom.” The Atlantic

Monthly. 274.6 (Dec 1994): 112-124.Print.

27. Stewart, Randall. Nathaniel Hawthorne-A Biography. New Haven: Yale

University Press, 1948. Print.

28. Taylor, Stoehr. Hawthorne’s Mad Scientist. Hamden: Archon Books, 1978. Print.

29. Turner, Arlin. Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Biography. New York: Oxford University

Press, 1980. Print.

30. Tuttleton, James. “Hawthorne’s “Secret.” [Jan 1985] Web. 2nd Apr. 2011.

www.newcriterion.com.

31. Warren, Austin. Rage for Order. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1948.

Print.

32. All references of Thomas Maule from Maule Family Newsletter, vol.8.2,

(Mar 1988) Web. 17th Oct 2008. maulefamily.com.

Iqbal 132

Chapter V

Political Correctness

in

The Blithedale Romance:

“Man is or should be woman’s protector and defender. The natural and proper timidity and delicacy which belongs to the female sex evidently unfits it for many of the occupations of civil life”(American Heritage).The preceding pronouncement of the supreme court of America in 1872 is resonant in the vigorous proclamation of the male chauvinist Hollingsworth in the novel The Blithedale Romance: “I would call upon my own sex to use its physical force, that unmistakable evidence of sovereignty, to scourge them back within their proper bounds! But it will not be needful. The heart of true womanhood knows where its own sphere is, and never seeks to stray beyond it!”

(511).

Hollingsworth is a very significant character in the novel who gives voice to sentiments of a male dominated society. His above peremptory statement is an outcome of his cultural conditioning which refers to an unconscious process by which people inherit certain ways of thinking and behaving in a given context. He represents unconsciously the dominant culture by constructing his speech out of its material.

Through recurrent use of words and phrases of patriarchal ideology, the author divests Iqbal 133

Hollingsworth’s character of its individuality. Hawthorne makes him an exemplification of the discursive ideology of the 19th century.

This novel is based on Hawthorne’s firsthand experience at the Brook Farm

Community. Hawthorne joined this socialist community on the 12th of April, 1841.

Brook Farm [1841-46] was established by a Unitarian minister and transcendentalist philosopher George Ripley in the spring of 1841. It was inspired by an idea called socialism which came to America from Europe. George Ripley seemed to be influenced by Charles Fourier, a French reformer. Fourier launched a system called Fourierist phalanx for restructuring the social set up. Fourierist phalanx was a project for the regeneration of the interdependent community which failed because no one took responsibility of carrying forward this project after his demise. In an essay published in the Dial, a journal of transcendentalist movement, Ripley acknowledged Fourier as a great man who was destined to resuscitate society.

Charles Fourier is frequently and elaborately referred to at various places in the novel. His name crops up in the discussion between Hollingsworth and the narrator

Coverdale in the chapter, “The Convalescent”. They discuss about Charles Fourier’s utopian vision of the socialist community which has inspired the Brook farm community.

Coverdale opines, “Fourier’s works, also, in a series of horribly tedious volumes, attracted a good deal of my attention, from the analogy which I could not but recognize between his system and our own” (BR 469). Iqbal 134

George Ripley established this voluntary community in west Roxbury near

Boston to realize his dream of a community which would be based on ideal vision of

Christianity. Here, days for physical and intellectual labor were divided. There was no intellectually superior and physically demeaning work because that there was dignity in every work. This socialist venture to reorganize the society was a kind of revolt against destitution, injustice, and inequality prevalent in the contemporary world. The socialists dissected the root cause of these social malaises in materialistic pursuit and individual ownership of property. Hence, they proposed to substitute cooperation and common ownership for individual ownership of property and belongings in the material world.

The Rising Romanticism, faith in the natural goodness of man, and sentimental fervor contributed to the fervor of the reform movements in the 19th century.

The Socialist Utopia was also the result of filth and squalor which was pestering the commercial world. Many intellectuals were repelled by its ugly aspects. Instead of the violent overthrow of the existing institutions, socialists focused on establishing a model community whose successful structure could be implemented in society at large. It resulted in Fourierist and Owenite movements and many others. Religion played an important role in the thinking of early 19th century America. Religious arguments were among the most powerful which reformers could use with reason to support their mission.

Mark Hopkins was a religious inspiration behind these movements. He said about these movements that, “ . . . they are legitimate, spring from the conscience, and their object is Iqbal 135

to bring human conduct and institutions into conformity with the idea of right” (Leopold and Link 327).

The Blithedale Romance was Hawthorne’s first attempt to write a novel about the contemporary world. He wrote a letter to William B. Pike from Lenox on 24th July,

1851, in which he mentioned that “when I write another romance, shall take the

Community for a subject, and shall give some reference to some of his experiences and observations at Brook Farm, . . . (clara net). His observations regarding the community definitely translated in his fictional work The Blithedale Romance. In the preface to the novel the author confessed:

the author does not wish to deny that he had this community in his mind,

and that[having had the good fortune, for a time, to be personally

connected with it] he has occasionally availed himself of his actual

reminiscences in the hope of giving a more life-like tint to the fancy-

sketch in the following pages. (BR 439)

It is altogether a separate issue whether they are really fancy –sketch as author has wished it to be treated to disown any historical and factual obligation or an important historical, political and social document of his time.

Hawthorne had no faith in the regenerative experiments of the radical theorist as he lacked the reformist temper. He always spoke out against reformatory movements which were inspired by fanaticism. It was ironical that he partook in such a Utopian venture. Actually, he aligned himself to this experiment with a desire to taste manual Iqbal 136

labor and to save time for his writing. The information of the availability of separate cottages for individual families provided him with the prospect of enjoying seclusion amid worthy company. Its co-operative arrangement was also attractive to him because he thought that it would alleviate his anxiety regarding economic matters. Hence, he invested whatever he saved from his custom house salary into this scheme with practical reasons. But very soon, he was disillusioned by the whole project. He found that the intellectual activities were incompatible with large amount of physical labor. Besides, he discovered that the community was aggressively democratic in matters of labor but outside the field, the members of the fraternity were divided naturally into two groups: the intellectually superior and the agriculturally experienced. It was ironical that the community retained the same class consciousness of the society which it professed to discard. Hawthorne found all the intellectually superior members of the community eccentric, hence, discovered in the study of his fellow colonists a very interesting subject for this novel.

[I]

Hollingsworth is a professional reformer and a member of the Blithedale community. His character can be subjected to different kinds of reading owing to its irrefutable relation to the time and society in which it is conceived. According to New

Historicist Stephen Greenblatt, human subject is not autonomous product rather the Iqbal 137

ideological product of the relations of power in a particular society. Hawthorne was writing this novel The Blithedale Romance at a time when concepts of gender role, sexuality, and authorship were in a state of flux. The novel worked through various contemporaneous issues, anxieties, and struggle; and projected them in shape of characters and events. Hollingsworth’s character as reformer and his integral association with a feminist Zenobia irrefutably linked him with two focal points of this reading- the role of reformers in society and confrontation between feminist and patriarchal ideology.

Both the ideas were offspring of transcendentalist ideology.

This novel can be read against the background of the relation of sexes within socio- political ideology of the 19th century. It captures the conflict fermenting in the

American society between the sexes during 1830 to 1840. It was a time when the voices of female dissent were registered, and the way was paved for the women suffrage.

Hawthorne has conceived Zenobia’s character and behavior in the light of the gender conflict in his time. It was the time, when the woman’s right movement was formally launched in the United States in the July of 1848 at Seneca Falls. At that point of time, women were pushed to the periphery of active politics. They were bound by the exaggerated standards of propriety and rigid taboos about dress and behavior. Their life was largely depended on English common law which was shaped by the standard of medieval civilization and which Americans inherited with pride. The gist of it was succinctly summarized in Blackstone’s words “the husband and wife are one and that one is the husband” (Bragdon and Cutchen 244). Woman’s right movement was received Iqbal 138

with anger and ridicule in the patriarchal social set up as an expression of deviation from the norms of conformity.

The social spectrum of the 19th century was preoccupied with debate on correct behavior and action for females. On one side, there were the traditional role models like

Hawthorne’s subdued wife Sophia Peabody, and on the other extreme, there were ambitious and assertive women like Elizabeth Peabody and Margaret Fuller. Hawthorne’s wife Sophia was oblivious to her individual identity and readily sacrificed her ambition of becoming a writer for the sake of her husband. Sophia’s own sister Elizabeth was a transcendentalist and a social activist. She endorsed along with Margaret Fuller an iconoclastic ideology. Fuller was an ardent advocate of female rights. This social scenario itself reflected the clash of ideologies within the female sphere. Amidst the rising discussion centered on the issues of feminism and feminist, this novel reflects the status of women in the 19th century social and political life. It also unravels Hawthorne’s own attitude towards women.

This text seems to be inspired by two distinctive models of womanhood present in the social orbit of the 19th century The female characters of the novel, Priscilla and

Zenobia are representative of two different ideologies-containment and rebellion. One ideology is cherished and nurtured and the other is feared and repelled. The liberal stance is projected in the character of Zenobia who exemplifies feminist principles and finds all the conventionally defined models of female as arbitrary. She rejects the subordinate position of women in society as only a man’s help mate. This novel shows that Zenobia’s Iqbal 139

preoccupation with her feminist principles has dehumanized her. She forgets her fundamental nature in her zealous emphasizing on intellectual domain for woman. She is condemned for refuting the importance of woman’s natural emotions as an integral part of her existence.

The other character is Zenobia’s half sister, Priscilla who exemplifies the 19th century model of an ideal woman. Priscilla is a woman of cultural invention which is the result of centuries old cultural conditioning. She unconditionally accepts conventionally defined, stereotyped role of woman as a submissive servant, emotional slave, and intellectually imbecile. This picture is fondly and ideologically painted by the masculine society which she unquestionably embraces. She prefers to lose her independent identity through her immersion in the socially constructed gender defined role. Priscilla believes herself to be innately weak, delicate, and intellectually inferior hence, desires to be protected and dominated by the opposite gender. Her development is so guided by society and convention that she ceases to exist as an individual and stands for an abstract idea.

She is a desirable model of female, submissive and sexually attractive; hence, appealing to masculine nature. Her attraction for Hollingsworth reveals her preference to be subjugated by a domineering male personality. She acknowledges her innate weakness hence, unconsciously seeks to rest upon his strength.

Priscilla’s half sister Zenobia is a writer, social activist, and a public figure who seems to be inspired by a real life figure Sarah Margaret Fuller who was a 19th century women’s right activist and a gender theorist. She was an ardent advocate of equal civil Iqbal 140

and political rights for females. She insisted on intellectual companionship between the male and female because she believed that woman’s traditional role, “led to excessive devotion ,which has cooled love, degraded marriage and prevented either sex from being what it should be to itself or the other”(Thomas 225). Fuller’s cultural upbringing sensitized her to the society’s masculine values which enraged her. She even wrote a book on sexual politics, Woman in the Nineteenth Century [1845]. It was a pioneer document of American Feminism. It contained graphic discussion of sexual matters and made a clarion call for the reform of the sexual and racial relations in the 19th century.

She deciphered the root cause of the unsuccessful male-female relation and found it in the absence of compatibility and denial of individual identity to female. She railed against the

“degradation of a large portion of women into the sold and polluted slaves of men”

(Davis 39).

She was a good friend of Emerson and shared his transcendentalist ideology. She even worked as an editor in the transcendentalist journal Dial from 1840 to 1842. Fuller held a distinctive position in the cultural life of American Renaissance and carved her own niche in the American society. Her life was an expression of the selection of unconventional opportunities and risks involved in an innovative engagement with destiny.

She was an apt example of androgynous personality because of her intellectual energy and passionate nature. She encroached upon the absolute domain of male through her intellectual competence which was condemned by the 19th century conservative Iqbal 141

society. It was appalled by her explosive energy rather than being impressed and charmed by it. Fuller like Zenobia found gender a constraint which associated men with mind and women with heart. For Fuller, the heart which represented womanhood didn’t enshrine woman as domestic angel rather insured a stifling domestication. According to her, such a heart was an encumbrance than a virtue. Fuller’s desire to be a man was a desire for the independence; she quite accurately associated with male. Fuller’s ideal woman was not

“actually “woman,” man’s binary opposite, but “soul,” man’s essential equal” (Davis 38).

Various available records bore testimony to the fact that Hawthorne knew Fuller personally. In the chapter entitled, ‘‘The Convalescent’’, there is a reference to Fuller when Priscilla brings her letter to Coverdale. He asks her “did you ever see Miss

Margaret Fuller?” (BR 469) and she has been referred to in the preface to the novel as,

“one of the most gifted women of the age” (BR 468). The introduction of Margaret

Fuller’s name in the tale made it evident that she was prominent in Hawthorne’s thoughts when he was writing this novel. Fuller was known to Hawthorne even before their encounter at Brook farm in 1841. Oblique reference to Fuller appeared in Hawthorne’s

Brook farm’s account of some “Transcendental heifer” (Erskine 222) and this reference definitely belonged to her.

The degree to which Zenobia represents Hawthorne’s conception of Margaret

Fuller’ character is debatable. Moncure Conway identified Zenobia as Margaret Fuller.

He observed that it was “Fuller’s fate to be Zenobia though she was homely and Zenobia beautiful’’ (Pfister 95). Charles Hale echoed the same sentiments in 1852, when he wrote, Iqbal 142

“it is not difficult to recognize who Zenobia really is, notwithstanding some prominent difference in external condition” (Pfister 95). Julian Hawthorne insisted that Fuller served as his father’s model for, “overbearing bluestocking Zenobia in The Blithedale Romance

(1852)” (Davis 48). James wrote that Zenobia was Hawthorne’s only very definite attempt at the representation of character. Margaret fuller was “in his imagination, the starting-point of the figure of Zenobia” the lady “whom he had encountered in the

Roxbury pastoral or among the wood walks of Concord, with the strange books in her hand and eloquent discourse on her lips” (James 72).

Fuller was Sophia Peabody’s friend but Hawthorne never liked her because of her openness and unwomanly conduct. Henry James wrote that Nathaniel Hawthorne, “could not, on the whole have had a not high relish for the very positive personality of this

(Margaret Fuller) accomplished and argumentative woman” (James 72, emphasis added). Hawthorne’s Italian notebook contained an observation on Margaret Fuller’s character which is definitely negative in tone. He wrote:

She was a woman anxious to try all things, and fill up her experience in all

directions; she had a strong and coarse nature, too, which she had done

utmost to refine with infinite pains, but which of course could only be

superficially changed. She was a great humbug; of course with much

talent, and much moral reality, or else she could not have been so great a

humbug. But she had struck herself full of borrowed qualities, which she

chose to provide herself with, but which had no root in her. (Kesterson 67) Iqbal 143

Joel Myerson pointed out that Margaret Fuller and Hawthorne’s relationship was a “complex one” because Hawthorne was, “uneasy about . . . [Fuller’s] aggressiveness but tended to treat it lightly (333). Fuller’s outspoken personality, her kind of unwomanly writing and her public appearances were under constant attack. She was a revolutionary character who won victories for liberalism. Sometimes, she gave offences by her hasty and impulsive utterances and penetrating arguments for the various causes, she espoused.

It was disliked by Hawthorne. Even conventional Sophia was shocked to see her “mount the rostrum” (Pfister 96).

In his critique of Women in the Nineteenth Century, Charles F. Briggs pointed out that Margaret Fuller could not write like a true woman because she was neither a wife nor a mother. Briggs was not the only critic who expected women writers to adhere to gender expectations in every word, line, and phrase. Fuller detested such expectations in writings and criticized Madame de Stael for not being able to forget the women in thought. Fuller found physically circumscribed women on the one hand and on the other hand, radiant exaltadas. Her vision comprises both the models of females - enslaved

Priscilla and emancipated Zenobia, who are poles apart. Fuller hopes to achieve the goal of ‘radiant exaltadas’ in some, “unspecified future” (Davis 37).

Like Fuller, Zenobia also envisions a new tomorrow and eloquently discusses it with Miles Coverdale. She talks about the suppression of female writers in male hierarchy. She is quite critical and vocal about the denial of freedom of expression to females. She is not a stereotype as she resists containment by type or language. She Iqbal 144

expresses her anger over the injustice which the world has done to women by not allowing them, the freedom to survive and honor to attain intellectual position in society.

She welcomes wholeheartedly woman’s natural utterance in public and raises issues pertaining to the liberty of press. She prophesizes optimistically about a better tomorrow for woman:

. . . When my sex shall achieve its rights there will be ten eloquent women

where there is now one eloquent man. Thus far, no woman in the

world has ever once spoken out her whole heart and her whole mind.

The mistrust and disapproval of the vast bulk of society throttle us, as with

two gigantic hands at our throats! We mumble a few weak words, and

leave a thousand better ones unsaid. You let us write a little, it is true, on a

limited range of subjects. But the pen is not for woman. Her power is too

natural and immediate. It is with the living voice alone that she can compel

the world to recognize the light of her intellect and the depth of her heart!

(BR 510)

Nina Baym also drew attention to the same issue of the manipulative ideology in the creative field in her critical book, Novels, Readers, and Reviewers: Responses to fiction in Antebellum America. She argued that male writers were appreciated by reviewers for using fiction to express their genius while female writers were praised by the reviewers for “the expression of the sex” (257). Baym also discussed how writers of Iqbal 145

both sexes were applauded by critics for representing female characters not as diverse individuals but as [true] women (Emphasis added 97-104).

Whether Zenobia resembles Margaret Fuller or not, it does not matter much. What matters is the concept of gender in Hawthorne’s time and how her fomenting voice reflects the clash of power in male and female relationship in the 19th century society. In the proclamation of Zenobia, we have the voices of Margaret Fuller who can be one possible source for Zenobia along with Lydia Maria Childs, Susan B. Anthony, Lucy

Stone, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton of the feminist movement. The Blithedale Romance offers an example of the way woman’s presence and voice challenge male discourse.

Zenobia resists the limitations of conventions and tradition which Miles Coverdale continuously attempts to enforce upon her in order to bring her within the sphere of his understanding.

In the 19th century a tension was generated by the scuffle between feminist and masculine ideologies which led to various campaigns. The feelings of women about their place and position in the world came to head in 1848 when Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth

Cady Stanton organized a campaign to declare female rights. Their campaign was directed towards the goal of redefining the relation between sexes. The Seneca Fall convention started with the self evident truth that all men and women were created equal.

The Seneca Fall Declaration went on to list the grievances of women against the patriarchal structure of society. It demanded full equality in every sphere of life and stated that : ‘‘The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpation on Iqbal 146

the part of man toward woman, having in direct object, the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world’’ (Commager and Nevins 423). Females rebelled against their exclusion from whole areas of political and social activity. Here are some excerpts from the Seneca Fall declaration:

He has never permitted her to exercise her in alienable right to the elective franchise…

He has monopolized nearly all the profitable employments. . .

He has denied her facilities for obtaining a thorough education, all colleges being closed against her.

He allows her in church, as well as state, but a subordinate position . . .

He has endeavored, in every way he could, to destroy her confidence in her own powers, to lessen her self respect and to make her willing to lead a dependent and abject life

(Commager 445).

It is ironical to note that, “The objection of indelicacy and impropriety which is so often brought against woman when she addresses public audience comes with very ill grace from those who encourage, by their attendance, her appearance on the stage, the concert, or feats at the circus” (Blake 285-286). By 1850, nearly all adult male [white] gained a right to vote but in no state did women win any active part in politics. Nothing changed for women even after the revolution. When a woman got married, her property was automatically passed to her husband, and her children were solely under his authority. In the Seneca Fall, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Coffin Mott objected to the denial of full membership to females in the abolitionist societies. They vehemently Iqbal 147

condemned patriarchal society for forcing women to refrain from public speaking thus restricting their right as an individual. They were denounced as shameless and irreligious if they did so as Blake wrote:

By an absurd convention it was permissible for women to make speeches

to members of their own sex but not to audiences that included men.

Moral standards were patently unfair. The woman known to have had

sexual relations outside of marriage became an outcast from society, while

the same act bought only mild rebuke to the men. (244)

It was resolved in the Seneca Fall Convention that it was duty of women to secure themselves their sacred rights to elective franchise. It was decided to disregard any law which placed women in a position inferior to men and restrained them from following voice of their conscience. They resolved to overthrow the monopoly of the pulpit and to secure to women an equal participation with men in various trades and profession.

Zenobia’s character has not been portrayed in a very commendable light owing to

Hawthorne’s dislike for women of “progressive type” (James 73). She has a kind of coarseness that Hawthorne found in Margaret Fuller. Hawthorne protested -not too convincingly-that he had not modeled Zenobia on Fuller (Wagenknecht 142). Hawthorne was a strong Democrat but “the social behavior of advanced women was apparently not to his liking” (Cowie 359). Hawthorne believed in womanhood and manhood as complimentary opposites. As in women, “his taste was conservative” (James 73), and he out rightly condemned assertive females. He speculated and nurtured a traditional role for Iqbal 148

women and did not appreciate literary talent in women. He wrote at one place that,

“Generally, women write like emasculated men, and are only to be distinguished from male authors by greater feebleness and folly; . . . ’’ (Baym, Hawthorne and Women 24).

Hawthorne professed his ardent love for his wife Sophia but he never appreciated or encouraged her creativity. His conception of gender became more partial with his preference for a wife within the periphery of his house. When T.Field, a publisher offered

Sophia a proposal to contribute to a magazine Atlantic Monthly, Hawthorne could not welcome that suggestion. He wrote in a jovial mood: ‘‘I do not know whether I can tolerate a literary rival at bed and boards; there would probably be a new chapter in the

Quarrel of author. However I myself at ease on that score as she positively refuses to be famous and content herself on being the best wife and mother in the world” (Mellow 519) but it was unconscious revelation of his essential being.

Sophia was a dutiful wife and an obedient partner. She respected her husband’s slightest desires and sacrificed her ambition to become a writer and be famous on the altar of marriage. The chief employment of her life became to help her husband in his labor and to create a congenial atmosphere for him to write and to be recognized.

Hawthorne never took notice of her sacrifices but praised her for being a true woman. He completely ruled over his wife irrespective of her feelings. She could not even wear clothes of her liking because Hawthorne had a say in the matter of her clothing too. She wrote at one place, “The dark purple moussetive which I wore in Boston I have had to give up ; for my husband all at once protested that he could not see me in it beyond all Iqbal 149

endurance’’( Wagenknecht 164). This attitude was the result of the socio-cultural environment in which they lived. It was in keeping with- the domestic ideals emerged in the early 19th century which assigned to women the destiny of fulfilling themselves through self sacrifice in the private roles of wife and mother. In a letter to his wife

Sophia Peabody on 18th March 1856, Hawthorne wrote about a female writer Grace

Greenwood, an author of Little Pilgrims in a disparaging term:

My dearest, I cannot enough thank God, that with a higher and deeper

Intellect than any other woman, thou hast never- . . . - never prostituted

thyself to the public, as that woman has, and as a thousand others do.

It does seem to me to deprive women of all delicacy; it has pretty much an

effect on them as it would to walk abroad through the streets, physically

stark naked. Women are too good for authorship, and that is the reason it

spoils them so. (Baym, Hawthorne and Women 24)

By equating literary women with prostitutes, Hawthorne consoled Sophia to compensate for her sacrifice of a career for his sake. In the same anti- feminist vein he wrote: ‘‘I should have no chance of success,” while the public taste is occupied with their trash and said further “ and should be ashamed of it if I did succeed’’(Baym,

Hawthorne and Women 24). Hawthorne’s conservatism was evident in his remark in the sketch of Mrs. Hutchinson (1830) that, “ “delicacy” perceives “a sort of impropriety in the display of woman’s naked mind to the gaze of the world, with indications by which its inmost secrets may be searched out” ”(Person108). Hawthorne disliked garrulous Iqbal 150

women and once wrote to Sophia, “Would that Miss Margaret Fuller might lose her tongue!-or my Dove her ears, and so be left wholly to her husband’s golden silence”

(Kesterson 66).

Hawthorne treats Zenobia unsympathetically because she is a new woman who has unsexed herself. Hollingsworth reflects the sentiments of the male dominated society when he opines , “a woman’s ,whose whole sphere of action is in the heart ,and who can conceive of no higher nor wider one!” (BR 568). The ambivalence towards her personality is maintained by constant reference to her theatricality which has been reemphasized in the novel through various characters. Like Zenobia, Margaret Fuller has also left the reputation of being “a great actress” (James 71). When Zenobia reads out lines from Shakespeare, Coverdale feels, ‘‘an intolerable wrong to the world that she did not at once go upon the stage” ( BR 501). Westervelt remarks that; “what an actress

Zenobia might have been!”(BR 580- 581) The narrator speaks about her presence in the

Blithedale community, “ . . . caused our heroic enterprise to show like an illusion , a masquerade, a pastoral, a counterfeit Arcadia, in which we grown-up men and women were making a play-day of the years . . .”(BR451). The preceding statements are indicative of her spurious existence and her public posture. She is projected as she is merely playing the role of feminist behind this façade her convictions are weak and shattering. She is shown superficially cultured whose mind is full of weeds. Even at the moment of her death she is shown as a lover of affectation. After seeing the dead body of hers, Coverdale observes, “She had seen pictures, I suppose, of drowned persons in lithe Iqbal 151

and graceful attitudes. And she deemed it well and decorous to die as so many village maidens have, wronged in their first love ,and seeking peace in the bosom of the old familiar stream, –so familiar that they could not dread it,- . . . . ( BR 579)

Zenobia’s father Old Moodie informed Coverdale that she grew up in affluence but lived worse than an orphan. After her mother’s death, her father was disgracefully exiled from the family after committing a crime. She was left all alone with no adequate control to guide her development hence, “her character was left to shape itself” (BR 550).

She grew into a “passionate, self- willed, and imperious” adult (BR 550). She was unrestrained by parental authority and was spoilt by her wealth. Hawthorne seems to suggest that her feminist principles are not the result of intellectual credence but the outcome of a lawless and discordant personality. He has captured the gap between role prescription of society and Zenobia’s actual behavior which leads to role anxiety and role resistance. The tension generated by the clash of dominant values and the new morality of women’s culture are Hawthorne’s prime concerns in the novel.

She is caught in that power struggle. As an emancipated female, she is uncompromising and dogmatic and deeply resents the conventions by which her sex has been shackled. She proclaims that, “It shall not always be so” and adds further “If I live another year, I will lift up my own voice, on behalf of woman’s wider liberty!” (BR 510).

She is against the social construction of gender and defies moving in the socially constructed restricted sphere. She dislikes women like Priscilla, “a gentle parasite” the complete opposite to her principle of womanhood. Her speech on “Eliot pulpit” leads to Iqbal 152

the discussion among characters on the status of woman in society. In chapter 17, “Eliot pulpit” becomes a rostrum for her tirade against male chauvinism. In the 19th century, women’s lives were governed by unwritten dictates of masculine values. They were the victims of fervent quasi religion of family life of which they were considered high priestess whether they liked it or not. She attacks Priscilla as meek and slavish in nature as, “the type of womanhood, such as man has spent centuries in making it” (BR 511). She denounces males for denying woman her right which “. . . betrays even more blindness to his own interests than profligate disregard of ours!” (BR 511).

Priscilla does not understand her words and looks forward to Hollingsworth for an explanation. Ruthless masculine egotist Hollingsworth replies by advancing an extremely conservative position of a female in society. ‘‘Her place is at man’s side. Her office, that of sympathizer; the unreserved, unquestioning believer; the recognition, withheld in every other manner, but given, in pity, through woman’s heart, lest man should utterly lose faith in himself; . . .” ( BR 511).

Zenobia is passionately in love with this self styled reformer Hollingsworth who is working on a project for the reformation of criminals. She does not join the socialist community for any idealistic conviction but to follow Hollingsworth. During one of his lectures in the city, his voice has captivated her. Her attraction towards a male chauvinist is difficult to explain. She is a kind of woman who, “never could tolerate a philanthropist before” (BR 451). It is interesting to explore why supposedly independent Zenobia prostates in front of a brutal power like Hollingsworth and becomes his greatest devotee. Iqbal 153

It raises a question regarding the natural subservience of woman to man. Miles Coverdale is bewildered by her conduct. He questions her (female) subservience, “Is it their nature?

Or is it, at last, the result of ages of compelled degradation?’’(BR 512). She pines for

Hollingsworth companionship and abandons her feminist belief to make herself accommodating and endearing to him. Her convictions shatter under the force of her natural emotions, when she takes, “the hand of Hollingsworth in both her own” and presses it “to her bosom and let(s) it fall again!” (BR512). It reveals that her character is governed by heart at that juncture and she is caught unaware.

Zenobia’s conception of herself as an emancipated feminist collides with the basic reality of womankind. Hawthorne has tried to reveal that her assertion on individualism, emancipation, and intellectual development of a female are an obstacle in her meaningful union with a male. In his introduction to the novel, he has alluded to her as “the high- spirited Woman, bruising herself against the narrow limitations of her sex” (BR440). Her subcutaneous being asserts itself and she abandons her subculture in favor of ruling ideology. She starts behaving like an ordinary woman in love. This is not for the first time that she is dominated by sexual instinct. In the past too, she was romantically involved with an unprincipled young man Westervelt. He was externally handsome but materialistic, unprincipled, and soulless. Zenobia was entrapped by his handsome feature and went on for, “even a secret marriage” (BR 550). By giving herself to an unprincipled man like Westervelt who looks at female as a commodity -an object- to be used and manipulated, she reinforces conventional ideology of society which asserts that a female Iqbal 154

is likely to fall prey to her instinct how much she goes in pursuit of a rationale domain.

The disparity in her character ironically highlights the spurious nature of her articulating principles.

Westervelt and Hollingsworth are agents of a male-dominated society. They give her lessons in the norms of the patriarchal society and try to teach Zenobia the meaning of being womanly. She is taught to earn her happiness under male protégé. Westerwelt is callous to any sentiments and is indifferent to female existence. She professes to hate his kind of attitude but she contrives with Westervelt to exploit Priscilla in a mesmeric performance. In spite of knowing the danger involve in it, she gives her consent to use

Priscilla as an object in it. The over simplistic explanation for such an action can be attributed to her jealousy because Hollingsworth has preferred Priscilla over her. She complies with the satanic venture of Westervelt to remove her from her path which leads to Hollingsworth. Before being her rival, Priscilla is a woman who trusts her as an elder sister. In subjecting her to malign intelligence of Westervelt, Zenobia behaves like a normal female who is swayed by negative yet thoroughly feminine emotion called envy.

She does injustice to her whatever are her reasons. There is mockery and malice in her kindness towards Priscilla. In mesmeric performance when she sees her pale and weak on stage, like a great actress, she exclaims, ‘‘Ah, the dear little soul! Why, she is really going to faint! Mr. Coverdale, Mr. Coverdale, pray bring a glass of water!’’ (BR 507).

Zenobia doesn’t acknowledge the supremacy of male authority but it is ironical that she gives her absolute rights into the hand of Hollingsworth. She allows man to be Iqbal 155

manly and Godlike and woman ever ready to become for him what he desires. She learns that, “. . . woman who swerves one hair’s- breadth, out of the beaten track. Yes, and add

[for I may as well own it, now] that, with that one hair’s- breadth, she goes all astray and never sees the world in its true aspect afterwards” (BR 571). As part of the narrative strategy of the author, her conscious opposition to the patriarchal structure of the society gives voice to the dominant cultural ideology through her subjection at the end. She loses her identity in her rebellious opposition to the power of male authority in a society structured by “disciplinary paradigms”. These paradigms produce what we desire and suppress what we fear. It even includes modes of social opposition that in the end merely confirm the original paradigms from which the rebel never departs. In spite of all her protestations, Zenobia’s behavior serves this purpose. She becomes a victim of the cultural process of feminization that has preconceived and predefined her role in the society. She learns her sexual identity and submits to the slavish legacy of female.

The other baffling point of the novel is the love of Hollingsworth for Zenobia.

His love for a feminist is inexplicable and requires special attention. He believes that true woman should know her limitation and; she should never seek to stray beyond her well defined social, political, and religious boundaries. He has a faith that and all the actions of a woman which deviate her from well defined norms are “false, foolish, vain, destructive of her own best and holiest qualities, void of every good effect, and productive of intolerable mischiefs!” (BR511). He is a male chauvinist who can be comfortable only with a submissive woman like Priscilla who mirrors the conventional Iqbal 156

ideology of a subdued female. Even then, he professes his love for an ardent feminist like

Zenobia.

He is an ego- centric and unscrupulous male, a “self concentrated Philanthropist”

(BR 440) who is suffering from dearth of feelings. He has poured out its warm tide exclusively through one channel that is his reformatory project. He is in need of enormous capital for his own philanthropist scheme so he covets Zenobia’s wealth for his ambitious project. He comes to know that she is an heiress to a large property. He did not have any means of his own to realize his dream project but he was convinced about the arrangement of funds through his attachment to her. It was at his disposal because she assured him to fling it into the scheme with uncalculating generosity.

Though he does not love Zenobia, he secretly guards this truth, lest he should lose the opportunity to use her monetary asset for the fulfillment of his long cherished dream.

He has joined Blithedale enterprise for the purpose of diverting its resources and the energies of its members into his project. He looks forward to use the land of Blithedale community for his ambitious project. His character is not an exclusive study in character rather a byproduct of the time, he has been conceived, “The march of the frontier and the rapid economic development of the nation made for ruthless individualism rather than selfless co-operation” (Fine 251). He is guided by the 19th century ideology of extreme individualism which knows no bound to achieve its end.

By forcing Zenobia to confront Priscilla as his choice, the passive, uncompetitive, and indomitably innocent woman she cannot be, Hollingsworth teaches her lessons of a Iqbal 157

conformist society. He prefers Priscilla over her because of her unquestionable obedience and silent sympathy for his project. It is unalloyed with criticism whereas any intellectual approbation always invokes a possible reserve of latent censure. Besides, Zenobia is too strong a woman for him to adjust with. He is not looking for intellectual companionship in a female who can understand him and share his dreams. He wants to play the role of deity in the life of a female who will worship him with tremendous faith which will be uncritical and unconditional.

Priscilla has an unquestionable faith in masculine ideals regarding female action and behavior. She is content to be a reflection of the picture of ideal womanhood as a gentle parasite, a willing slave of her master. Such entire acquiescence is her source of complete happiness. In her vision, man is always at the center and woman is always at periphery, a mere incident in the great sum of man. Hollingsworth’s decision to marry her reaffirms the dominant ideology of a society where a woman is second fiddle to a male. His preference for her over Zenobia articulates one of the ways through which women’s voices are suppressed and marginalized. Priscilla’s marriage with

Hollingsworth is a conformist’s triumph.

After Hollingsworth’s declaration of intended marriage to Priscilla, Zenobia commits suicide. She plunges into the river near the utopian colony. Her death is interpreted and is read as the result of her injured ego because she cannot accept her defeat from a fragile and insignificant Priscilla. Coverdale describes her as a lovesick maiden who drowns herself when faces rejection in love. He deplores her death in these Iqbal 158

words: ‘‘It is nonsense, and a miserable wrong – the results like so many others, of masculine egotism,-that the success or failure of woman’s existence should be made to depend wholly on the affections, and on one species of affection; while man has such a multitude of other chances, that this seems but an incident ’’ (BR 581).The above statement of the narrator Coverdale reveals her character as living argument against her feminist convictions.

She embraces death at the end after discovering Hollingsworth’s true character.

Her suicide should not be interpreted as a desperate step of a frustrated woman who has been forsaken in love. Her end is generally studied in the light of the natural weakness of woman. In her final speech, she indulges in the role of a traditional woman. She displays all the faults of her sex, using the same as an excuse for her failure. Her excuse that male dominated society was not nice enough to her revealed an immersion in the feminine ideology.

At least, I am a woman, with every fault, it may be, that a woman ever

had-, weak, vain, unprincipled, [like most of my sex; for our virtues,

when we have any, are merely impulsive and instinctive], passionate, too,

and pursuing my foolish and unattainable ends by indirect and cunning,

though absurdly chosen means, as an hereditary bond slave must; false,

moreover, to the whole circle of good, in my reckless truth to the little

good I saw before me, – but still a woman! (BR 567) Iqbal 159

Her death manifests feminine nature which has been deliberately and consciously suppressed by her. It falsifies her feminist posture and reveals an intellectual recognition of her own venality. She is far from being the strong, independent woman she has fancied herself. Such oversimplifying interpretations overlook her character as an individual.

These opinions enforce upon her character the narrator’s stance to retain in Stephen

Greenblatt’s view a type of “political correctness” in the social orbit. In such a politically correct world, any deviation from prescribed, well defined role is inevitably punished.

Zenobia pays the price because she has acted as a dissenter. The treatment of her character reveals the attitude of a conservative author towards such model of female. Her pathetic end depicts the cherished desire of a society which shapes and governs a work, a political disposition unknown to the author himself. Hawthorne’s anti-feminist stance secretly wished the failure of such feminist principles.

Though Zenobia advocates female rights, her difference from other women is highlighted to maintain patriarchy at the center. She refuses to conform, hence she has been marginalized. Her suicide further reinforces and strengthens conventional ideologies. Instead of undermining the male hegemony of her culture, her fate helps to reinforce it by her acceptance of defeat in the hands of male oriented society. Her failure reaffirms the paradigm which she has initially rejected. She accepts hopelessly and says:

There are no new truths, much as we have prided ourselves on finding

some. A moral? Why this. That in the battlefield of life, the downright Iqbal 160

stroke, that would fall only on a man’s steel head –piece, is sure to light on

a woman’s heart, over which she wears no breastplate, and whose wisdom

it is, therefore to keep out of the conflict. (BR 571)

Hawthorne was skeptical of any change in long accepted ideology of male female relationship hence; he depicted through Zenobia’s suicide that she was no more different from Priscilla. She was dominated by passion and emotion all along in her relation with

Hollingsworth in total alienation to logic and reason. She was ashamed of her natural sexuality hence; she was not comfortable with her emotions. Her own behavior was at variance with the fundamental reality of female nature. She was “a study in the emotional hazards of feminism and transcendentalist utopianism” (Chase 84). The turmoil and confusion of her inner life was a result of her misconception. Her passions were unruly and uncontrollable lacking the guidance of intellect and reasons which she thought, she possessed.

The aim of the Blithedale community was “to gather a few individuals having the same object of being wholly true to their natures as men and women”( Hoeltje169) and

Zenobia’s behavior contradicted that aim because it was termed as, unwomanly, “Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the culminative force of a whole life’s cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another you have only an extemporaneous half possession”(Emerson 48). The idea of self reliance focused that man should live according to his own nature. Zenobia behaved like an imposter contrary to the basic ideology behind the socialist experiment. Such lines of Iqbal 161

interpretations were offered by those pro-male critics who got disturbed by any deviation from the accepted norms of society hence; her death was also depicted in the same light.

It is neither her failure in love nor her inability to comply with basic human emotions which are at variance with her ideology which make her vulnerable. It is wrong to assume that she commits suicide because she cannot bear to survive with the label of a jilted woman. Westervelt observes on her death that, “twenty years of a brilliant life-time thrown away for a mere woman’s whims!”(BR 582) and Coverdale speculates on the reason of her death, “love had gone against her. It is nonsense and miserable wrong, – . .

. (BR 582). These sympathetic remarks ironically help to reiterate the male conceived notion of female reality. Silas Foster, a man of commonsense sees no justification in her suicide. He observes that she “lacks nothing to make her comfortable but a husband and that’s an article she could have, any day” (BR 575). These are politicized perspective of the author, a byproduct of masculine culture. The focus on the universality and naturalness of her behavior is misleading. It demonstrates one of the ways through which society controls its members. She was a normal woman but that did not curb her right to indulge in intellectual speculations.

At the end she is disenchanted with Hollingsworth and discovers him as a

“monster! A cold, heartless, self beginning and self - ending piece of mechanism!”

(BR567). She finds in him the epitome of masculine egotism. She expostulates, ‘‘The fiend, I doubt not, has made his choicest mirth of you these seven years past, and especially in the mad summer which we have spent together. I see it now! I am awake, Iqbal 162

disenchanted, disenthralled! Self, self, self! You have embodied yourself in a project.

You are a better masquerader than the witches and gypsies yonder; for your disguise is a self- deception’’ (BR567-568). She discountenances Hollingsworth’s true character, a man not worth fighting for. She dissects his fabricated existence and his plan of her exploitation. She must deem herself fortunate that she could save herself from his vicious alliance. If she commits suicide in a desperate bid to lose her so called reformer lover, it is a sheer waste of a valuable and worthy life.

Among the conflicting interpretations of the reasons for her suicide, it is difficult to point to one reason. The present reading does not find any connection between her death and her basic feminine nature. It rather identifies a bruised self esteem at the bottom of the trouble. The full truth of herself and the intent of her previous self deception dawns on her at last. Her fatal outcome is the result of her despair because she has failed to be true to her feminist principles. Zenobia’s death is hopeless and a desperate recognition of her being. She has subjected herself to the temptation of an abject and dependable life by abjuring her avowed ideology. In the past, her failed love and an unsuccessful marriage could not shatter her. She has survived that and falls in love again. Westervelt’s comment is significant here, ‘‘love had failed her, you say! Had it never failed her before? Yet she survived it, and loved again,-possibly not once alone, nor twice either ’’ (BR 582).

She is last seen in the novel in the chapter ‘‘The Three together ’’, where she is shown in a very distressful light. She leans her forehead against a rock. The forehead is Iqbal 163

indicative of the intellectual domain which she has abandoned. Coverdale comments about her sobs as “dry” such as have nothing to do with tears. Tears represent emotion which originates in heart. In a chapter called, ‘‘Zenobia and Coverdale’’, Coverdale notices that, ‘‘she puts her hand to her forehead, with a gesture that made me forcibly conscious of an intense living pain there’’ (BR 570). She feels, she has betrayed the very principles, she has been fighting for and “sacrificed the honor of her sex at the foot of proud, contumacious man. Poor womanhood, with its rights and wrongs!”(BR 572).

Instead of being a champion of her sex, she turns into its doom. She will no longer be able to continue her mission of emancipation of females when her own example contradicts her ideology. Nobody will believe her words, when she will speak in anticipation of a better tomorrow for the female lot because her very example has maligned the concept of liberated woman.

In the description of Zenobia’s suicide and her dead body, Hawthorne’s source was an actual incident which he witnessed during his stay at Concord, the suicide of

Martha E. Hunt. She was a Concord schoolteacher having sympathies for transcendental ideologies. She met a fate similar to Zenobia’s. Hawthorne was among those who searched for her body in the river. He gave a chilling, precise, and methodical account of

Martha Hunt’s dead body. The way he has depicts the body of Zenobia and his comment about the inappropriateness of displaying the ugly contorted dead body of a female to be viewed by male reflects him as a slave of conventionalities. Martha Hunt was an intelligent woman who aspired for her complete development but circumstances had not Iqbal 164

permitted her to do so. Her death was recognition of the limitation of resources as well as double jeopardy involved in a female existence. Her female existence was an obstacle in her successful advancement which could not surmount; however, her brother could rise above his limitation and became successful. The successful emergence of his brother against all odds is recorded in his biography by Allen French, published in 1940 in the memoirs of the members of the social circle in Concord.

Zenobia’s character and behavior tends to homogenize the dynamics of male power under the mindlessly simplistic category of “patriarchy”. As a historian,

Hawthorne tells a story which legitimatizes and perpetuates the power of governance in male orbit, by controlling the weak. This kind of discourse conceals the possibility that woman can exist independently and that she can be intellectually stronger than a male.

Even in Europe, writers were busy in such cultural productions which propagated an ideal concept of female with traditionally defined role. In Alfred Tennyson’s poem, ‘‘ The

Princess’’ [1847] , one of the characters says ‘‘As are the roots of earth and base of all

;/Man for field ,woman for hearth / Man for sword ,for needle she / Man with head, woman with heart / Man to command and woman to obey; all else confusion’’ (Manson

182 ). This anti –feminist stance of prince’s father propagates the same kind of well defined boundaries for women. It celebrates the slavish legacy of females as “Man is hunter ;woman is his game : / the sleek and shinning creatures of the chase , we hunt them for the beauty of their skins ; / They love us for it, and we ride them down

(Manson 176-177) . In the portrayal of Zenobia, Hawthorne attacked the mid nineteenth Iqbal 165

century feminist movement for its failure to recognize the true nature of woman. He forced her to accept that woman was always, “weak, vain, and unprincipled” “impulsive and intuitive” “passionate” too” (BR 822).

[II]

The romantic attachment of Priscilla and Zenobia to Hollingsworth made him another significant centre of the present reading. Though his character, Hawthorne found an opportunity to present diverse perspectives including his own on various reformatory projects and socialist utopian experiments in the 19th century. Social reform was one of the great watchwords of that time, a corollary of American democracy. The first half of the 19th century was unique not only for the intensity with which men had struggled to save their souls, but for the passion with which they sought to reform society (Blake

268). The great democratic movement, of which Andrew Jackson became a symbol, expressed itself in demands for all sort of reforms. “Once launched reformed movements in the United States owed much of their effectiveness to the fact that American understood the techniques of democracy’’ (Bragdon 276). Democracy implied that a better society can be created by people’s own efforts. It resulted in optimism, a faith in creating a better world through human effort. People wanted to create a heaven on earth.

These reform movements were inspired by a humanitarian zeal. Reformists wished to alleviate the anxiety in the society regarding moral degradation, financial Iqbal 166

irregularities, and socio-political corruption. Communitarian socialism can be best understood by viewing it as a product of the varied ideas and forces that entered into the ferment of reform during Jacksonian ruling. One such reform was the establishment of organizations to improve prisons and the character of Hollingsworth seems to be inspired by that. He wants to build an enduring edifice for the reformation of criminals. After

1791, Americans were busy in penal reforms. The substitution of prison terms for harsher penalties focused attention on the local jails. The overcrowded prisons were of great concern, and room could be made for incoming prisoners only by pardoning a sufficient number of inmates –a practice that opened wide the door to corruption and privilege.

Attempts continued for a better system to accommodate prisoners. New gate prison was opened in 1797 in Newyork under the direction of Thomas Eddy, a Quaker philanthropist and well known advocate of penal reform.

Theodore Parker’s “Sermon on the Dangerous Classes,” can also be a possible source for the portrait of Hollingsworth. Parker was a known Boston reformer who was attached to several movements for the ameliorations of masses. This sermon was delivered on 31st January 1847 at the Melodeon. Here, Parker spoke about the various classes of criminals. He especially referred to criminal with corrupt soul as born foe of the society. These marauds lacked conscience to control their discordant behavior and inherently dangerous propensities for the society.

Hollingsworth seems to belong to this class of self willed villains. Initially he seems to be inspired by a noble impulse but gradually it degenerates into a monomaniac Iqbal 167

obsession, a danger Emerson has noted in his essay, “New England Reformers.” His obsession with crime is equal to puritan’s obsession with sin, ‘‘ There was in all the practical activities of New England for the last quarter of a century, a gradual withdrawal of tender conscience from the social organizations. There is observable throughout, the contest between mechanical and spiritual methods, but with a steady tendency of the thoughtful and virtuous to a deeper belief and reliance on spiritual facts’’(Emerson 379). In spite of Hawthorne’s professed dislike of Emerson’ philosophy, he was closer to various components of his philosophy. Especially he was apprehensive of various reform movements of which New England had become the seed bed in the 19th century.

The Blithedale Romance displayed Hawthorne’s profound distrust of reform movements. He believed that Reform cannot be successful; if man’s essential nature remained unchanged. Little could be accomplished by a change of beliefs or institutions.

Emerson’s faith in individualism acted against any belief in institutional reform for social regeneration. Like Hawthorne he felt that the most necessary reform was change from inside, hence he was not comfortable with the idea of joining the Brook farm and said, “I do not wish to remove from my present prison to a prison little larger” (Emerson 145).

The evil from which the utopians were trying to escape was not something apart from human nature but a product of it. This was what Hawthorne introduced as a theme in his tale “Earth Holocaust” and developed in the novel The Blithedale Romance. The theme of Iqbal 168

‘‘Earth Holocaust’’ was reflected in an article published in Blackwood Magazine, which proclaimed:

Experience will prove whether, by discarding all former institutions, we

have cast off at the same time the slough of corruption, which has

descended to all from our first parents. We shall see whether the effects

of the fall can be shaken off changing the institutions of the society;

whether devil cannot find as many agents among the socialists as the

Jacobins, whether he cannot mount on the shoulders of those Robespierre

and Marat.(Reynolds 399)

The high sounding theories of these utopian communities doomed to a failure because it was based on an erroneous notion. It was an outcome of a belief that all the ignoble attributes of human nature were result of man’s subjugation to an evil world from which he could extricate. The Blithedale Romance is a comment on the folly of utopianism by seriously questioning Utopian quest for perfection. Their desire to attain uncompromising excellence reflects men age-old quest for perfection, hence their very desire carries in its womb the seed of the past. Hollingsworth identifies that “selfish principle” (BR 470) is at work in the community.

A belief prevailed at that time that in quest of reform and refinement, men and women of western society sacrificed their normal emotions, including sexual passions.

When normal emotions are suppressed, they pervert and reassert themselves through distorted human nature. Often this desire to perfect humanity transforms into fanaticism, Iqbal 169

bordering on the verge of lunacy that stops at no extreme. “The criticism and attack on institutions, which we have witnessed, has made one thing plain, that society gains nothing whilst a man, not himself renovated, attempts to renovate things around him: he has become tediously good in some particular but negligent or narrow in the rest; and hypocrisy and vanity are often the disgusting result” (Emerson 383).

In America during 1940s labor movement was affected by social reform which had drawn people into co-operative programs. Ripley saw innumerable opportunities to improve the world. He found the fundamental incompatibility between Christian doctrine and Christian life, hence, laid the foundation of Brook farm community which inspired the text The Blithedale Romance. Stearns wrote that ,‘‘one of the professed objects of the Brook Farm association was, to escape from the evils of the great world, from the trickery of trade, the pedantry of colleges, the flunkeyism of office, and the arrogant pretentions of wealth’’(150). Same intentions were reflected in the professed aim of the

Blithedale community as said by Miles Coverdale:

And, first of all, we had divorced our self from pride, and were striving to

supply its place with familiar love. We meant to lessen the laboring man’s

great burden of toil, by performing out due share of it at the cost of our

own thews and sinews. We sought our profit by mutual aid, instead of

wrestling it by the strong hand from an enemy, or flinching it craftily from

those less shrewd than ourselves. . .or winning it by selfish competition

with a neighbor. (BR 449-450) Iqbal 170

Coverdale’s above statement is ironical in the light of what actually happens in the Blithedale community. Hollingsworth’s scheme becomes criminal when in pursuit of its success, he subverts the nobler purpose of total regeneration embodied in the community. He destroys faith and happiness of other members in the process. He appears brutal in his personal relations and dishonest in public. Leopold and Link write:

Reformers, according to their critics, often strengthened the very abuses

they were attacking. Their truculent denunciations, it were charged, were

never designed to convince the upholders of the systems under attack and

could have no other effect than to goad these latter into equally violent

defense and resistance. (367)

Hollingsworth reveals the evil of the established system in his exclusive preoccupation with a single cause excluding any sense of human good. Instead of revealing his plan to others, he proposes to Coverdale to become his collaborator in his design of subversion of the Blithedale experiment. This community was built on a premise of high idealism but in reality it was standing on the same old faulty foundation of hypocrisy, greed, dishonesty, falsehood, and betrayal. Hawthorne portrayed

Hollingsworth’s character in the negative light owing to his dislike for professional reformers. He did not hesitate to sacrifice every relation on the altar of his dream project, be it his friend Coverdale or his lover Zenobia.

He professes to love Coverdale but breaks off his friendship with him when he refuses to enlist his heart and soul in his project, undermining the original aim of the Iqbal 171

whole community. He asks Coverdale: ‘‘Be with me, or be against me! There is no third choice for you’’ (BR 519). He abandons his friend merely because he is aware of his right as an individual and takes independent decision. Hollingsworth’s behavior was contrary to the teachings of the era of enlightenment which emphasized that it was sinful and tyrannical to compel a person to support opinions he did not share. It was considered encroachment upon the inalienable rights of an individual, which allowed citizen sovereignty over his own mind and conscience. Thomas Jefferson declared that, “I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man” (Peterson 112-124).

In the perusal of his philanthropic scheme for the criminal brethren,

Hollingsworth transforms into a criminal himself. He does not love Zenobia but in fear of losing her financial resources, he exploits her emotions and secretly guards this truth.

When he comes to know about her bankruptcy, he casts her off like a broken tool and embraces Priscilla as his prospective life partner. Priscilla is a perfect match for him, in spite of that he would have preferred Zenobia to retain control of her wealth if the matters would have been otherwise. Zenobia’s father Old Moodie reclaims all her wealth after her inequitable treatment of Priscilla.

Hawthorne was disillusioned with the whole concept of utopian enterprises.

Mostly Power hungry politicians and self-seeking and manipulative individuals were involved in these reformative schemes. They tried to act as demigods in arranging the affairs of men which involved the sin of arrogance also. This was what Hawthorne felt Iqbal 172

and depicted in the novel The Blithedale Romance through the character of

Hollingsworth.

Not only Hollingsworth but also Zenobia’s character defeats the very purpose of the socialist utopia. She has not joined the community with a faith in its idealism but to pursue Hollingsworth. Her treatment of Priscilla raises doubt about her sincerity towards the principle of equality among sexes when she helps in the subservience of a female. It is ironical in the light of her fight for women’s suffrage and social justice. It seems that for her, personal considerations are greater than the common good of womanhood. She appears selfish and lacks self restraint which is desirable to look after fragile and gullible

Priscilla. Her greatest fault lies in giving her consent to Westervelt for using Priscilla’s soul as a filter in a mesmeric performance.

She addresses Priscilla in an authoritative tone as somebody inferior to her. She never reciprocates the love bestowed on her by Priscilla. Priscilla trusts her completely but she breaches her faith. She is so overpowered by the feeling of jealousy seeing her object of Hollingsworth’s affection that she collaborates with Westervelt to remove her from her path. Coverdale remarks: ‘It would have made the fortune of a tragic actress, could she have borrowed it for the moment when she fumbles in her bosom for the concealed dagger, or the exceedingly sharp bodkin or mingles the ratsbane in her lover’s bowl of wine, or her rival’s cup of tea ’’ ( BR 485). The Blithedale Community was based on the concept of human brotherhood against the predatory competitiveness of the established system. It turned against its professed aim when its inhabitants exhibited Iqbal 173

exploitative individualism. Against the concept of common brotherhood in the community, siblings turned out to be great rivals here.

The narrator Coverdale appears to be the greatest well wisher of Zenobia but his very presence in the community is questionable. His tendency to pry into people’s passions and impulses has gone to the extent that it dehumanizes him, and turns him into a misanthrope. His obsessive interest in Zenobia’s life is condemned. Blithedale society turns a failure because it has come to be organized exclusively on the basis of the force which has caused the failure of Bradford’s communitarian experiment in reality. The fate of the Blithedale community is applicable to the whole wave of American reformation in the 19th century. It met its doom because its members were overpowered by mutual suspicion and frictions than by any successful surrender of self.

The failure of this community replicated the fall of the actual community at the

Brook Farm where Hawthorne spent some time, which was amusement of the transcendentalists (James 69). This fictional narrative provided the author with a platform to indulge in speculation regarding the real issues which led to the collapse of the fictional as well as the real enterprise. All the characters appear as masqueraders here, corresponding to the hypocrisy which is at the base of this organization. The utter insensitiveness of Hollingsworth to normal human affections leads to the climax of the novel, the suicide of Zenobia. The ending of the novel performs two functions simultaneously through its depiction of an indispensible connection between the disturbing end of feminist Zenobia and her misalliance with misanthropic reformer Iqbal 174

Hollingsworth. Through this narrative, Hawthorne finds a medium to express his distrust of the various reform movements, besides, articulating the contemporary society’s concern for radically different activities in feminist circle. Both the activities were inspired by a desire to reformulate society and redefine social and political role of male and females. Hawthorne was successful in communicating through this cultural narrative that: ‘‘what is called philanthropy, when adopted as a profession, to be often useful by its energetic impulse to society at large, it is perilous to the individual whose ruling passion, in one exclusive channel, it thus becomes. It ruins, or is fearfully apt to ruin, the heart ,the rich juices of which God never meant should be pressed violently out,’’ (BR

583). Hawthorne was not a cynic but he could realize that the 19th century belonged to narrow minded reformers and visionaries themselves imbued with the spirit of the competitive world. The reason Hawthorne explained was that the seeds of the competitive and sinister world were carried by its inhabitants in their heart. That is why the very evil of the society which inhabitants of the Blithedale were evading, raised its monstrous head in this utopian world. Frederick Engels lamented at the “disintegration of society into individuals, each guided by his private principles and pursuing his own aims”

(Gallant 1). It was directly applicable to the disintegrated community at Blithedale.

The very real possibility that the concept of female empowerment and liberation might pass from Zenobia to other devoiced female entities is concealed from the women of the time by such cultural reproduction as Hawthorne’s narratives of Zenobia. She unconsciously collaborates in perpetuation of that cultural construct by her suicide as Iqbal 175

well as by her difference from other females. Woman’s biological weakness, her softness, her sexual identity are learnt in this tale. The danger of matriarchy is quietly suppressed in the novel by highlighting Zenobia’s desire to submit to her passion for Hollingsworth and through her horrendous end. A historically specified and accepted model of truth and authority is retained at last. It is one of the ways in which power is consolidated by the hegemonic group and existing power structure is maintained.

Iqbal 176

Works Cited:

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2. Baym, Nina. Novels, Readers, and Reviewer: Responses to fiction in Antebellum

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3. - - -. “Again and Again, the Scribbling women” in John L. Idol, and

Melinda M. Pounder, eds. Hawthorne and Women: Engendering and Expanding

the Hawthorne Tradition. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999.

Print.

4. Blake, Nelson Manfred. A Short History of American Life. New York: McGraw Hill

Book Company Inc, 1952. Print.

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Thoughts. New York: McGraw Hill Publishing Co; 1963.Print.

6. Chase, Richard. The American Novel and its Tradition. New York: Doubleday and

Company Inc, 1957. Print.

7. Commager, Henry Steele, and Allan Nevins, eds. The Heritage of America. Boston:

Little Brown and Company, 1949.Print.

8. Commager, Henry Steele, ed. Living Ideas in America. New York: Harper and Row

Publisher, 1951. Print.

9. Cowie, Alexander. The Rise of American Novel. New York: American book

Company, 1948. Print. Iqbal 177

10. Davis, Cynthia J. “Margaret “Fuller, Body and Soul.” American Literature 71.1

(Mar 1999):31-56. Print.

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1966. Print.

13. Fine, Sidney, and Gerald S.Brown. The American Past. 2nd ed. Vol.1. New York:

Macmillan Company, 1965. Print.

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Spring, 2000. Web.2nd Mar. 2011. findarticles.com.

15. Hoeltje, Hubert H. Inward Sky; the Mind and Heart of Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Durham: N.C, Duke University Press, 1962. Print.

16. James, Henry. Hawthorne. Newyork: Cornwell University Press, 1956. Print.

17. Kesterson, David B. “Margaret Fuller on Hawthorne” in John L Idol JR.,and Melinda

M. Ponder, eds. Hawthorne and Women. Amherst: University of Massachusetts

Press, 1999. Print.

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Newyork: Northwestern University, Prentice –Hall ,Inc.,1954. Print.

19. Manson, J.A, ed. Tennyson Complete Works. Dehradun: Reprint Publication,2004.

Print.

20. Mellow, James R. Nathaniel Hawthorne in His Times. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Iqbal 178

Company, 1980. Print.

21. Myerson, Joel. “Nathaniel Hawthorne” The Transcendentalists: A Review of

Research and Criticism (1984):328-335. New York: MLA. Print.

22. Pearson, Norman Holmes, ed. The Complete Novels and Selected Tales of Nathaniel

Hawthorne. New York: the Modern Library, 1937. Print.

23. Person, Leland S, jr. Aesthetic Headaches. Athens: University of Georgia Press,

1988. Print.

24. Pfister, Joel. The Production of Personal Life. California: Stanford University Press,

1991. Print.

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274.6(Dec 1994):112-124. Print.

26. Reynolds, Larry J. “The Scarlet Letter and Revolutions Abroad.” American

Literature 57.1(Mar 1985):44-67 Print.

27. Stearns, Frank Preston. The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Philadelphia:

JB Lippincott Company, 1906.Print.

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US Information Agency, 1981. Print.

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University Press, 1961. Print.

30. Details of Martha Hunt’s suicide from concord MA .com Iqbal 179

01742,Webmaster@Concord ma.com.Web. 2nd May. 2008.

31. Letter of Hawthorne to William B. Pike.Web.3rd Apr. 2011.home.clara.net. Iqbal 180

Chapter VI

Poetics of Culture

in

The Marble Faun

“Moral responsibility was seen to develop the individual’s character, and such responsibility is impossible where virtue is not a matter of conscience but of constraint, of outer rather than inner compulsion” (Hall 175). This philosophical aspect of the book is centered in the character of Donatello in the novel The Marble Faun. This last novel of

Hawthorne was published in 1860. Hawthorne’s stay in Liverpool as an American consul general provided him with the concept and background of the novel. It introduces four characters who are artists by profession. They are Donatello, Miriam, Kenyon, and Hilda.

Donatello is an innocent, faun-like creature, who has grown in a rural arcadia in the company of nature. In this pre-lapsarian state of existence, he is not conscious of sin,

“had no conscience, no remorse, no burden on the heart, no troublesome recollections of any sort . . .” (MF597). At this stage, the question of restrain by any external mandate is insignificant to him. He is a kind of simpleton whose innocence has kept him outside the periphery of any formal rules and restrains. He encounters evil for the first time when he confronts the monk Antonio in the evil and corrupt city of Rome. Antonio is a vicious creature who is Miriam’s evil genius. He knows the past of Miriam and malignantly dogs her steps. The mysterious and frightful circumstances of a past event points out that she was “accomplice in the crime” (MF 838). Antonio threatens her with the disclosure of that event in which she was implicated as a murderess. He says, “men have said that this white hand had once a crimson stain” (MF645). It makes her restless and miserable as she Iqbal 181 is haunted by the frightful memories of her past. She implores to him to deliver her from his bondage but he says, “we are bound together, and can never part again” (MF 644). He asks her to leave Rome with him and warns her, “You are aware of the penalty of a refusal” (MF 643).

Donatello is deeply in love with Miriam. He cannot bear her suffering and humiliation in the hands of the monk. His attachment to her offers him a possibility for a moral education. He kills the wretched monk by flinging him down from the Tarpeian

Rock to rescue her from his pestering presence. She unconsciously, assists in transforming him from an unthinking animal like existence into a thoughtful human being. On the instinct of natural justice, voiced by her, he slew her prosecutor with her consent. He did what her eyes bid him to do, while he was holding the wretched over the precipice.

After this incident, a kind of transformation takes place in him. Donatello is bewildered with the novelty of sin and grief. His conscience is evolved which torments him day and night; yet, this torment is preferable to the bliss of ignorance. This transformation in his character depicts an evolution of good out of evil. “. . . the fierce energy that had suddenly inspired him. It kindled him into a man; it developed within him an intelligence which was no native characteristics of the Donatello whom we have heretofore known” (MF 689). It leads to the working of a moral consciousness resulting in the disappearance of that simple and joyous creature.

The coarse animal part of his nature is eventually thrown into the background.

Donatello’s friend Kenyon speculates on his changed behavior, and the recently developed astonishing mental and moral maturity in him. Kenyon perceives a perceptible Iqbal 182 difference in his character after the murder of Antonio. It seems to Kenyon that “from some mysterious source,” as sculpture feels assured, “a soul had been inspired” (MF741) in him. Donatello loses his natural impulsiveness and acquires, “the power of dealing with emotions” (MF737). Kenyon finds that he has gained a far deeper understanding to deal with higher subjects. The customs, rules and regulations of society become meaningful for him. He gains an insight into the moral mysteries of the world. “It was perceptible that he had already had glimpse, of strange and subtile matters . . . life forever afterwards” (MF 740-741).

The irrefutable connection between sin and education as revealed in the novel The

Marble Faun is similar to Emerson’s views as expressed in his essay “Compensation”,

“When he is pushed, tormented, defeated, he has a chance to learn something; he has been put on his wits, on his manhood; he has gained facts; learn his ignorance; is cured of insanity of conceit; has got moderation and real skill” (69).

The fierce primitive energy of Donatello on the verge of spiritual maturity develops only after the commission of sin. After passing through an agonizing phase, he is inspired by a new soul and intellect. Sin proves a means for his education; guilt leads to the evolution of the conscience. The guilt torments him with his crime and guides him towards a spiritual maturity. Miriam observes, “He has traveled in a circle, as all things heavenly and earthly do and now comes back to his original self, with an inestimable treasure of improvement won from an experience of pain . . . was the crime a blessing in disguise?” (MF 840) The deed has performed its office. No proof of Donatello’s commission of the murder remains, but the pang in his heart constantly reminds him of his guilt. He lifts his hand to his breast and says, “I have a great weight here” (MF 703). Iqbal 183

It is followed by repentance and regeneration of soul. It kindles in him a mature man and develops intelligence. Miriam says, “Here is Donatello haunted with strange remorse, and an immitigable resolve to obtain what he deems justice upon himself” (MF 839). The right conduct is not enforced upon him to reveal an evolution of moral responsibility in him. He remains restless and is constantly haunted by his conscience until he subjects himself to the jurisprudence, on his own accord. The price of his guilt is the loss of his innocence and the peace of his mind.

“In seeking of his own accord to bring justice upon himself, Donatello becomes the fictional proof of Emerson’s theory that formal government is rendered unnecessary by the growth of private character” (Hall 175). Transcendental ideas, which chiefly occupy Hawthorne’s thoughts in the present tale, are expressed by Emerson in his essay,

“Circles”, “Valor consists in the power of self recovery, so that a man cannot have his flank turned, cannot be out generalled, but put him where you will, he stands. This can only be by his preferring truth to his past apprehension of truth, and his alert acceptance of it from whatever quarter” (183).

The 19th century thinker and philosopher Thomas Paine’s political and moral thoughts also raised questions pertaining to the self governing society consisting of self governing individuals. It referred to the willingness of an individual to constantly choose and hold to the principles or ideals yet flexibly applying that deal in diverse situations.

Paine was an offspring of the enlightenment who framed the American constitution. He focused on the application of the power of reason as an inner check upon the conduct of a free individual. Paine believed that natural law was inscribed in the divine order. It emanated a cosmos of a beautiful harmony and order which had existed prior to history Iqbal 184 or governments and it was superior to them. The natural law was at least partially knowable through the moral disposition in man and the depth of his conscience. Paine wrote, “As for moral, the knowledge of it exists in every man’s conscience” (Age of

Reason 185). If you break natural law your conscience will tell you if you practice being attuned to it. In this regard, Paine quoted Cicero, “the true law is right reason, comfortable to the nature of things, constant, eternal diffuse through all, which call us to duty by commanding, from sin by forbidding, which never loses its influence with the good” (Social and Political Thought 93).

Donatello’s character is conceived in the light of the teaching that has emerged in the 19th century. His character seems to develop around the ideology of evangelical

Protestantism and emerges as an illustration of its teachings. He garners his intellectual energy from Thomas Paine also. It is represented through his willing submission to the jurisdiction of the state. After committing the murder of Antonio, he flees from Rome along with Miriam to some distant land. Everyone is clueless of his whereabouts. No policeman hunts for him. He has no fear of being apprehended and punished by the civil authority, yet he subjects himself to the course of legal proceedings voluntarily. He achieves maturity by his independent choice of right conduct not by the imposition of any external coercive mandate. The individual attains moral wisdom and character, through the use of his freedom to live conscientiously.

. . . man was able to practice virtue of his own free will, and through the

spiritual experience of such practice develop integrity. To show the

individual’s potentialities for growth. Hawthorne wrote his story of the Iqbal 185

Faun, who, living as nearly as possible in state of natural simplicity and

devoid of any formal knowledge of ethical principles; is transformed and

educated by the activity of an innate moral faculty into a mature and

civilized being. (Hall 176)

Donatello’s character also owed its allegiance to the American social ideology which surfaced in the 19th century. At that time, the mind of populace was preoccupied with the idea of boundless individualism, unobstructed liberty, and equilateral society, irrespective of state’s interference through the imposition of law. The democratic movement laid emphasis on an all powerful individual with an aspiration for an overall expansion of individuality. Like Democratic movement, Transcendentalism also focused on courage, restraint, self reliance, and social consciousness. It was believed that man was naturally and innately good, and his divinely implanted instincts were reliable guides to judgment and action. The same ideas were inherent in Jefferson’s democratic philosophy. “Jefferson legacy was that of faith in humanity; he touched the moral consciousness of men with the spark of inspiration and sounded the trumpet call to battle for human rights” (Baldwin 160).

In the transcendentalist phraseology “reason” meant “intuition”.

Transcendentalists believed that “reason” was capable of apprehending truth better than

“understanding”. The “understanding” referred to logical argument and scientific inquiry.

Emerson and the other New Englanders acquired this attitude partly from the Germans and partly from their English counterparts, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Thomas

Carlyle. It appealed to them largely because it provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of individual freedom. If everyman could apprehend the truth by direct intuition Iqbal 186 than any form of external mandate, political or religious institutions would turn futile. It affirmed that all men, and not merely elect few might achieve a state of grace by casting off external authority and responding to their spiritual intuitions. They stated that man should trust his own intuition, even, when it contradicted conventions and traditions.

Transcendentalists believed that as men acquired genuine self reliance, any form of external restrain became meaningless for them. Emerson looked forward to a society free from superficial restraints. In an epoch of American development, when possibilities of progress seemed limitless, it was easy to equate self-reliance with moral virtue. Henry

David Thoreau in his essay “On Civil Disobedience” denounced all organized government. He proclaimed that the duty of the individual was to follow the dictates of his conscience against state. It was a philosophic anarchism but at the time when an individual was in danger of being crushed by social organization, such radical and non- conformist attitude was not altogether rejected.

In a political set up, where an individual was invested with incalculable powers, they were liable to fall in the abyss of all sorts of corruptions. Responsible citizens were apprehensive of the judicious use of the invested powers of individuals. Debates were also centered on ethical morality as a guide to check individual excesses. Its efficiency in preventing man from indulging in all kind of excesses boarding on lawlessness in their self-seeking concern was questioned. This discussion ultimately led to “conscience” as an important educating mentor of an individual. It did not need any formal training and instruction to guide an individual in his choices of right and wrong. It could check any aberration in man’s conduct such as licentiousness and egotism born out of inner discord or instinct. Hawthorne like Foucault was wary of the state’s power and skeptical about Iqbal 187 relying upon its judgment for enforcing morality, which he found innately present in an individual.

Inner check was the doctrine indispensible to the social and political philosophy of the 19th century’s democratic thinkers. Its roots were found in the works of Thoreau,

“On the Duty of civil Disobedience”, Emerson’s “Self Reliance”, and in Thomas Paine’s

“Common Sense”. “This belief in some faculty through which the moral law could be apprehended by the individual regardless of his background and training is fundamental to equalitarian philosophy in the first half of the century (Hall 174). Thomas Paine also emphasized on the naturalness of human solidarity and introduced civil society as a natural and potentially self regulating form of association, “counter posed to

‘government’ which is, at best, a necessary and artificial evil” (Lane) .

Paine’s invocation of civil society was against the despotic regime of the organized power of any government or institutional authority. His philosophical speculations aimed to overthrow the outdated allegiance and entrusted the hearts and minds of citizens with a new responsibility. Paine asserted on the growth of self confidence of the civil society in such a manner that it could simultaneously control state action as well as keep alive the conscience of ordinary citizens towards their responsibility. He defended the dignity of ordinary citizens as the source of political legitimacy. Walt Whitman asserted in 1892:

The whole universe is absolute law. Freedom only opens entire

activity and license under the law . . . Great-unspeakably great– is the will.

The free soul of man! At its greatest, understanding and obeying the laws,

it can then, and then only, maintains true liberty. For there is to the Iqbal 188

highest, that law as absolute as any–more absolute than any-the law of

liberty. The shallow, as intimated, consider liberty a release from all law,

from every constraint. The wise see in it, on the contrary, the potent law

of laws, namely, the fusion and combination of the conscious will, or

the partial individual law, with those Universal eternal, unconscious

ones, which run through all time, pervade history, prove immortality,

give moral purpose to the entire objective world, and the last dignity of

human life. (336-337)

Whitman along with the other democratic thinkers of the 19th century saw morality operative in the human conduct. He was convinced that human beings could achieve true liberty and happiness only through living out the moral impulse, which was the pervasive principle of the universe and innate in men. He believed that the regulatory and policing influence of the state in the lives of men could be kept at minimum since each individual’s behavior was policed by his own conscience. It would facilitate the growth of the human beings; and the full value of democracy would be realized then only. Donatello says, “I have no head for argument, but only a sense, an impulse, an instinct, I believe, which sometimes leads me right” (MF 839).

He is an uneducated individual who attains a state of grace by demonstrating the validity and effectiveness of conscience. It is his final action which validates the democratic faith in the individual’s inner control. “He fancies, with a kind of direct simplicity, which I have vainly tried to combat, that, when a wrong has been done, the doer is bound to submit himself to whatever tribunal takes cognizance of such things, and abide its judgment”(MF 839). Iqbal 189

He revisits Rome with the purpose of delivering himself up to justice. During the carnival in Rome, he is arrested along with Miriam on his free will. Miriam’s family connections would have shielded her and Donatello from the consequences of the imputed guilt as one of her relatives was occupying a prominent position in the Papal government. But he was able to convince her to go for a life of penitence, “Our life is an apprenticeship to the truth that around every circle another can be drawn; that there is no end in nature, but every end is a beginning; that there is always another dawn risen on midnoon, and under every deep a lower deep opens”(Emerson, Circle 179).

[II]

When we talk about the character of Miriam and the possible sources of The

Marble Faun, we should not forget the influence of the contemporary Praslin murder case on the present story. Julian Hawthorne has suggested Miriam’s possible relation with

Praslin murder case. Nathalia Wright in “Hawthorne and the Praslin Murder” (42) cites an analogue for the case of Miriam in the murder and suicide of the Duc de Choiseul-

Praslin over an affair with his governess, Henrietta Deluzy-Desportes. Hawthorne may have been introduced to her in 1851. In the character of Miriam, the novel anticipates two contemporary studies in fiction of the Praslin murder – Joseph Shearing’s “Forget-Me –

Not- the Strange Case of Lucile Clery” [1932] and Rachel Field’s “All This and Heaven

Too” [1938]. Iqbal 190

Miriam Schaefer is an artist whose character is enveloped in mystery. She belongs to a rich and influential family, an English parentage from her mother’s side and Jewish connections from her father’s side. Her father belongs to the rich and princely families of

Southern Italy which still retains great wealth and influence. She is a passionate, bold, and outspoken woman. She is responsible for the murder of the monk whom Donatello has thrown from the rock on her consent. In her early age, she was betrothed to old marchese, much older than her. She is modern and independent woman, thus, vehemently rebels against such an arranged marriage of disproportionate age difference. Besides that her destined husband was vile, evil, and treacherous creature. His characters lacked no traits of insanity. At the age, when the contract should have been fulfilled, she repudiated it unlike other girls of noble families. There was “something in Miriam’s blood, in her mixed race, in her recollections of her mother, –some characteristics, finally, in her own nature,–that had given her freedom of thought, and force of will, and made this prearranged connection odious to her” (MF 837). After her refusal, a terrible incident followed and unfortunately Miriam was implicated in the crime. She fled from the place and started a new life in Rome. Here, her identity was unknown. Antonio knew about it and constantly reminded her of the past and her suspected involvement in a murder.

As an artist, she makes paintings of Jael, Judith, and Salome. These characters represent murderous women who seek vengeance against men. She calls those pictures

“ugly phantom” (MF 615) which she has not created but which “haunt me” (MF 615).

These paintings have an underlying association with the terrible memories of her past from which she is trying to escape, “Miriam had doubtless conveyed some of the intimate results of her heart- knowledge into her own portrait” (618). She takes her vengeance Iqbal 191 upon her persecutor Antonio by giving her consent for his murder. Hence, her paintings seem to reflect her self portrait.

Her true name and her relation with her persecutor remains a mystery till the end but her character is surrounded by the suggestive presence of many characters and incidents from the actual life. The beauty of Miriam is borrowed from the beautiful

Jewess whom Hawthorne has seen at the banquet given in his honor on April 7, 1856 by the first Jewish Lord Mayor of London, David Salomons. She is also identified as Emma

Abigail Salomans, daughter of Jacob Montefiore who was married to Philip Salomons in

1850. Emma was seventeen years old at that time and he was fifty four. This age difference between the two also reminds one about the difference of age between Miriam and the man she might has been betrothed (Laurence).

Praslin murder case could be seen in connection with Miriam’s antecedent mystery and Henrietta’s suspected involvement in the murder case. Henrietta Deluzy was working as governess of the children of Duc de Choiseul. In 1847, Duc’s wife dismissed her from the job out of jealousy. Duc promised to get her back on her job through a letter of recommendation from Duchesse. But his wife refused to give such letter and he became incensed. In August of that year, the Parisian world was astounded by the news of a terrible murder which took place at the residence of Duc de Choiseul. On August 18,

1847, Duchesse de Praslin was murdered by Duc de Choiseul Praslin in Paris. His wife appeared to be a jealous and neurotic woman who made the life of her husband a nightmare. Popular opinion held that the governess Henrietta Deluzy was his mistress, and an accomplice in the murder to let him free from a pernicious relation. Iqbal 192

Apparently, in a fit of rage Duc stabbed his wife over and over, and shortly afterward poisoned himself before he could be arrested. This case awoke extra-ordinary public interest in France. The role of Henrietta in murder was never proved in that murder. After this episode, she migrated to America and married reverend Henry Field in

1848, the brother of Cyrus Field. Hawthorne was very well aware of her and may have met her because she moved in an intellectual circle until her death in 1875 (Laurence).

When Miriam reveals a name in connection with her past, her friend Kenyon gets startled and turns pale. This name was familiar to the world in connection with a mysterious and terrible event of a recent past, as Kenyon recalled, “The reader –if he think it worthwhile to recall some of the strange incidents which have been talked of, and forgotten, within no long time past –will remember Miriam’s name (MF 837)”. Miriam was grieved to see Kenyon’s tremor after knowing her real identity. She thought that

Kenyon suspected her guilty and asked him the same. Kenyon replied, “No; you were innocent. I shudder at the fatality that seems to haunt your footsteps, and throws a shadow of crime about your path, you being guiltless.” (MF 837) He alluded to some crime in which her name was involved, though, she was innocent. It was a well publicized episode hence, Kenyon knew about it. Miriam’s history and fate corresponded to the fate of unfortunate Henrietta. Though Henrietta was possibly innocent her social image was ruined by the charge of murder. She was acquitted in the trial but it could not restore her good image. Henry Bright asked Hawthorne about the original source of

Miriam, and suggested Henrietta Deluzy’s name, Hawthorne replied, “Well, I dare say she was. I knew” (Wright 5-14).

Iqbal 193

[III]

The other significant context, in which this novel can be placed, is Hawthorne’s countrymen’s untiring effort to understand and write about Catholicism. All attempts to comprehend Catholicism by American writers are shrouded in ambivalence. From

Washington Irving to James Fennimore Cooper, Hawthorne to Herman Melville and

Mark Twain, the transatlantic journey had its own fascination for them. It was an attempt to revisit their old home. Europe represented for them a complex model of aesthetic refinement, beauty, historical depth, decadence, and moral ambiguity. Their European tours provided them with an opportunity to observe Catholicism from a close quarter.

Catholicism fascinated and influenced the American writers and artists in their visit to

European countries. The American writers were natives of the democratic republic of

America; hence, they were wary of certain tendencies of Catholicism. They were suspicious of the massive authority and power of the Pope. At the same time, their democratic outlook provided them with a balanced perspective in appreciating its spiritual splendor. They loved the gothic structure as an expression of Christian spirituality e.g. St Thomas Aquins. The splendor of the church building related God with beauty, unity, and goodness. They saw beauty as a medium to convey the glory of God, a reflection of the higher being.

In 1860, Rome was occupied by Napoleon III’s troops and under a despotic papal government of Pius IX. The administration of Pope Pius IX reacted in a conservative fashion to the short republic of 1849-50 led by Mazzini and Garabaldi. When the Italian authors complained of the restrain on freedom of expression under the despotic papal Iqbal 194 regime, Hawthorne enjoyed freedom of expression there. In The Marble Faun, one of the character says, “and Rome is not like one of our New England villages, where we need the permission of each individual neighbor for every act that we do, every word that we utter, and for every friend that we make or keep. In these particulars the Papal despotism allows us freer breath than our native air” (MF 652). But the phrase “Papal despotism” reflects his negative perception regarding the authority of Pope in church.

Hawthorne grew up in a culture that had passive anti- Catholic components. There were a few opportunities in New England to meet Catholics, and gain an independent perspective. His Italian stay provided him with an opportunity to observe it closely. A F

Hewitt in “Hawthorne’s attitude towards Catholicism” (1885) studied Hawthorne’s relationship with Catholicism. For his study, he picked up references to Catholicism dotted throughout Hawthorne’s writings. Hewitt maintained in his study that Hawthorne was a liberal Christian, whose contact with Catholicism in European enabled him to find out what was wrong or what was right or rather attractive or unattractive in Catholicism

(Hewitt).

Gilbert Voigt also summarized a valuable material from Hawthorne’s biography and notebook to ascertain that Hawthorne moved from the initial attitude of hostility to a more judicious view regarding Catholicism. Hawthorne observed that the Church of

Rome was a very human institution. It made many grave mistakes but had several redeeming features. Both these aspects have been dealt in The Marble Faun.

Hawthorne shows the encounter of his two characters: Hilda and Kenyon, the natives of New England with the amoral and corrupt Rome. Hilda is an embodiment of female virtues who reflects some traits of Sophia Peabody’s character which are admired Iqbal 195 by Hawthorne. He fondly called his wife “dove”. Hilda is also frequently referred to as

“dove” in the novel. She is a staunch Puritan who is utterly alone in Rome without native homeliness and familiar sights and faces. She inadvertently sees the murder of

Antonio, a crime, in which her friend Miriam has collaborated. Her situation becomes wretched by the necessity of confining all her trouble within her own consciousness. She has no one to share her burden, even her only friend Kenyon is away from her at that time. In this state of spiritual and moral crisis, she is drawn towards the magnet of

Catholicism by its apparent comfort on all occasions for the pent up heart. She indulges in self –questioning, whether the New England faith in which she is born and bred can be perfect. “If it leaves a weak girl like me to wander, desolate, with this great trouble crushing me down?” (MF 794).

The attraction of Hilda towards St. Peter’s cathedral reflected Hawthorne’s perception regarding the spiritual comfort experienced by sincere Catholics. Hawthorne seemed to be impressed by the universality of the church and was particularly fascinated by its idea of “confession”. In one of his novels, The Blithedale Romance, his character

Hollingsworth says, “I have always envied the Catholics their faith in the sweet, sacred

Virgin mother, who stands between them and deity, intercepting somewhat of his awful splendor, but permitting his love to stream upon worshipper more intelligibly to human comprehension through the medium of as woman’s tenderness (BR 511).

Hilda’s restlessness and inner turmoil compels her to go inside St. Peter’s confessional booth, pro Anglica lingua. She goes inside the St. Peter cathedral with a hope to draw consolation from the confessional. She pours out her whole misery amid sobs and tears in the confessional box. She feels lightened after doing that. She discovers Iqbal 196 a solace which she cannot find anywhere else. She is not ashamed of what she has done.

She tells Kenyon, “I have a great deal of faith, and Catholicism seems to have a great deal of good, why should I not be Catholic, if I find there what I need, and what I cannot find elsewhere? The more I see of this worship, more I wonder at the exuberance with which it adapts itself to all demands of human infirmity” (MF 802).

It shows her recognition that regardless of the Church’s alleged shortcomings and the fraud and humbuggery of a section of its clergy, it also offers spiritual comfort. She feels that for every weakness of human nature, Catholicism possesses a remedy. It has marvelously adapted itself to every human need. Catholic theology characterizes human nature as wounded, accepting a tendency in a man to sin but still possessing the grace of

God’s creation. When the priest in the confessional asks Hilda, why has she sought to avail a privilege exclusive to member of one true church and what were her grounds: confession or absolution? Regarding absolution, she says “never” and defends her refusal by adding that, “God forbid that I should ask absolution from mortal man!” (MF 796).

The confessional scene of The Marble faun has its parallel in the novel Villette by Charlotte Bronte. Hawthorne must have read her novel and found here, the description of a protestant heroine confessing to a Roman Catholic priest. Hawthorne spent a prolonged period in Europe. In writing The Marble Faun, Hawthorne used his European notebooks as frequently as he used his Brook farm notebook in writing The Blithedale

Romance. The background of the novel is the picturesque and degenerate Italy of classic art, decadence and disease. In 1858, Hawthorne observed Catholicism, as he sojourned in

Rome. This encounter enriched his understanding of sin, and its effect on human beings. Iqbal 197

Soon after his arrival in Rome, he described the scene of a “lady confessing to a priest

“within a ‘wooden confessional’ ” (N.B 184).

The Confessional boxes impress Hilda with its infinite convenience for its devout believers. After a tumultuous and disgusting phase of life, a devotee could go there and leave all troubles behind without any disquietitude “purifying themselves with a touch of holy water at the threshold.”(MF 794) On the contrary, a Puritan upbringing compels a person to keep all his torture in his pent up heart and let it burn there till it sears him into an indifference. Hilda has a great respect for the spiritual resources of Catholic Church which concurs with the opinion of the author. Hawthorne writes in his French and Italian notebook:

The ceremonies of the Catholic Church were a superb work of art, or

perhaps a true growth of man’s religious nature; and so long as men felt

their original meaning, they must have been full of awe and glory. Being

of another parish, I looked on coldly, but not irreverently, and was glad to

see the funeral service so well performed. (Gutenberg 9)

Hawthorne’s contemporary, James Fennimore Cooper from 1826-1833 went for a lengthy tour of Europe. Here, he encountered a living, vibrant Catholicism which surprised and intrigued him. He found a powerful spirituality that spoke to him. His

Heidenmauer was centered on Catholic Church and society. He narrated his experience in

Switzerland, which destroyed any anti –catholic sentiment in him (Beard 3:174). On 11

Sep, 1828, he went for a walking tour in Switzerland and arrived at Einsiedlen. It was home to Benedictine, an abbey. The shrine of our lady of the Hermits was close to the principal feast of the place, the feast of Angles on 14 September. Cooper wrote, “It was Iqbal 198 touching to hear the prayers and see the bodies of pilgrims arriving and placing themselves before the shrine . . . the interior of the chapel was well suited to excite the awe of the worshippers”(Beard, 1:325-26).

Cooper witnessed genuine prayers and worships and saw beauty at sacred places as an aid to worship and prayer, connected with the spiritual splendor. A similar stance toward Catholicism could be found in Hawthorne’s observation in his French and Italian

Note Book (1858). Hawthorne observed while stepping into the Pantheon:

Everybody seemed so devout, and in a frame of mind so suited to the

day and place, that it really made me feel a little awkward not to be able

kneel down along with them. Unlike the worshippers in our own

churches, each individual here seems to do his own individual act of

devotion, and I cannot but think it better so than to make an effort for

united prayer as we do. It is my opinion that a great deal of devout and

reverential feeling is kept alive in people’s hearts by the Catholic mode

of worship. (95)

Hawthorne was curious to know about Catholicism, as his American upbringing and Puritan heritage provided him with little opportunity to understand it rationally.

Rome evolved under papal authority as a mere contrivance of man which gave

Hawthorne an opportunity to test his ethical principles and reformulate his religious ideologue. Hawthorne’s democratic leanings made him apprehensive regarding the immense power of popish authority in church and the corruption inherent in it.

Hawthorne held Pope largely responsible for the depraved condition of Catholic

Churches. He seemed to agree with his mentor Thomas Jefferson who stated, “The Iqbal 199 clergy, by getting themselves established by law and in grafted into the machine of government, have been a very formidable engine against the civil and religious rights of man” (Walker).

Hilda, like Hawthorne recognizes the fallible nature of man who represents the church and acts as a mediator between men and God. She finds that the spirit and program of Catholicism is contrary to political liberalism, humanitarian, social impulses, and all that is associated with democratic America. Hawthorne feels a kind of incomplete sympathy for Catholicism, as recorded in his notebook [1858]:

I suppose there was hardly a man or woman, who had not heard

mass, confessed, and said their prayers; a thing which--the prayers, I

mean—it would be absurd to predicate of London, New York, or any

Protestant city. In however adulterated guises, the Catholics do get a

draught of devotion to slake the thirst of their souls, and me thinks it

must needs do them good, even if not quite so pure as if it came

from better cisterns, or from the original fountain head. (96)

Hawthorne’s younger daughter Rose said that he might have sympathized with

Catholicism more clearly, if his puritan perception would have allowed him. Rose was a converted catholic who founded a sisterhood for the relief of the cancerous poor in New

York and died as mother Alphonso (Voight and Wegelin). Hawthorne was reared in an atmosphere hostile to Catholicism. Not only did the prevailing sentiment influence him but his puritanical upbringing also formulated his religious consciousness.

His extensive reading in the colonial history played an important role in shaping his opinion and the setting of his mind about the Roman Catholic Church. He absorbed Iqbal 200 the eighteenth-century skepticism and morals. He himself shared the later eighteenth- century distrust of established institutions. A reading of Thomas Paine alone would have provided him with a remarkably lucid attack upon the Roman Catholic Church.

Undoubtedly, without tracing the direct influences, it was certain that Hawthorne was already predisposed to hostility towards the Roman Catholic Church. He was ready to condemn what he considered its excesses before his arrival to Europe. Ellery

Channing, Hawthorne’s contemporary and a transcendentalist wrote about Roman

Catholic Church, “It is remarkable fact, that the very spirit to which Christianity is most hostile, the passion for power, dominion, pomp, and preeminence, struck its deepest roots in the church. The church became the very stronghold of the lusts and vices which

Christianity most abhors (139).

Similar views are expressed by Kenyon about Roman Catholic Church, when he describes it as a, “mass of unspeakable corruption” (MF 800) a mere contrivance of man not an emanation of the broad and simple wisdom from on high. Hilda says, “If its ministers were but little more than human, above all error, pure from all iniquity, what a religion would it be !’’(MF802). Hilda feels that her mother’s spirit is weeping to see the daughter of a Puritan is ensnared by the gaudy superstition of Catholicism. The prejudice against Catholicism in America came over with Puritans and Pilgrims who fled from the

Church of England under the despotic rule of Pope. Kenyon observes in negative vein, the predominant corruption in the city after the sudden disappearance of Hilda from

Rome:

Being so innocent, she had no means of estimating those risks, nor even a

possibility of suspecting their existence. But - who had spent years in Iqbal 201

Rome, with a man’s far deeper scope of observation and experience–

knew things that made him shudder. It seemed to Kenyon, looking through

the darkly colored medium of his fears, that all modes of crime were

crowded into the close intricacy of Roman streets, and that there

was no redeeming element, such as exists in other dissolute and wicked

cities. (MF 827)

Kenyon’s skepticism towards Catholicism was reinforced when he met the clergy who was in the confessional box with Hilda. The same priest wanted to seize that innocent and instinctively human experience of Hilda in the “confessional” for the publication as part of their propaganda. It earned Kenyon’s ire. He exhibited his hostility towards the unjust activities of the Church and condemned the immoral disposition of some of its clergies by responding:

For here was priesthood, pampered, sensual, with red and bloated

cheeks, and carnal eyes. With apparently a grosser development of

animal life than most men, they were placed in an unnatural relation with

woman, and thereby lost the healthy, human conscience that pertains to

other human beings, who own the sweet household ties connecting them

with wife and daughter. And here as an indolent nobility, with no high

aim or opportunities, but cultivating a vicious way of life, as if it were an

art, and the only one which they cared to learn. Here was a population,

high and low, that had no genuine belief in virtue; and if they

recognized any act as criminal, they might throw off all care, Iqbal 202

remorse, and memory of it, by kneeling a little while at the

confessional, and rising unburdened, active, elastic, and incited by

fresh appetite for the next ensuing sin.(MF 827)

These observations of Kenyon remind us of Chaucer’s treatment of the Parson in the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales. In the foregoing remark, Kenyon anticipates what Mark Twain has projected in his novel Innocents Abroad and Fennimore Cooper records in his letters. Twain’s comments become caustic when he turns his attention to some of the clergies of Roman Catholic Church. He wrote that, when the members of the

Quaker City excursion were in Italy, “We were in the heart and home of priest craft—of a happy, cheerful, contented ignorance, superstition, degradation, poverty, indolence, and everlasting uninspiring worthlessness” (Durocher 132). The clergy consisted of “well-fed priests . . . fat and serene” (Durocher 108) in a very graphic contrast to the poverty- stricken masses of Italians. Twain implied that the hunger of these poor people was in direct proportion to the gastronomic surfeit of the clergies. Hawthorne also commented about the people reeling in poverty in Italy, in his French and Italian Notebook :

The very curious part of the spectacle was the swarm of beggars who

haunted the street all day; the most wretched mob conceivable, chiefly

women, with a few blind people, and some old men and boys . . . the

whole wretched mob flung themselves in a heap upon the pavement,

struggling, fighting, tumbling one over another, and then looking up to

the windows with petitionary gestures for more and more, and still

for more. Doubtless, they had need enough, for they looked thin,

sickly, ill-fed, and the women ugly to the last degree. (373) Iqbal 203

Hawthorne wrote further about the multitude of beggars in Italy which made the heart as obdurate as a paving-stone (NB 240). In commenting on the anomaly of a bankrupt Italy and a fabulously wealthy priest, Hawthorne was putting his finger on a sore spot. The indictment of the priest was overwhelming and represented a high point in

Hawthorne’s condemnation of what he found blameworthy in the Church. This concurred with the opinion of Jefferson when he wrote, “In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own.”(Walker). Jefferson believed that, “religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship” (Walker). In Thomas Gladsky’s article “Cooper’s Other

Americans”, he cited examples of Cooper’s anti Catholic attitude. He quoted Cooper’s statements :

that some terrible disclosures are about to be made, touching the

Canadian monasteries, which are described as no better than

brothels, in which murder is a common pastime. That the conventional

system is infamous, and that it was framed to ‘comfort the priests’ . .

. who are kept in celibacy to wheedle the women and thus extended

influence of the papists, I make no doubt.’’(Beard 3:174)

Cooper’s scathing attack on the moral depravity of the monasteries corresponded to Kenyon’s vehement condemnation of institutionalized religion. Through Kenyon’s criticism of the “confessional”, Hawthorne expressed his ambivalence regarding its spiritual efficiency. The author maintained a balanced judgment toward the Church that was at once unusual and interesting. The mysterious circumstances of Hilda’s Iqbal 204 disappearance forced her lover Kenyon to think that: if the incident of the confessional was known in Italy, the eager propagandists, who were always prowling about for souls like cats in search of mouse would not let that opportunity pass, without forcing her to turn towards their faith. He suspected that they would not even hesitate in kidnapping her,

“Hilda was most likely a prisoner in one of the religious establishments that are so numerous in Rome” (MF 830). He thought that she would be possibly under the spiritual assaults in barred portals or in convent –cells. After her release, Hilda disclosed to

Kenyon “I was a prisoner in the convent of the Sacre Coeur, in the Trinita de Monte”

(MF858).

Hilda went to the most offensive and ugliest part of Rome, adjacent to the Ghetto to deliver a sealed packet to someone. This packet was given to her, by her friend Miriam with earnest injunctions of secrecy and care. Miriam instructed her that, if nobody claimed for the said packet for a certain period, she should deliver it to the address written on it on a specified time. Hilda visited that place to fulfill her commitment and disappeared after that. Miriam was no longer in Rome. She left Rome soon after the murder of Antonio. After her departure, the municipal authorities came to know of the murder of Capuchin and his persecution of her. Her disappearance after the incident led to the suspicion that there was some connection between Miriam and that fatal incident.

When Hilda went to deliver that packet, she was detained. The authorities suspected that the packet might contain some information regarding Miriam. They were also apprehensive of Hilda’s role in the episode. Hilda told Kenyon, “My entanglement with

Miriam’s misfortunes, and the good abbate’s mistaken hope of proselyte, seem to me a sufficient clue to the whole mystery” (MF 858). Iqbal 205

The remark of Hilda at the end of the novel depicted that Hawthorne’s attitude towards Catholicism was not unqualifiedly hostile:“In such custody of pious maidens and watched over by such a dear old priest, that – had it not been for one or two disturbing recollections, and also because I am a daughter of the Puritans –I could willingly have dwelt there forever” (MF 858). It reflected his honest insight into Roman

Catholicism and an acknowledgement of the presence of positive virtues in some catholics irrespective of their faith. It is fair to point out that Hawthorne appears to be a compassionate humanitarian and a great democrat, who bestows approbation, where he feels, it deserves.

Nevertheless, we should not conclude from the foregoing remark that his attitude towards an authoritarian church, his conviction of its political activity, and an unwholesome hold on men’s allegiance changed in any perceptible degree. Like

Jefferson, he was apprehensive of the abuse of disproportionate power in the hands of a fallen man as a mediator between man and God, “History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes (Walker).

Hawthorne retained his spirit of magnanimity towards certain representatives of the Church but the very idea behind Catholicism made him wary of it because of his republican convictions. On the whole, he was willing to observe the Catholic Church with a fair mind and a full heart as he was not hostile towards it except for what he considered for good reasons.

Iqbal 206

Works Cited:

1. Baldwin, Leland D.The Stream of American History.vol .2, 4th ed. New York:

Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1969. Print.

2. Beard, James Franklin, ed. From the letters and Journals of James Fennimore

Cooper. Vol. 1-6. Cambridge: Belknap Press, 1960-1968. Print.

3. Channing, William Ellery. The Works of William Ellery Channing. Vol. 2

New York: General Books, 2010. Print.

4. Durocher, Aurele A. “Mark Twain and the Roman Catholic Church”, 1960.Web. 1st

May. 2010. https://journals.ku.edu.

5. Emerson, RW. Essays. New Delhi: Eurasia Publishing House, 1965.Print.

6. Hall, Lawrence sergeant. Hawthorne: Critic of Society. New Haven: Yale University

Press, 1944. Print.

7. Hawthorne, Sophia, ed. Passages from the French and Italian Note-Books by

Nathaniel Hawthorne. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1883.Web. 1st

June. 2009. www.ibiblio.org.

8. Hawthorne Nathaniel. Passages from the French and Italian Notebooks. Vo.1. EBook.

The Project Gutenberg: Gutenberg literary archive foundation, 2003-2010 .Web.

2nd Mar. 2011.www.gutenberg.org.

9. Hewitt A.F. “Hawthorne’s Attitude towards Catholicism.” 1885. The Catholic World

Monthly Magazine of General Literature and Science 42 (Oct.1885):34. New

York: The Catholic Publication Society co., 1886. Print.

10. Lane, Melisa. “Tom Paine and Civil Society.” New Left Review. Questia Online

Journal.Vol.a. 1995. Web. 30th Oct. 2010.www.questia.com. Iqbal 207

11. Laurence, Anya “Henrietta Deluzy Desportes, Accomplice to murder or an innocent

woman?” 1967. Web. 10th Nov. 2008. Suite 101.com.

12. Paine, Thomas. Social and Political Thoughts. London: Unwin Hyman, 1989.Print.

13. - - -. Age of Reason. NJ: Citadel Press, 1988. Print.

14. Pearson, Norman Holmes, ed. The Complete Novels and Selected Tales of Nathaniel

Hawthorne. New York: The Modern Library, 1937. Print

15.Voigt, Gilbert. P. “Hawthorne and Roman Catholic Church.” New England

Quarterly19.3 (Sep 1946):394-397. Print.

16. Walker, Jim, Comp. Thomas Jefferson on Christianity and Religion. Web. 2nd Nov.

2010. NoBelief .com.

17. Wegelin, Christof. “Europe in Hawthorne’s Fiction.” ELH 14 (Sep 1947):219-

245. Print.

18. Wiltman, Walt. Complete Prose Works (1892). Philadelphia: David McKay,

Publisher, 1892. Print.

19. Wright Nathalia. “Hawthorne and Praslin Murder.” New England Quarterly 15

(1945): 5-14. Print.

Iqbal 208

Chapter VII

Historical and Cultural Resonance in Hawthorne’s Selected Tales

The American past is a subject of various tales and sketches of Hawthorne. His critic Roy R. Male writes, “these pieces taken together comprise a pageant of some two hundred years of American history” (38). Hawthorne writes that his tales are not “the talk of secluded man with his own mind and heart, . . . but his attempts, and very imperfectly successful ones, to open an intercourse with the world” (Matthiessen 222). The knowledge of historical matrix of Hawthorne’s fictional world is necessary to understand his tales. Longfellow writes “One of the most prominent characteristics of these tales is, they are national in character. The author has wisely chosen his themes among the traditions of New England; the dusty legends of “the good old colony times”, when we lived under a king” (23).

The stories selected in the present chapter offer a profound interpretation of the persecuting spirit of the late17th century Puritan culture and reflect Hawthorne’s ambivalence towards Puritanism. The first generations of English settlers were afraid of divine castigations for sinful behavior hence, they were very careful about individual conduct and practices. The Puritan mind was constantly haunted by a strong belief in the omnipresence of the devil. They believed that the devil was constantly looking for an opportunity to seduce true believers and misguide them towards the life of heretics. Their psychological insecurity led them to form a very close knit and austere society to protect their way of life. It gradually degenerated into bigotry because they resorted to harshness Iqbal 209

to prove themselves divine agents. These issues are taken by Hawthorne in his two tales

“The Maypole of Merry Mount” and “Endicott and Red Cross”. These tales have direct historical borrowings.

Hegemonic Forces and Containment

“The Maypole of Merry Mount” is a fictional treatment of a conflict at Merry

Mount between Puritans and Hedonists. Richard L. Stokes in his dramatic poem “Merry

Mount-A Dramatic Poem for Music in Three Acts of Six Scenes” [New York 1932] depicts the expression of uncontrolled passion bordering at insanity at Merry Mount which is an outcome of Puritan repression. Robert Lowell’s “Endecott and Red Cross”

[The Old Glory, New York, 1968] projects the confrontation between Puritans and

Morton Gent as an outcome of power game at the primitive level. Lowell takes a negative view of the Puritan police raid and their undue severity in destroying Maypole. The republican pedagogy of the 19th century left an indelible impression on Hawthorne. He was not lagging behind his modern counterpart in looking at the whole affair with critical perspective. He admonished repression as an unwholesome attitude towards life with his preference for a classless society. Hawthorne appreciated the virtue of tolerance which was an integral part of the democratic infrastructure of the society.

Mount Wollaston or Merry Mount was set up by a liberal tradesman, Thomas

Morton [1579-1647] who was a man of some learning and wit along with an extremely jovial disposition. Historical Thomas Morton Gent was an early American colonist from

Devon, England who was a lawyer, writer, and social reformer. Devon at that time was considered the dark spot of the establishment by Protestant reformers due to its Iqbal 210

traditionalist intransigence. It had not only an affinity with a High Church Anglicanism that shared many traits with Catholicism but also had a paternalistic populism combined with a rural folk tradition that Puritans considered very close to paganism. Local inhabitants regarded it as their Old England. This culture was firmly ingrained in Morton

Gent who was ideally a high churchman of good birth but a royalist and anti-Puritan. He was known for founding the colony of Merry Mount and his writings against Puritan’s suppressive regime. Morton was a “Renaissance man” with respect for Native

Americans. He found their culture far more civilized and humanitarian than his intolerant

European neighbors.

Morton visited America in 1622 but returned to England in early 1623. He demurred at the violation of individual rights and presence of tyrannical elements in the

Puritan community. He revisited America in 1624 as a senior partner in a Crown- sponsored trading venture with his associate Captain Wollaston and thirty other indentured young men. Native Algonquin tribes donated them a piece of land on which they settled. Morton had great passion for its scenic beauty and belief in its trade potential. He set up a trading post there along with Captain Wollaston to avail the opportunity of flourishing in the fur trading. It soon expanded into an agrarian colony which became known as Mount Wollaston (now Quincy, Massachusetts).

Morton found that Wollaston was selling indentured servants into slavery on the

Virginian tobacco plantations. He rebelled against his action along with the remaining servants. Wollaston fled with his supporters to Virginia in 1626. Morton was now in sole command of the colony and renamed it as Mount Ma-re [a play on “merry” and “the Iqbal 211

sea”] or simply Merry Mount. Under his guidance, an almost utopian project was embarked upon. Colonists were declared free men and a certain degree of integration into the local Algonquin culture was attempted.

He raised Maypole in May 1628 and invited everyone to celebrate the spring, to improve his trade connections with natives which included even the sale of guns. His establishment, Merry Mount led to a riotous life and scandalous rumors were spread of debauchery here. The Puritans accused Morton of immoral sexual liaisons with native women in drunken state.

Bradford recorded the involvement of crowd at Wollaston into “great licentiousness, and into all profaneness. And Morton became Lord of misrule, and maintained [as it were] a school of Athisme” (Andrews 333). They set up May –pole, got the Indian woman to drink and dance about it with worse practices, and changed the name to Merry Mount, as if this jollity would last forever. They indulged in all kinds of licentiousness and profanity (Frank 94). Hawthorne was aware that the greatest objection against Merry Mount and its ceremonies was that it encouraged sexual license.

The occasion of the present tale is the anger of the Puritan establishment against unconventional mode of life at Merry Mount. This tale unfolds at the moment of an eventful episode in the colonial history. In 1628, Mayday, a huge Maypole was erected topped with deer antlers which unnerved Puritans. The following June, the Plymouth

Militia under John Endecott, chopped down the Maypole and raided Mount Dagon’s plentiful corn supplies. They called it “Calf of Horeb” and denounced it as a form of pagan idolatry for its heathen practices. “Lord hath sanctified this wilderness for his Iqbal 212

peculiar people. Woe unto them that would defile it!” (MPMM 45) and with this conviction, Endecott assaulted the hollowed Maypole, “Merrymount was rechristened

Mount Dagon, the place of Philistine idolatry” (Andrew 363).

The Puritan sternness and narrowness are epitomized in John Endecott who was an efficient executive officer but an intolerant and aggressive Englishman. Hawthorne focused on his despotic nature against democratic sentiments in his sketch on Mrs. Anne

Hutchinson. In his untiring zeal to suppress dissenters, he became barbaric. In 1628, he left England as in charge of an advance company of Massachusetts Bay Colony. This time is recorded in the history of America for the intolerance of the Puritans and

Archbishop Laud.

The Maypoles were celebrating the immemorial culture of the English folk with its Catholic and ultimately pagan roots. This culture was preserved in songs and dances, festivals, and superstitions, and especially the rites and dramatic practices of which May

Day ceremonies were the key. The record of Thomas Morton’s Merry Mount comes principally from two sources: Morton’s own account in Book III, Chapter XIV of The

New English Canaan, and William Bradford’s very different account in his Of Plymouth

Plantation. John Winthrop also had an account of it in his History of New England which

Hawthorne used along with New England Annals as source for tale. The masques, mummeries and festive customs as described in the text are in accordance with the manners of the age. Hawthorne asserts in the tale that the authority on these points may be found in Strutt’s Book of English Sports and Pastimes [1801] (MPMM 40). Iqbal 213

Massachusetts Bay Colony was a Puritan state developed from Puritan church leaders who feared liberty in political, social, and religious spheres. They were aristocratic and autocratic in their approach against democratic congregationalism and eliminated those who were undesirable in the colony. Mirthfulness and jollity was a sin in that drab and gloomy state, hence, the jollity of Merry Mount raised the frowned eye brow of the Puritans. “Not far from Merry Mount was a settlement of Puritans, most dismal wretches . . .’’ (43), in that establishment, if anyone attempted to follow a dictum of his heart against the documentation in the religious scripture, he was condemned as rebel for undermining the monopoly of the church ministers.

Morton transplanted the traditional West Country May Day customs to the colony, and combined them with fashionable classical myth according to his own libertine tastes. He was very enthusiastic about the support he received from the newly- freed fellow colonists. On a practical level the annual May Day festival was a reward for his hardworking colonists. It also marked the day and a chance for the mostly male colonists to find brides amongst the natives.

The Puritans objected to Morton’s fur-trading post, near Wollaston Beach in

Quincy on the ground of it being a non-Puritan commercial plantation. But it was a partial representation of the truth. The Puritan’s account of the colony as a decadent nest of good-for-nothing that annually attracted all the scum of the country to the area was guided by malicious intentions to divert mind from the real issue. The Puritan’s ire was not so much directed against Morton’s revelries as for his rivalries in dealing with the

Indians. Merry Mount was the fastest-growing colony in New England. It was rapidly Iqbal 214

becoming the most prosperous not only as an agricultural producer but also as the fur trader in which Plymouth Colony was trying to build a monopoly. Hawthorn focused on the conflicting economical interest of the Puritan colony with Thomas Morton. The

Puritans gave religious coloring to the whole affair.

Morton was earning profit in his trading with the Indians. Unlike the Puritans, he was not biased against Indians as damned state old savage. He understood red men better than the Puritans hence, he easily made them friend. His plan of setting up a Maypole at

Merry Mount was a well thought decision with a practical purpose. He knew that no pilgrim could compete with an Indian as a trapper. He wanted to succeed in fur trading so he tried hard to win their confidence in order to obtain their fur. His method of handling the Indians proved not only enjoyable but eminently profitable. Puritans of the

New England colony of Plymouth objected to his sales of guns and liquor to the natives in exchange for furs and provisions, which at that time was technically illegal although almost everyone was doing it. The weapons undoubtedly acquired by the Algonquin were used by them to defend themselves against raids from the Northern Tribes not against the colonists.

Morton was considered an interpolator and undesirable person for going against the economic interest of the colony by refusing to respect the fur trading regulations of the Massachusetts Bay Company. Morton also wrote a book in 1637 New English

Canaan [3 vols ]to take his revenge upon Puritans. It was an inspired denunciation of the

Puritan regime and their policy of land enclosure and near genocide of the Native population. Iqbal 215

He won an influential backing for his cause and was treated as a champion of liberty. The real political force behind his good fortune, however, was the hostility of

Charles I towards the Puritan colonists. In 1635 Morton’s efforts were successful, and the

Company’s charter was revoked. He was accused of being a “Royalist” and put on trial for his role in the revocation of the colony’s charter, as well as charges of sedition.

He was arrested and expelled from the colony several times for his deviance from

Puritan code of behavior. He was exiled by Plymouth’s Myles Standish without any legal process for his supplying guns to the Indians, “Standish had seized Morton and sent him back to England three months before Endecott reached the colony, . . .”( Andrews 362).

His trial is recorded in the legal history of Massachusetts as the first entry for

Massachusetts Bay Colony’s prosecutions of religious, economic, cultural rivals, and troublemakers. The conservative historian A. C. Adams dismissed Morton as a vulgar royalist libertine, an extremely reckless but highly amusing debauchee and tippler but more recently his reputation has begun to be restored. Today there is a 1½-mile-long wall surrounding Mount Wollaston Cemetery in Quincy, Massachusetts, erected by the WPA in 1934-35 and dedicated to the memory of Thomas Morton.

Hawthorne bewailed religious austerity of the Puritans and denounced their cheerless spirit and hypocritical characters by demonstrating that they adopted subversion as a rule of governance against which they rebelled in England. Massachusetts Bay

Colony in the 17th century was not a bastion of freedom and equality. Although the

Puritans fled from England in search of religious freedom, the General Laws and

Liberties of the Massachusetts Colony were extremely restrictive. The long list of Iqbal 216

“crimes” for which citizens could be put to death was astounding. The essential elements of the 17th century Salem are reflected in the breast plate of Endicott in the tale “Endicott and Red Cross”. It helps in recreating the bigoted and repressive atmosphere of the 17th century Puritan world.

The image of the whipping post symbolizes austere Puritan regime for disciplining those who go astray. The plate displays a tall lean man, a fanatic bearing on his breast this label-A WANTON GOSPELLER, which betokens that he,“ had dared to give interpretations of HOLY WRIT unsanctioned by the infallible judgments of the civil and religious rulers” (Crew 42). It is similar to Felt’s record of an order of 4th

November,1646, according to which, if any one opposed a preacher in season of worship he would stand two hours on block four feet high with an inscription, “A WANTON

GOSPELLER” on his breast in capital letters. The other figure on the plate is of a woman who is wearing a cleft stick on her tongue for speaking against the elders of the church.

Felt recorded an incident of August of 1646, of a woman Mary Oliver, with a cleft stick on her tongue for slandering the elders. The same incident was recorded in the Journal of

Winthrop (Doubleday105).

There is also an image of a man whose ears are cropped like puppy dogs and the other whose cheeks have been branded with the initials of his misdemeanors. The other figure is of a man whose nostrils are slit and seared and another is punished with a halter about his neck. These modes of punishment were common in first half of the 17th century.

When a man was caught for burglary, he was punished by judges by the lopping off of one ear and the branding of a “B” on his forehead. Hawthorne’s perusal of Annals of Iqbal 217

Salem by Felt made him aware of all the celebrated cases in which his ancestor William

Hathorne acted as one of the judges.

There is also a figure of a young woman, “with no mean share of beauty, whose doom it was to wear the letter A on the breast of her gown, in the eyes of the entire world and her own children” (ERC 206). In Winthrop’s “Journal”, Hawthorne had read about punishment of Mary Latham who bore letter “A” on her breast. The plate depicts a repressive environment which is an indirect denunciation of Puritan regime. It is ironical in the light of Endicott’s proclaimed love of liberty in the tale. In the Puritan set up,

“Democratie” was feared and repelled as an agent of the devil. Even Puritan leaders were banished from the colony if they refused to conform. Nevins and Commager wrote about this period:

The Puritans were not religious radicals; they were religious

conservatives. In England they had believed in the Church of England, but

had wished to modify the absolutism of its hierarchy and to alter it by

abolishing Catholic forms, observing the Sabbath strictly, and keeping a

close watch upon morals. Failing in their hope to capture the

establishment, they sought the American wilderness to set up their

“patriarchal church” supported by public taxation, interwoven with the

state, and tolerating no opposition. (25)

“Endecott and the Red Cross” is based on an actual incident of 1634 of late autumn. On a muster day for colonial militia in Salem, John Endicott rented the Red

Cross from the English flag under which the company of militia was drilling. He was Iqbal 218

then an assistant in the colonial government who raised his arms against the English authority. New England Puritans spent painstaking years establishing a system of church government that was based upon independence and power of individual congregation.

The state in Massachusetts did not appoint a clergy, nor was there one over-arching body that regulated churches. Each church was a sovereign unit. Only one church was tolerated in Massachusetts: the Puritan or Congregational church. The Puritans of Massachusetts were afraid that the English government would try to force its new rules of toleration and

Presbyterianism on them. In order to save their freedom; they elected their own governor and established a General Court which was a combination of legislature and judiciary.

They built many forts to protect their harbor and drilled their militia men regularly. They continued to persecute Quakers, who brought their own version of the Gospel to New

England despite the harsh and cruel punishments they received.

According to Puritan’s any sacred symbol was idolatry so a cross was not a symbol of genuine Christianity but Popery. Endicott ripped the cross from the English banner, “one of the boldest exploits our history records” (Fogle 8). This episode tarnished the image of the colony and projected it as a subversive and unpopular form of the government which was menacing for the independent status of the colony. A committee was constituted to judge his impudent behavior and condemned him for challenging the royalty without the advice of court. Endicott was debarred from holding any office for a year. Charles I was the king and colonists were afraid of the Romanization of England by

Laud and the royal family, “The bigoted and haughty primate, Laud, Archbishop of

Canterbury, controlled the religious affairs of the realm, and was consequently invested Iqbal 219

with powers which might have wrought the utter ruin of the two Puritan colonies,

Plymouth and Massachusetts” (ERC 205). “Endicott and the Red Cross” establishes the historical authenticity by starting the tale in the background of the dissension between

Charles I and his subjects, for several years on the floor of the parliament, “There is evidence on record that our forefathers perceived their danger, but were resolved that this infant country should not fall without a struggle, even beneath the giant strength of the

King’s right arm” (ERC 205).

Endicott expounds, “Wherefore, I say again, have we sought this country of a rugged soil and wintry sky? Was it not for the enjoyment of our civil rights?” (ERC 207-

208)These lines indicate the stirring seeds of rebellion. Endicott obscures his legal ties with the English government through this grandiloquent outburst against the authority of bishop and the king. He asks “Who shall enslave us here? What have we to do with this mitred prelate,-with this crowned king? What have we to do with England?” (ERC 208).

It was in this spirit that an order from the English judges to bring about the downfall of the Massachusetts Bay Company was disregarded by the Puritan rulers.

Massachusetts Bay Colony was established with the desire of the English non – conformists to work out their ideas in the church and state which would be both a religious refuge and profit making plantation. The king granted land to New England but regarded it a part of England, and planned to govern it from there. With this intention, conservative English legal mind passed the Charter which gave Puritans the right to control their affairs but Puritans wished to establish a state independent of any alien control. They refuted any allegiance to the king and found it difficult to obey God as well Iqbal 220

as public officials of England who were guided by the laws, customs, and needs of the kingdom.

England threatened to withdraw the privileges of the charter and to send over a governor general to manage affairs on king’s behalf. The tale reverberates the same historical moment when Endicott reads out the gist of the letter that King and Archbishop are, “taking counsel, saith this letter, to send over a governor general, in whose breast shall be deposited all the law and equality of the land” (ERC 208).

The King relied heavily on the advice of William Laud whom he made an

Archbishop of Canterbury. Laud was resolved to have the services of the established church carried on in precisely the way that was most offensive to Puritans. The archbishop Laud insisted that every English clergy should read from his pulpit a favorable declaration of traditional Sunday pastimes. It was one of the important reasons for leaving the Old world for few New England clergies which they could not bear any longer in this new World (Frank 99).

For eleven years the king and Archbishop continued to govern with a high hand.

Puritans suspected the intention of William Laud to establish idolatrous forms of English episcopacy in New England. With their right to their charter and their territory questioned, and with their principles of civil government facing serious modification, the

Puritans were now in danger of seeing their most cherished theological doctrine and practices denounced and demolished.“Massachusetts formed by Puritan ministers and merchants under the leadership of John Winthrop. Here nobody was welcome who wouldn’t accept the beliefs and moral disciplines of the Puritanism” (Parkes 34) because Iqbal 221

they believed that the Unity of the faith was essential to ensure their lasting regime and diversity of sect would scatter their power.

Elizabeth Hathorne, William Hathorne’s sister was married to Richard Davenport, who was an ensign bearer for the Salem Company of Militia. He was the first to be called by the court for the explanation for the defacing of the flag (Loggins 18).This ancestral connection with the episode was one of the reasons for Hawthorne selecting this historical moment as the subject of this tale.

The presence of the mild and tolerant Roger William in the tale is not without significance. Historical Roger William came to Massachusetts in 1631 and soon became the pastor of the church of Salem. He was a non conformist who advocated the separation of the church and state. He declined to conform to the rigid practices of the church in

Massachusetts Bay Colony and demanded equality in the administrative policies and freedom in religious affairs. He condemned the way the early Americans grabbed lands from Indians. Hence, he was also expelled from the colony.

A dissenter rebuffs John Endicott pompous claim that the colony is founded, “for liberty to worship God according to our conscience” because he has suffered imprisonment for his own interpretation of the Holy Writ, Endicott forcefully suppresses his voice. Endicott’s rhapsody regarding liberty turns ironic in the light of his preceding action. He forcefully nullifies individual rights. A sad smile flits across the mild visage of

Roger Williams, who disagrees with the rampant religious intolerance and stands in the tale for the liberty of conscience. Iqbal 222

Hawthorne left the tale on a rebellious note and deliberately not followed the embarrassing aftermath of Endicott’s act. Through this tale, he highlighted the irony of the Puritan settlement which was formed to avoid religious persecution but its founders themselves turned hostile to religious freedom. Hawthorne condemned the aristocratic nature of the regime in favor of democratic paradigm of society.

“The Gentle Boy” can be coupled with “Endicott and Red Cross” and “Maypole at Merry Mount” in the present reading because of its thematic angle. Like them, it also depicts Puritan repression but Hawthorne’s treatment of this tale is singular. It juxtaposes

Puritan despotism with Quaker’s fanaticism and projects an ambivalent attitude towards

Puritanism. The forceful reinforcement of discipline by Puritans in religious and social life was necessary for survival yet their fanatical bigotry was fiercely condemned. The persecuting spirit of Puritans and Hawthorne’s shameful acknowledgement of his ancestor’s role in the episode is in the background of the tale. In 1832, version of “The

Gentle Boy” Hawthorne wrote, “they feared that admitting divergent religious sects should destroy the unity that would be necessary for their survival” (Mather 62). In the tale, Ibrahim is a victim of religious sadism of Puritans as well as religious masochism of

Quakers.

The fictional occurrence of the tale takes place in Boston and its vicinity during the time of persecutions of Quakers in mid 17th century New England when, “the government of Massachusetts Bay indulged two members of the Quaker sect with the crown of martyrdom” (GB 48). Hawthorne seemed to be drawing upon the execution in

Boston common of William Robinson and Marmaduke Stevenson on October 27, 1659. Iqbal 223

There was also a woman Mary Dyer among them but who was extenuated at that time like the mother of Ibrahim. Historical Mary Dyer was an ally of Mrs. Hutchinson. She was an extreme case of Quaker fanaticism. In 1659, she was punished but not executed.

In spite of that, her heresies continued and she was finally hanged on 1st June 1660. She was the first woman executed in America for practicing her personal religious beliefs.

Mary Dyer’s execution implied that the tolerance of other religious viewpoints was non- existent in the Puritan community.

The Puritan leaders justified the persecution of their opponents without any compunction. In the beginning, the movement of the Puritans was directed towards the preservation of the values of humanity and morality but later on, they neglected the virtue of tolerance that was essential for peaceful co- existence. Hawthorne could perceive that democratic fervor of the Puritan regime gradually degenerated into a rigid and self righteous pride which manifested itself in bigotry and oppression. Puritans were bent on crushing all sorts of dissention. Their fanatical temperament led them to forget their common humanity in the artificial rationalization of bigotry. In Pearson’s condemnation of Puritan’s severity of punishment against Heretics, Hawthorne bespoke his own mind.

The main character of the tale is a Cromwell soldier Tobias Pearson who migrated to New England. Tobias and his wife are moderate Puritans who retain their basic humanity. Tobias fought courageously against Cromwell to overthrow the autocratic tyranny of the state and church. Pearson was returning home from Boston on the night of

Quaker persecution when he found a little boy Ibrahim. He was weeping on a grave of his

Quaker father who was hanged and buried beneath the gallows on Boston Common. Iqbal 224

Tobias brings Ibrahim to his house in spite of his being son of a Quaker. His action reveals the triumph of intuitive humanity over dogmatic harshness of Puritanism. Pity and gratitude succeed spiritual pride as celebrated virtue.

The tale seems to convey that heart can serve as a better guide than the logical tenets of theology. It is interesting to note the conviction of William Ellery Channing, the spiritual mentor of Sophia Peabody, “I have expressed my abhorrence of the sectarian spirit of Rome; but in that, as in all other churches, individuals are better than their creed; and amidst gross error and the inculcation of a narrow spirit noble virtues spring up and eminent Christians are formed. It is one sign of the tendency of human nature to goodness that, it grows under a thousand bad influences” (210). Puritanism with its fanaticism and absence of rational piety could not prosper beyond the 17th century. In the character of

Tobias Pearson, the author has combined the virtues of Puritanism with perfect tolerance.

Hawthorne intensely desired to make tolerance an important component of the ideology of his parental religion in order to embrace it unconditionally and uncritically.

Pearsons are a childless couple and the loving and sensitive child Ibrahim lives with them like their own son. They are ostracized and segregated from the Puritan community and are subjected to repeated penalty for sheltering a son of Quaker. Their fearless advocacy of human values is applauded in the tale. Ibrahim’s widowed mother is a turbulent Quaker. There is ample record of many zealous Quakers in New England at the time of Boston Common in the mid seventeenth century. We find Ibrahim’s mother

Catherine’s parallel in Mary Fisher, a Quaker zealot in Turk (Taylor 41). Iqbal 225

Catherine abandons her motherly responsibilities in favor of wild fanaticism and admits, “My child, my child, how many a pangs awaits thy spirit, and I the cause of all”

(GB 56). Her confession brings tears in the eyes of every parent. Dorothy convinces her about the welfare of Ibrahim regardless of his paternity. These spontaneous outbursts of

Dorothy celebrate intuitional virtue of love and sympathy upheld by Emerson in opposition to the dogmatic religion of the Puritans. Catherine is recognized in the tale as a woman who “had assaulted the Governor with frightful language as he passed by the window of her prison; they knew, also, that she was adjudged to suffer death, and had been preserved only by an involuntary banishment into the wilderness (55). It has its historical counterpart in Mary Prince who “called to him from a window in the prison, railing at and reviling him, saying, Woe unto thee, thou art an oppressor; and denouncing the judgments of God upon him (Taylor 53).

There is a historical parallel available for fictitious Tobias Pearson in the form of

Captain Robert Pike and his friend Thomas Macy of New England. Pike was an orthodox

Puritan but of moderate character who was excommunicated for Sabbath breaking.

Robert Pike’s friend, Thomas Macy was summoned by the general court for providing shelter to four Quakers. Pearson’s other parallel could be find in Nicholas Upsall who was banished for his sympathies with Quakers. Even his wife Dorothy boldly supported her husband at the time of his banishment by writing a letter to the General court for the revocation of the sentence. Hence, history is replete with examples of humane Puritans on which Pearsons’ characters are based. Iqbal 226

Puritans believed that the Quakers were heretics because anyone who was not an

Anglican was a heretic, be they Catholics, Lutherans, Anabaptists, Antinomians, Quakers or Ranters. These heretics put barriers in the way of salvation. They were also considered traitors to their country because they did not belong to the official state religion. The

Puritan Congregationalism was the official and only religion of New England. But it wasn’t just about their religion. The persecution of Quakers was also part of the Puritans’ determination to rule them, independent of England. Puritans left England because they were persecuted by the government for their demands of reform in church. When

Quakers showed up in Boston in the 1650s, it was no surprise that they were persecuted.

Hawthorne writes in the tale, “The King’s mandate to stay the New England persecutors was effectual in preventing further martyrdoms,” (GB 66). It replicates the actual order of Charles in November 1661. “ . . . that if there be any of those people called Quakers amongst you, now already condemned to suffer death, or other corporal punishment, or that are imprisoned or obnoxious to the like of condemnation, you are forebear to proceed any farther.…” (The Colonial Gazette 4). According to the “King’s

Missive,” any Quaker accused of breaking the law in Massachusetts should be sent unharmed to England for trial. It indirectly undermined the authority of the local General

Court but they could not violate the King’s law. If they did so, they would be declared traitors, and would be forced to accept a royal governor rather than their own elected governor. Hence, slowly the atrocities against Quakers ceased. But long before it, the

Puritans of Massachusetts found it impossible to inflict the death penalty on Quakers as all the colonists were not in favor of the harsh treatment, for example, James Cud worth. Iqbal 227

The Quakers reveled over the discomfiture of the magistrates and played some of their most offensive antics of railing and defiance. Hawthorne seemed to be advocating for a midway. He condemned the harshness of Puritans but at the same time disapproved the unbridled fanaticism and the spiritual arrogance of Quakers. The distorted moral perception of Puritans is condemned in the violence of their children against Ibrahim. He tries to befriend them and they pelt him with stone, “. . . the devil of their fathers entered into the unbreeched fanatics, and sending up a fierce, shrill cry, they rushed upon the poor Quaker child” (GB 60). At the same time, Quaker’s extremism was condemned in the character of Catharine whose, “imagination hopelessly entangled with her reason” and she mistook “flood of malignity” for “inspiration” (GB 55). This tale presents accounts from both oppressed and oppressors and assesses the error and guilt on each side to study the psychological aberrations involved.

Religious Hysteria vs Personal motives

Hawthorne’s tale “Young Goodman Brown” draws heavily from the history of the witchcraft trial of 1692. Cotton Mather’s Remarkable Providence offered Hawthorne the public essence of Puritanism. John Winthrop’s “Journal”, Samuel Sewell’s “Diary”

Felt’s Annals of Salem supplied him with information and a personal approach to

Puritanism. The names of Goody Corey, Goody Cloyse and Martha Carrier are not new in the history of witchcraft trial. Even the witch meeting at the centre of the tale, where the protagonist Brown goes at night has its historical parallel. Iqbal 228

The action of the tale is focused near Salem village, probably in 1691, a year before the witchcraft trial. The story takes place in the reign of King William, as

Hawthorne has mentioned, who ruled from 1688 to 1702. The historicity of the time is established by reference to persecution of the Quakers by Brown’s grandfather [1660s] and King Philip’s War [1675-1676] in which Brown’s father participated. Locales like

Salem, Boston, Connecticut, and Rhodes Island are mentioned. This tale is replete with ecclesiastical terms that were part of the Puritan’s vocabulary like meeting Houses, communion table, lecture days, select men, ministers etc.

Young Goodman Brown was married three months back to a pretty, innocent, and pious woman Faith. He lives in Salem, Massachusetts in the late 17th century. One evening, he tells his wife about his plan to spend the night in a forest to perform a secret mission which could only be performed between sunset and sunrise. He does not tell her that he is going to attend a witch Sabbath. Faith is apprehensive of his plan and requests him to postpone his visit till morning but Brown is adamant and set off. He knowingly proceeds on an evil purpose because he admits that his wife would die due to shock and horror, if she knew his mission and after this one terrible night he would “cling to her skirts and follow her to heaven” (YGB 247).

Brown meets a traveler in the forest and promises him that he will attend the witch meeting and participate in a diabolical sacrament. This traveler is a devil disguised as a middle aged respectable looking man. The devil tells him that the church and the states are in league with Satan. In the forest, Brown hears the voices of his minister and deacon of his church and sees his childhood teacher of Sunday school as a witch. Iqbal 229

In the historical account of the witchcraft trial in The Wonders of the Invisible

World, Cotton Mather quoted a testimony of a lady who confessed her physical presence at, “ . . . witch meeting in Salem village; and that she knew the prisoners to be a witch, and to have been at a diabolical sacrament and that the prisoner was the undoing of her and her children, by Enticing them into the snare of the Devil . . .”(Burr 244). Another woman Lacy also confessed her share in the witchcraft and said, “ . . . they had Bread and Wine Administered unto them”(Burr 244). Even Abigail William testified her presence in a diabolical sacrament along with forty others. Diabolical sacrament was a profane parody of the Christian baptism. On that occasion Goody Cloyse was one of the deacons. Mary Osgood too confessed her baptization by the devil (Doubleday 202).

Cotton Mather wrote, “Hellish Randenzvouzes, wherein the confessors do say, they have had their diabolical sacraments, imitating the Baptism and the supper of Our

Lord” (Fowler 395). Young Goodman Brown believes in what he sees in the forest and participates in the ceremonial baptism by the devil in the witch Sabbath. He identifies one of the voices as the voice of the minister and the other as of Deacon Gookin. In this story Hawthorne raised the question of Specter Evidence which baffled the judges of witchcraft trial. During the first phase of the trial accusation against a person that his specter afflicted and persuaded them for devil’s association was sufficient evidence against the alleged person.

Cotton Mather wrote that according to the belief of the Great in Spectral Evidence the devil might take the shape of innocent person. Here is an extract from the confession of Mary Osgood, which throws some light on this controversial topic. She said that she Iqbal 230

attended a meeting along with Goody Parker, Goody Tyler and Goody Dean at Moses

Tyler’s house, last Monday at night. She also stated that she and Goody Dean carried the shape of Mr. Dean, the minister between them to make persons believe that Mr. Dean was afflicted.

Q. “What hindered you from accomplishing what you intended?”

A. “The Lord would not suffer it so to that the devil should afflict in an innocent person’s shape” (Doubleday 207).

But a woman Susanne Martin says, “How do I know? He who appeared in the shape of

Samuel, a Glorify’d saint, may Appear in any ones shape”. Hutchinson wrote that it was accepted in the formal statement that, “It is an undoubted and notorious thing, that a demon may by God’s permission, appear even to ill purposes, in the shape of innocent, yea, and a virtuous man” ( Burr 230). Hence, Spectral Evidence was nullified in the later trials of the court.

This controversial issue surfaces in “Young Goodman Brown”, when the identity of the traveler whom Brown meets in the forest is not established. He has been described as “bearing considerable resemblance” to the protagonist himself. Old Goody Cloyse identifies him as the devil. The other personages Brown encounters during his journey are his moral and religious mentors, Old Goody Cloyse, Deakin Gookin, his grandfather and his wife Faith.

The crux of the tale comes when Brown goes to the altar to be the part of the band of lost souls. He is shocked to see his wife there whom he has considered an embodiment of heavenly virtues. By merely seeing a pink ribbon, like of his wife, he believes that she Iqbal 231

is present there. Later on, he sees her in ceremonial satanic baptism and cries out in despair, “come devil”. The next morning when he returns to Salem, he finds nothing has changed. All those personages he has met in the forest as part of devil band remain excellent Christians. They are engaged in domestic worship and catechizing others. But

Brown is a changed man now. He turns into a cynic who doubts the righteousness of everyone.

Brown does not believe in the sacred truth uttered by the minister from the pulpit with fervid eloquence. He cannot ascertain whether what he has witnessed in the night or sees in the morning is true. The questionable issue is compressed in a single statement:

“Had Goodman Brown fallen asleep in the forest and only dreamed a wild dream of witch meeting?”(YGB 255) or is he deceived by the devil in shape of innocent people like minister, Goody Cloyse, Old Deacon, and his wife and so many others.

At first glance, Hawthorne’s selection of such subject for his tale appears meaningless for the 20th century readers as a mere figment of imagination but a study of

American past, biographical details of Hawthorne’s life and his interest in the colonial period will establish the historical ground for it. Cotton Mather, the most learned man of the period attested eloquently his belief in the witchcraft phenomenon in his book The

Wonders of the Invisible World as stated in the present reading.

This tale had been placed in later part of the 17th century in America when witchcraft was a reality. There was nothing strange and unusual in the beliefs that one’s neighbor is in the service of the devil. Historians turned their attention towards Salem

Village because it figured as a spectacular example of how “pagan” forms of supernatural Iqbal 232

beliefs endured even in the fervently Christian culture of Puritan New England. As David

Hall’s Worlds of Wonders, Days of Judgment and Richard Godbeer’s The Devil’s

Dominion showed that the case of Salem Village vividly illustrated the remarkable persistence among all early New Englanders of beliefs in the witchcraft and magic, demonical possession and angelic visitations, spectral apparitions, prophetic dreams, and portents. In short, not only New Englanders but almost every American at that time inhabited a complex supernatural universe, one in which Christian doctrines and practices were mingled with varied beliefs in “a world of wonders” (Leigh). John Butler emphasized the same in his most recent book, Awash in a Sea of Faith .

Deomcratic Aesthetics and Revolt

“Gray Champion” and “My kinsman Major Molineaux” celebrate the democratic and revolutionary spirit of New England against the interference of British administration in matters of the colony. “Gray Champion” is based on Boston revolt against the dictatorial regime of Sir Edmund Andros in 1689. He was a representative of

James II who “had annulled the charters of all the colonies and sent a harsh and unprincipled soldier to take away our liberties and endanger our religion” (GC 21).

Channing wrote:

In 1676 Edward Randolph arrived at Boston. He came as the bearer of a

letter from the king, in which monarch vigorously complained of the

action of Massachusetts as to the navigation laws. His further duty was to Iqbal 233

spy out irregularities in the conduct of the government on which a suit

could be founded for the revocation of the Massachusetts Charter. (86-87)

Boston revolt was a defiance of the commoner against the king to regain the privileges of the Charter which were revoked by the British government. It was a part of the general scheme of Stuart monarchy for the consolidation of all the colonial governments under the direct control of the crown and to diminish the power of the colonists to withstand the attack of king and the parliament.

Edward Randolph sent a report unfavorable for the colonists. Theocracy had a number of things to its discredit; hence, he found no difficulty in discovering many unlawful proceedings going on in the colony. After a long legal battle, Massachusetts

Charter was annulled in 1684 in James II’s regime. The initial first two paragraphs of the tale are the summary of the historical account and the details are so accurate that any parallel reading of the book of history of that particular period will find mutual explanation in each other.

Massachusetts Bay colonists enjoyed full freedom under the Old Charter. After its revocation the government of Massachusetts was confided to Joseph Dudley, son of one of the founders of the colony. He was the governor in place of John Winthrop to restrict the power of the Puritan assistants in the general court. The revocation of the charter was considered an act of oppressive tyranny. Hence, Dudley as the representative of the royal authority was considered a traitor. Joseph Dudley appears in the March of Sir Edmund

Andros in the tale, “Dudley came behind, with a downcast look, dreading, as well, he Iqbal 234

might to meet the indignant gaze of the people, who beheld him, their only countryman by birth, among the oppressors of his native land” (GC 23).

The rule of Dudley was soon replaced by Edmund Andros who was a tyrannical ruler. He and his council were appointed by James II, and were entrusted with unaccountable power liable to corruption and its abuses lacked “scarcely a single characteristic of tyranny” (GC 21). Andros was free to make law, levy taxes, perform executive functions and appoint judges. He was allowed to convict people charged with disobeying his decrees. In most ungracious manner, he abused his power to seize private property. Individual rights were violated. There was no freedom of expression as the voice of dissenters was muffled, “by restrictions on the press” (GC 21). Andros compelled the witnesses in the court to kiss the Bible when they swore to give true testimony. New England was groaning under the pressure of these wrong doings and

Puritans complained that this harsh and unprincipled soldier was, “to take away our liberties and endanger our religion” (GC 21). These tyrannical measures paved the way for the revolution. In England “Glorious Revolution” of 1688 hurled James II from the throne and it had a great impact in America also. “The news of the landing of William of

Orange, in November 1688, reached Boston in March,1689, and the flight of James II was probably known to the colonial leaders not long after”( Channing 88).

Gray Champion announces the fall of, “a Popish tyrant” from the throne of

England” (24). It was seen as a triumph of civil and religious rights in New England. It stirred the people and made them bold. People were on the verge of revolt, waiting for a signal to rouse from a sluggish despondency. The time period is established in these lines, Iqbal 235

“one afternoon in April 1689” (GC 21). Edmund Andros and his favorite councilors

“made their appearance in the streets of Boston”(GC 21) and before another sunset, “ the governor, and all that rode so proudly with him, were prisoners, and long ere it was known that James had abdicated, king William was proclaimed throughout New

England ”(GC 25).

On the morning of April 18, the town was full of armed men; Andros was

arrested and the commander of an English frigate, which happened to be

in the harbor, was compelled to strike her topmasts and send her sails on

shore. A provisional government was then formed under the Old Charter,

and William and Mary were proclaimed king and Queen. (Channing 88)

The rebellion in Boston was a miniature prototype of the actual revolution. After the accession of William of Orange on the throne of England, a declaration was issued that magistrates unjustly turned out of office should resume their functions. The bearer of the news John Winslow was at once arrested but before his imprisonment, the news was out. This intelligence produced a marked effect and precipitated a revolt.

The aftermath of the revolution led to the restoration of governorship in

Bradstreet’s provisional Government in 1691. This new government was a midway between that of an independent colony and a Royal Province. The revolt aimed to regain the Charter’s privileges but the act of civil disruption was denounced by Bradstreet. He exclaims in the tale, “do nothing rashly. Cry not aloud, but pray for the welfare of New

England, and expect patiently what the Lord will do in this matter!”(GC 22) and after the revolt, Massachusetts became practically independent. Iqbal 236

“My Kinsman Major Molineaux” is also centered on people’s rebellion against the English authority for revoking the autonomous status of the colony. The historical context is established in these lines of the tale, “After the kings of Great Britain had assumed the right of appointing the colonial governors, the measures of the latter seldom met with the ready and generous approbation which had been paid to those of their predecessors, under the original charters” (MKMM 517). It unfolds in the time of high political excitement, “not far from a hundred years ago” (MKMM 518) when the agitation against the colonial authority was not a rare spectacle. “The people looked with most jealous scrutiny to the exercise of power which did not emanate from themselves

. . .” (MKMM 517).

Hawthorne captured the wave of revolution in the present tale that generated immense interest in the American revolutionary leaders who were trying to constitute the representative government and alleviate the oppression that precipitated the revolution.

The story revolves around a country bred youth, Robin who arrives in a little metropolis of a New England colony from a far off place in search of his wealthy and influential relative, Major Molineux. Robin has an ambition to prosper in the world with the help of this paternal uncle. He has come to the town for the first time hence, he does not know about his dwelling. In his encounter with various people, he inquires about it but nobody gives him a proper answer. The response of the people on hearing the name of his relative baffles him.

On his expedition, he meets a man with painted visage. His face was painted intense red on one side while the other side it was black. This man tells Robin to wait at Iqbal 237

one side of the street as Major Molineux would pass by. Robin has actually arrived in the town on the night of a planned riot in which his relative is the victim. The Major seems to be an official of the British administration, a loyalist to the crown, and a member of the court party, hence, is hounded by the mob in the wake of the revolution. The Loyalists were those Americans who remained faithful to the British Empire during the war.

Although they were steadfast in their commitment to remain within the British Empire, it was a very hard decision to make and stick to during the Revolution. They suffered regular harassment as their property was plundered and they were subjected to personal attacks. About one-in-six Americans was an active Loyalist during the Revolution and that number undoubtedly would have been higher if the Patriots hadn’t been so successful in threatening and punishing people who made their Loyalist sympathies known in public.

Robin waits for the arrival of his relative and finally a procession comes into his view. His relative is being driven out of the town by an angry mob whose leaders are disguised to conceal their identity from the authority. The man with the painted visage with whom Robin enquires about his relative was the leader of the protesters. The Major is seen amid mighty stream of people in an uncovered cart, “there, in tar-and-feathery dignity, sat his kinsman, Major Molineaux!”(MKMM 528) In Annals of Salem( ii edition), Felt wrote, “It was a mobbish custom with a small portion of the people here and elsewhere, before and at the first of revolution, to punish individuals, charged as traitors with a coat of such materials”(2:562). Tar and feathering was the sort of activity in which the sons of liberty were carrying in summer of 1765. In his essay “The Old News” Iqbal 238

Hawthorne referred to, “the ignominy of tar and feathers” (155). The process of “Tar and feathering,” was brutally violent. The victims were stripped off their clothes, covered with hot tar, and splattered with feathers then they were forced to parade about in public unless the British Army was close at hand to protect them. They often suffered bad treatment from the Patriots and often had to flee from their own homes. The American patriots used tar and feathering to intimidate British tax collectors.

The colonists acknowledged the right of the parliament to regulate their trade and to impose tariff duties but tacitly reserved a right to disobey laws whenever it would run counter to their interest. Taking its lessons from the French and Indian war, the British government tried to tighten the administration of its laws on its colonies. This step was followed by an attempt to tax the colonist which led to a warning growl of discontent.

The Americans opposed the Stamp Act of 1765 and the Town Shed Act 1767 with unexpected violence. The colonists objected to being taxed at all by any legislative body, in which they had no representation.

In spite of numerous protests from the colonies the Stamp Act was passed. This law required the colonists to put stamps of varying values upon the newspapers, pamphlets, and almanacs published in the colonies. It was also required to put the stamp on advertisements, college, diplomas, wills, deeds and mortgages, and on every sort of legal documents used in the court proceedings. The stamps were to be bought from officers appointed to sell them. The revenue derived thus was to help pay the cost of the government in the territory obtained from France at the end of the French and the Indian war. In August 1765, the names of the stamp distributors were published which led to Iqbal 239

riots in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. The Stamp Act struck at all classes and interest such as lawyers, editors, and clergyman; hence it aroused a universal opposition and led to resolutions, memorials, boycotts, riots, and hangings-in-effigy. It threw the entire set up of the colonies into turmoil. Barker and Commager wrote about this time:

. . . and pressure was exerted everywhere to induce the officers appointed

to sell the stamps to resign their positions: where they refused to comply

with this demand, the colonists restored to mob violence, seizing and

destroying the stamps, riding the officials on rails, and otherwise showing

their determination not to submit to the tax. (106-107)

The colonial resistance led to further coercion by the British administration and coercion led to war. Decades before the actual revolution took place; resistance in

America against the British colonial policies was intensifying. The resentment of people was directed against the custom officials as well as against the stamp officers. In the temper prevailing in America, it was absolutely impossible to enforce it without an armed conflict (Barker and Commager 1o6). One famous Loyalist, Thomas Hutchinson was lieutenant Governor and Chief justice in 1765, and he became victim of mob fury because he favored the Stamp Act. His house was sacked and his books and papers were destroyed. In 1774, he was forced to leave America for London (Channing 106).

Hawthorne had read the papers of Thomas Hutchinson “the unfortunate governor of the

Massachusetts Bay colony who had fled to England on the eve of revolution” (MKMM Iqbal 240

40) and that reading would have given him an edge in factual details and a historical coloring to the whole event.

Hawthorne was skeptical of any kind of violent revolution; hence, he called the leaders of rioters “like fiend”. Hegle Norman Nilsen said about this perception of

Hawthorne, “what Hawthorne seems to say, in his subtly ironic manner is that the essential nature of any political leadership is moral chaos and corruption. This quality is usually hidden behind a polished exterior, but in times of revolt and mob violence, it is revealed in all its horror” (134).

Everybody was not in favor of violent revolution. There is one man in the tale that represents the voice of those who disapprove violence in the name of reform. He says about the upcoming violent procession, “three or four riotous fellows abroad tonight.”(MKMM 527). Hawthorne’s democratic association could understand and sympathize with the anger of masses against the unjust domination but his distrust of mob fury and violent behavior would explain his negative tone for the rioters. The revolution had been a fearful thing in Hawthorne’s mind for sometime even though he found the ends it wrought at times admirable. His skepticism towards revolution is resonant in the words of R W Emerson:

A mob is a society of bodies voluntarily bereaving themselves of reason

and traversing its work. The mob is man voluntarily descending to the

nature of the beast. Its fit hour of activity is night. Its actions are insane,

like its whole constitution. It persecutes a principle; it would whip a right;

it would tar and feather justice, by inflicting fire and outrage upon the Iqbal 241

houses and persons of those who have these.( 87)

Violent reforms and mob frenzy disturbed Hawthorne. He had some reservations regarding the behavior of the revolutionary mob as reiterated in his manuscript

“Septimius Felton” and in his sketches “Liberty Tree” [1840] and “The Old Tory”

[1835]. His manuscript Septimius Felton contained some of his final thoughts regarding mob frenzy:

In times of revolutions and public disturbances all absurdities are more

unrestrained; the measure of calm sense, the habits, the orderly decency,

are in a measure lost. More people become insane, I should suppose;

offenses against public morality, female license are more numerous;

suicides, murders, all ungovernable outbreaks of man’s thoughts,

embodying themselves in wild act, take place more frequently, and

with less horror to the lookers-on. (67)

At the end of the story, Robin remains in the town though he knows that his uncle is no longer there to support him. It throws light on the optimistic ending of the tale. In a democratic era there will be hope and better prospect for everybody irrespective of lineage. In this new political structure aristocratic lineage and royal connections will be meaningless. Robin chooses to adopt himself to an emerging social structure which is full of democratic convictions. Hawthorne seems to celebrate this moment because of his

“marked preference for democratic rather than aristocratic occasions” (Mellow 10). He was a professed democrat; hence we can understand his joy and hope in coming out of the yoke of British rule. QD Levis says about the tale my Kinsman Major Molineaux as, Iqbal 242

“a tale symbolizing America’s coming of an age deposing an old practical authority and beginning to establish itself as a young, new and independent country” (Nilsen 125).

Abuse of Intellectual Power

The next set of tales in the present chapter shift focus from the 17th century to the

19th century. Hawthorne’s tales “The Birth Mark” and “Rappaccini’s Daughter” are reflective of the attitude of the 19th century society towards men of science. They depict the author’s distrust of science in the wake of Nazi’s experiments on human beings and the creation of atom bomb in the 19th century. Hawthorne found in his contemporary society a relentless devotion to procuring money, deviousness, and obsession with appearance, along with the manipulative reduction of others to a tool. This moral decadence was quite disturbing to him. These tales originate at a single point that is the radical viciousness of trying experiments on human beings. In both the tales the central figure is a physician or a scientist. Hawthorne wrote these tales in the 19th century, so attributed some of the evils present in medical profession at that time to the characters of these tales. The prime concern of Aylmer and Dr. Rappaccini is the success of their scientific venture to enhance their reputation as physicians or scientists not the life of those who are subjected to their experiments or treatment.

“The Birth Mark” was published in 1843. The historicity of the tale is established by placing the happenings of the tale in the late 19th century. It was the time when electricity was recently discovered as mentioned in the tale itself. At that time, medical practitioners were enjoying financial prosperity coupled with social respect but they were Iqbal 243

severely criticized for their inhuman attitude toward their patient. During 1831, the major allegation against physicians was that they were indifferent to human life.

The physicians were so obsessively involved with their studies that they began to develop eccentricities beyond normal standards and tolerances. Since the 19th century, fictitious depictions of science vacillated between notions of science as the saviour of society at one extreme and its doom on the other end. Consequently, depictions of scientists in fiction ranged between the virtuous and the depraved, the sober and the insane. Until the 20th century, optimism about progress was the most common attitude towards science but later latent anxieties about disturbing the secrets of nature surfaced following the increasing role of science in wartime.

The prototypical fictional obsessive scientist appeared in 1818 as Victor

Frankenstein in the novel Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley.

Frankenstein was a sympathetic character but the critical element of conducting forbidden experiments that cross “boundaries that ought not to be crossed” heedless of the consequences was present in Shelley’s novel also. Frankenstein was trained as both an alchemist and a modern scientist that made him a bridge between the two eras.

Another archetypal Mad Scientist was Faust, or Dr. Faustus in Marlow’s Dr. Faustus.

The Faust legend was widely recognized and referred to as an example of selling one’s soul to the devil. In almost all cases, Faust sold his soul for knowledge or supernatural power.

Hawthorne’s men of science are not evil genius but their obsessive passion for knowledge and their desire to test the power of science lead them to cross formidable Iqbal 244

boundaries, hence, inviting their material and spiritual ruin. Aylmer is a man of science and has explored the secrets of chemistry. His love for science overrules his love for his beautiful wife, Georgiana. He is so obsessed with the idea of perfection that he cannot bear even the slightest imperfection. There is a mark upon the cheek of Georgiana, which resembles a human hand. It appears to Aylmer as a visible mark of earthly imperfection.

He has tremendous faith in the power of science and is convinced of his ability to remove it through an operation. This confidence is generated in him because of his “successful explorations of his (my) studies of nature” which opened, “new vistas of human endeavor”. He even rejoiced in the imperfection of Georgiana, “Since it will be such a rapture to remove it” (BM 231).

He persuades his wife to undergo an operation for its removal. He happily ejaculates, “What will be my triumph when I shall have corrected what Nature left imperfect in her fairest work!”(BM 230). Georgiana has gone through the record of

Aylmer’s failure in other great experiments. She knows that how he has fallen short of his greatest conception yet loves him for what he is. She wants to satisfy his highest and deepest conception and puts her life at stake for him. At the end of the tale, she dies on the operation table and Aylmer’s failure has been highlighted with these words of

Georgiana, “Do not repent that with so high and pure a feeling, you have rejected the best the earth could offer” ( BM 237).

The criticism of medical profession goes back to the time of Chaucer whose physician loved “gold in special”. During 1830 to 1850, the medical profession was thought to be a respectable and noble profession. But the impact of chemical and Iqbal 245

technological discoveries and the success of medical practitioners in South and North during the civil war paved the way for their enjoying more favored positions and its misuse. Even Aylmer had made discoveries in the elemental powers of nature that roused the admiration of all the learned societies in Europe.

At the advance stage of his experiment on his wife, Aylmer becomes conscious of the risk involved in it but does not stop there. He prefers to sacrifice his lovely wife on the altar of professional pride. His looks and gestures betray how much was at stake when he tells Georgiana, “there is a danger”, to which Georgiana replies, “Remove it, remove it, whatever be the cost, or we shall both go mad” (BM 235). She identifies Aylmer’s monomaniac obsession with perfection and self so, instead of being the subject of her husband’s loathsome gaze for the rest of her life, she prefers death. Aylmer is insensitive and individualistic. He says, “. . . only one thing remains to be tried. If that fails us we are ruined” (BM 235). Aylmer is only concerned about the success and failure of his experiment.

On the contrary, Georgiana is a perfect picture of the self –sacrificing woman with unconditional love and devotion. Her only wish is to satisfy her husband’s highest and deepest conception regarding her physical perfection. It is only for his sake that she wishes to put off the birthmark. After administering the draught of the liquid concocted by him, “Aylmer sat by her side, watching her aspect with the emotion proper to a man the whole value of whose existence was involved in the process now to be tested” (BM

236).The success of his experiment will be another draught of success in the ocean of his accomplishment to enhance his reputation in the learned circle. “There was a fear that Iqbal 246

doctors would “try things’ on them; that patients, in short, were used, not treated” (Gross

134). Aylmer is not an exception but an exemplification of the negative countenance of the medical profession. This story can also be studied as a brilliant depiction of sexual politics of idealization. Georgiana was acceptable to her male counterpart only on terms of her physical perfection.

Rappaccini of “Rappaccini daughter” is also a victim of the evils of medical profession. He is an unorthodox practitioner with his belief in medicinal herbs. The

University of Padua and its botanical garden are the setting of the tale. The Botanical garden in the University of Padua was in existence as early as in 1545. Dr. Rappaccini makes his daughter, Beatrice the subject of his scientific study without her consent. He treats her as an object and gradually instills poison in her. The gradual exposure to the poisonous herbs and plants makes her breath poisonous for normal beings; be it human or any other natural living objects. She is deprived of simple joy and cannot look at an insect without harming it because her look is capable of sucking life from that creature.

She is bereft of any normal relation by her association with her father’s study.

Like a normal girl of her age when she falls in love with Giovanni, to her utter despair she realizes the “awful doom” of her life as this natural emotion is prohibited for her. It is reflected in the following words, “the effect my father’s fatal love of science, which estranged me from all society of my kind . . .” (RD 273). Giovanni’s contact with

Beatrice contaminates his breath too.

This tale highlights the professional warfare of a long continuance between two physicians Rappaccini and Baglioni. The malicious and evil intention of Dr. Baglioni is Iqbal 247

revealed when he tells Govianni that, “Rappaccini is said to have instructed her (Beatrice) deeply in his science and that Young and beautiful as fame reports her, she is already qualified to fill a professor’s chair. Perchance her father destines her for mine!” (RD

261).

In Hawthorne’s time, factionalism was common and it was normal for doctors to abuse each other with unsparing violence in the name of their medical commitments. The criticism of Rappaccini procedure by Baglioni and lack of respect towards each other was not unusual among doctors during the 19th century. Baglioni speaks about the success of Rappaccini as “'work of chance” and attributes his failure to his mistaken theories. The author of “Character and Abuses of the Medical Profession” records,

“Physicians exhibit a sensitiveness and jealousy of temper, especially in their intercourse with each other, far greater than is met with among other educated men” (Gross 137).

They lacked “professional etiquette” like respectful attitude of one physician towards other. The criticism of a doctor’s way of treatment by a colleague, an unfavorable estimation of one practitioner’s skill by another that smacked of “patient- grabbing” or even remotely implied an unfavorable estimation of one practitioner’s skill by another- doctors were constantly, and often neurotically, on watch for. The result was that

“intercourse between [physicians] is but too often disturbed by personal rivalry,

. . .” (Gross 137). The apathy of doctor towards the patient was most severely censured.

RH Shryocks in “Medicine and Society in America 1660-1860” [1960] mentioned about, “medical sectarianism” which referred to the division of medical practitioners in two camps. In one camp, there were physicians, who were known for Iqbal 248

their bigoted attachment to authorized modes of practice. This group of physicians was unwilling to receive, inform or to adopt improvements in practice however valuable that did not come through the regular channels of scientific investigation or established theories. On the other hand, there were doctors who were known for their, “bigoted devotion to visionary theories” (Gross 139).

In larger perspective, a contest was on between galenic and paracelsan medicine.

These two schools of thoughts were engaged in a battle related to the cultivation of botanical garden. In “Rappaccini’s Daughter” this factionalism is present in form of a rivalry between the two doctors and their modes of practices. Rappaccini is more respectable. His bigoted devotion to “visionary theories” deters him from the good old rules of the medical profession. Rappaccini follows Thomsonianism [using only botanic drugs], a radical and an unconventional mode of treatment of diseases which has sprang up in 1830s and 1840s. Like a fanatic, he holds biological control over the life of his daughter. He has limited his material medica to medicine distilled from plants. His theory, that all medicinal virtues are comprised within those substances which we term vegetable poisons makes him an ally of both botanic and homeopaths.

Baglioni is a regular practitioner who condemns Rappaccini because, “. . . he cares infinitely more for science than for mankind. His patients are interesting to him only as subjects for some new experiment. He would sacrifice human life, his own among the rest, or whatever else was dearest to him, for the sake of adding so much as a grain of mustard seed to the great heap of his accumulated knowledge”(260-261). But ironically, even Baglioni does not hesitate in taking away the life of Beatrice to beat Rappaccini. Iqbal 249

The situation in medical field is reflective of other radical changes in the Formatted: Space Before: 0 pt, After: 0 pt, Tab stops: 0.56", Left American society analogous to the radical departures from orthodoxy in other areas of the cultural life of America. Beatrice and Giovanni become victim of the professional rivalry between the two giants of medical world. Baglioni exploits the gullible and simple

Giovanni to take his revenge upon Rappaccini. He makes Giovanni believe that

Rappaccini has a scientific interest in him and there must be some role of Beatrice in it.

Under his influence, Giovanni accuses Beatrice of a crime she has not committed.

Giovanni gives a liquid as antidote to Beatrice to drink to prove her love. This liquid was given to Giovanni by Baglioni. As soon as Beatrice drinks that chemical, she dies.

Baglioni bursts forth in happiest ejaculation and exclaims: “perchance most learned Rappaccini, I may foil you where you little dream of it!” (RD 265). He sacrifices two innocent lovers on the altar of his professional rivalry. The tale seems a fictional representation of the ethical deviation in the medical field. The Physicians’ indifference to the stuff of mankind and imperviousness to the ordinary emotion of humanity was under constant attack. They were obsessed with the ambition to enhance their reputation irrespective of the life of their patients. Both the characters, Alymer and Dr. Rappaccini depict Hawthorne’s distrust of scholarship, devoid of emotions.

Cultural Colloquy: A Quest for Utopia

Hawthorne’s next set of tales “Shaker’s Bridal” and “The Canterbury

Pilgrims” are based on his actual observations of the shaker community. The vision of Iqbal 250

Christian perfectionism led the first half of the 19th century in an era of utopian experimentation. All of them, Owenists, Fourierists, Oneida Perfectionists, Mormons,

Amana inspirationalists, and New Icarians were founded in America between 1820 to

1870. The Shaker community was one of them. In an age when,“ Thousands were involved in soul searching religious experiences, many heard God speak in the thunder or encountered angelic visitants bringing a revelation that would save mankind”

(Bragdon and Cutchen 259).

The Shakers sect first appeared as an offshoot of the Quakers around 1750 in

Manchester, England, “Some religious groups decided to cut themselves off from the world and found utopian communities of their own. Thus the shakers, an off shoot of the

Quakers established scores of village where everything turned in common” (Bragdon and

Cutchen 292). The new sect was the result of protest against denominationalism. It was a calling for a return to primitive faith. As Zealous Protestants, they studied the bible and felt full liberty to interpret the sacred writings for themselves. The Shakers were best known for the fervor of their worship services like the Quakers and their community spirit.

The idea of writing about a Utopian experiment was not new in the 19th century.

Thomas More coined the word “Utopia” in 1516 in his work De optimo reipublicae statu deque nova insular Utopia. It was about the highest state of the republic which was ruled by reason and where property was shared communally. The population of cities was controlled by resettlement. His work inaugurated a genre of speculative fiction in the

West that imagined the possibility of perfect societies existing outside the confines of Iqbal 251

Europe. More’s book spawned a vibrant genre of speculative fiction that later included such notable works as Johann Valentin Andreae’s Christianopolis (1619), Tommaso

Campanella’s Civitas Solis [The city of the sun, 1623], and Francis Bacon’s The New

Atlantis [1627].

The cultural impact of More’s novel on actual utopian experimentation is difficult to measure. All of these utopian communities in the 19th century experimented with communal ownership and control of property, and alternative family arrangements. These

Christian perfectionists created the template for subsequent Utopian communities by demonstrating practical alternatives to the patterns of domesticity, radical individualism, and competitive capitalism within the new American Republic. By the 19th century, this utopian format was already well established and easily appropriated by the authors of that era. Twenty-nine utopian works were published in America between 1800 and 1860.

This fictional treatment of the actual shaker community by Hawthorne was not something unusual. Molly Jones’ “The Choosing Tree” was set in Maine in the late 19th century and it reveals shakers in the background. Daniel is an eight year-old boy who is left to live with a strange, fervent group of people called Shakers. “The Choosing Tree” explores lesser-known people shakers and contributes to the understanding of the history of the church in America.

In August 1831, Hawthorne actually visited New Hampshire with his uncle

Samuel and saw the shaker village at Canterbury. He was impressed as well as amused by the shaker customs. He described the village in a letter to his sister, Louisa; “If it were not or their ridiculous ceremonies,” he added, “A man might do worse than join them” Iqbal 252

(Mather10). In August 1851, twenty years later, he again described the shakers settlement at Hancock in his notebook in terms of disgust and disdain. Hawthorne observed:

No bathing or washing facilities in the chambers; but in the entry there

was a sink and wash-bowl, where all their attempts at purification were

to be performed. The fact shows that all their miserable pretense of

cleanliness and neatness is the thinnest superficiality; and that the Shakers

are and must needs to be a filthy sect. And then their utter and systematic

lack of privacy; the close function of man with man, and supervision of

one man over another-it is hateful and disgusting to think of; and the

sooner the sect is extinct the better-a consummation which, I am happy

to hear, is thought to be not a great many years distant. (Mather10)

The shakers, he concluded, ‘‘are certainly the most singular and bedeviled set of people that ever existed in a civilized land ’’ (Mather 10). Hawthorne’s tale “The

Canterbury Pilgrims” derives its title playfully from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales as well as the name refers to an actual New Hampshire Shaker village. This tale chronicles the woes of three pilgrims en route to a Shaker village. The group comprises a poet, a merchant, and a yeoman. They are all failures in The World and are escaping from it to seek solace and a better life within the confines of a Shaker village. These pilgrims meet a pair of young Shakers, Miriam and Josiah who have just fled from the community to marry. These pilgrims try unsuccessfully to convince these lovers to return to the village with stories of their own misfortunes in the larger world. Iqbal 253

Hawthorne meaningfully refers to the garb of its inhabitant Miriam and Josiah as,

“strange”, and “old-fashioned”. They are dressed “in a mode unknown to our times” which might have existed, “half a century before” (CP 490).Hawthorne’s reflections regarding Shaker establishment display his impatience with such religious colonies. He criticized their goal for utopia at the expense of worldly “fret and fear” and “iniquities of the flesh”. About this settlement, he writes in his tale, “The Canterbury Pilgrim”,

“Where all former ties of nature or society would be sundered, and all old distinctions levelled, and a cold and passionless security be substituted for mortal hope and fear, as in that other refuge of the world’s weary outcasts, the grave ”(495).

Hawthorne called Shaker’s abode a living tomb for they prefer a secluded and ascetic way of life instead of battling the difficulties of life. He portrayed the pilgrims to

Canterbury in ironical light who dissuade Miriam and Josiah from joining the larger world but they themselves are still imbued with passions and aspirations of the former world.

The culture in which Hawthorne was brought up did not allow him to indulge in sexual details yet he could not conform to the ideal of celibacy so vehemently proclaimed by Shakers. Shaker communities were the form of protestant monasticism. It was essentially ascetic in its orientation with a belief in abandoning the world. Shakers from early childhood avoided face to face contact with their elders in fear of betraying their carnal passion in front of them. Shaker rules did not forbid a member to leave the community but they were asked to announce their intention of leaving the community at the time of departure. Hawthorne had a strong inclination and liking for married love and Iqbal 254

domestic life. He wrote in “The Old Manse”, “Therefore, along that shady river- bank, there are spots, marked with a heap of ashes and half consumed brands, only less sacred in my remembrance than the hearth of a household –fire’’ (23), hence, in “The

Canterbury pilgrims”, Hawthorne wishfully depicted Miriam and Josiah rejecting the

“cold and passionless security” which the shakers substitute for “mortal hope and fear”. It was a celibate sect which failed to keep its ranks full from new conversions, hence obviously doomed to an eventual extinction. “The emphasis on celibacy, however, tended to drive away the young people and reduce the strength of the communities” (Baldwin

248).

The shakers were followers of an English mystic Mother Ann Lee who claimed to have seen Christ in a vision. She said that Christ told her that the marital relations were not merely sinful but the fountain head from which all the rest of the world’s evil proceeded, hence, should be discarded (C 2002 Pagewise). She rejected the idea that God had sanctioned sex for reproduction and insisted on the spiritual necessity of celibacy.

Shaker beliefs appealed to many people in the United States at that time. They believed that everyone was child of God, hence, should be treated equally, regardless of sex, age, race, education, or wealth. Many were particularly drawn to the Shaker’s doctrine of radical equality.

In “The Shaker Bridal” father Ephraim bestows the responsibilities of his village on Adam Colburn and Martha Pierson. They were former lovers but could not marry in absence of proper subsistence. They remained faithful to each other and did not marry anyone else to prosper in the world otherwise possible but their fortune never blossomed. Iqbal 255

They decided to join the Shaker community and soon became an integral part of “the primitive form of shaker government, as established by Mother Ann” (SB 203). In the

Shaker communities sexes were rigidly segregated, using separate entrances, stairways, and sleeping quarters to avoid intermingling. Each family had two elders who were responsible for the spiritual management of the family, and the elders answered to the

“ministry”--which consisted of two male elders and female eldresses chosen from among the elders of the families. Detailed oral confession of sin before witnesses was considered to be necessary for salvation, and was required for admission to the sect. The confession was to be repeated frequently, each time a member felt that he had sinned.

Adam’s ambitious nature accommodates his worldly affection for Martha and he willingly accepts her as his sister in the new arrangement but Martha fails to do it. “ But, had she attempted it, perhaps the old recollections, the long repressed feelings of childhood, youth, and womanhood, might have gushed from her heart, in words that it would have been profanation to utter there” (203). Father Ephraim hopes that, “ . . . the time may hasten on, when the mission of Mother Ann shall have wrought its full effect, – when children shall no more be born and die, and the last survivor of mortal race, some old and weary man like me, shall see the sun go down, never more to rise on the world of sin and sorrow ” (SB 204).

His longing for the end of this world because of its “sin and sorrow” is reflective of shaker’s perverted vision. Hawthorne has rejected it as unhealthy human aspiration which was involved in the basic conception of Shaker sect. They appear to be escapists who have turned their back from the struggle of life. Hawthorne describes the Iqbal 256

membership of the sect as being, “below the ordinary standard of intelligence” (SB 202).

Martha died before the actual ceremony because she could not let her earthly affection extinguish completely. She still retained in her heart, “the iniquities of the world”. She could bear no longer, “the weight of its desolate agony” (SB 204).

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) visited the Canterbury, New Hampshire

Shakers in 1828 and 1829 and condemned them as incapable animals led by shrewd male and female oligarchs. Unlike Hawthorne, Emerson renewed his interest in the Shakers and tempered his criticism in 1842 after his visit to the Harvard community with

Nathaniel Hawthorne. He established lasting relationships with two Shaker elders and observed similarity between Shaker communalism and the European socialism sweeping across the United States before the Civil War. He also admired the institutionalized equality among the Shakers.

But Hawthorne was not the only one who was uncomfortable with the fundamentals of the Shaker community. Like him, Catharine Maria Sedgwick was also simultaneously attracted and repulsed by the new utopianism. In her novel Redwood

[1824], she describes the Shaker villages of Lebanon, Hancock, and Massachusetts, as a

“religious republic divided into communal family units. She describes respectfully the structure and practices of the Shakers in an earlier section but finds “deceit lurking under many a broad brim” (RW 207) in the Shaker community. In the midst of this mostly flattering portrayal, she observes that these communities “have been visited by foreigners and strangers from all parts of our union—all are shocked or disgusted by some of the absurdities of the shaker faith, but none have withheld their admiration from Iqbal 257

the results of their industry, ingenuity, order, frugality, and temperance” (RW 181).

Sedgwick’s conflicting assessment of Shaker culture is representative of the mixture of skepticism, abhorrence, and grudging respect extended by Americans to their brethren living in utopian communities during the same period. She devotes ten pages of the novel to the rescue of young Emily from the sect. Sedgwick also casts an elder Reuban

Harrington in the role of villain who forces Emily to marry him.

Daniel Pierce Thompson (1795–1868) also published a story titled “The Shaker

Lovers” in 1848 that chronicles the “escape” and impetuous wedding of two hot-blooded

Shaker youths. The first chapter promises to display the wonderful honest exterior (SL 7) of Shaker life, prefacing a story that will climax with the attempted murder of young Seth by an enraged Shaker elder wielding an oar. Herman Melville’s [1819–1891] treatment of the Shakers in chapter 71 of Moby-Dick is also less than flattering. Melville describes an encounter between the Pequod and the plague-ridden Jeroboam which has been taken over by a Shaker prophet named Gabriel. Hailing from the “crazy society of Neskyeuna

Shakers,” Gabriel is said to have ascended to heaven through a trapdoor during “their cracked, secret meetings” (MD 312). Melville’s association of Shaker culture with religious fanaticism is consistent with the literary skepticism accorded to them throughout the 19th century.

One obvious reason for the Shaker’s decline was that it was not marriage-based.

As Shakers were celibate, their communities could grow only by constantly bringing in new converts which was hard to find in the 19th century. The unquestioning submission to authority, celibacy, and strenuous manual labor in the shaker community disenchanted Iqbal 258

American populace. At that time when a common American citizen was overpowered by individualistic and materialistic values, Shaker’s insular and communal way of life and its rigorous spiritual discipline did not appeal to them.

All the tales selected in this chapter breathe the episteme of time and draw material from colonial history of the 17th century as well as the 19th century society. They comprise the complex web of attitudes, ideals, and perception; and highlight the poetics of culture of that particular historical moment. It is interesting to note that this cultural reproduction serves as a guide to the Puritan world of the 17th century from the point of view of the author of the 19th century. These stories dramatize the conflicting forces and values within a culture for eg. Quakers and Puritans, Catholicism and Protestantism,

Democratic aesthetics and subversive Colonial regime, and Individualism and Society.

This reading articulates the multiple voices present in these tales that are suppressed and reconciled. In the present reading of this cultural colloquy, it has been observed that the character and circumstances of Hawthorne’s life have influenced the discourse contained within this text. Consciously or unconsciously the author’s perception has mingled with the facts which are as accurate as any actual book of history notwithstanding some abbreviation deliberately intended by the writer.

Iqbal 259

Works cited:

1. Andrews, Charles. M. The Colonial Period of American History. Vol.1. New Haven:

Yale University Press, 1934. Print.

2. Baldwin Leland D. The Stream of American History. Vol. 2. 4th ed. New York: Van

Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1969. Print.

3. Barker, Eugene. C, and Henry Steele Commager. Our Nation. New York: Row,

Peterson and Company, 1949. Print.

4. Bragdon, Henry W., and Samuel P. Mc Cutchen. History of a Free People. New York:

Macmillan Publishing Company, 1981. Print.

5. Channing, Edward. A History of the United States, Vol.1.New York: Macmillan Co.

1933. Print.

6. Channing, George.G. The Works of William Ellery Channing. Vol.6. 11thed. Boston:

Munroe and Francis,1849. Print.

7. Crews, Frederick. The Sins of the Fathers .Newyork: Oxford University Press, 1966.

Print.

8. Davidson, Edward H, Claude M. Simpson, and L. Neal Smith, eds. “The Elixir of Life

Manuscript.” Columbus: Ohio University Press, 1977. Print.

9. Doubleday, Neal Frank. Hawthorne’s Early Tales. Durham: Duke University Press,

1972. Print.

10. Emerson, Ralph Waldo. “Culture” Essays & Lectures. New York: Penguin,

1983.Print.

11. - - - . Essays. New Delhi: Eurasia Publishing House, 1965. Print. Iqbal 260

12. Felt Joseph. B. Annals of Salem. Vol.2. 2nd ed. Salem, Massachusetts:

W.&S.B.IVES,1849. Print.

13. Fogle, Richard Harte. Hawthorne’s Fiction: The Light and the Dark. Norman:

University of Oklahoma Press, 1964. Print.

14. Frank, Albert J Von, ed. Critical Essays on Hawthorne’s Short Stories. Boston: GK

Hall & company, 1991. Print.

15. Gross, Seymour L. “Nineteenth Century Physician” in Gray Richard Thompson, Ed.

Ruined Eden of the Present. Indiana: Purdue University Press, 1981. Print.

16. Hawthorne, Nathaniel. Mosses from an Old Manse. Colombus: Ohio State University

Press, 1974. Print.

17. - - -. 21. Parkes, Henry Bamford .The United States of America –A history. Rev.ed.

II edition revised by New York Unscientific book ag22 Raja woodmunt street Calcutta

. The Complete Short Stories of Nathaniel Hawthorne. New York: Doubleday

& Company, Inc.1959. Print.

18. Jack. Dempsey. Thomas Morton of “Merrymount”: The Life and Renaissance of an

Early American Poet. Digital Scanning, Inc. (2000):53-55. Web. 4th Feb. 2011.

19 - - -. , ed. “New English Canaan.” by Thomas Morton of Merrymount: Text & Notes

(Scituate MA: Digital Scanning 2000. 4th Feb. 2011.

20. Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. “ Hawthorne’s Twice Told Tales.” in Albert J Von

Frank, Ed. Critical Essays on Hawthorne’s Short Stories. Boston: GK Hall &

Company, 1991. Print. Iqbal 261

21. Leigh, Heyrman, Christine “Witchcraft in Salem Village: Intersections of Religion

andSociety”.Web.4thFeb.2011.http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/eighteen/

ekeyinfo/salemwc.htm

22. Loggins, Vernon. The Hawthornes: The Story of Seven Generations of an American

Family. New York: Colombia University Press, 1951. Print.

23. Male, Roy. R. Hawthorne’s Tragic Vision. New York: The Norton Library, 1964.

Print.

24. Mather, Edward. Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Modest Man. USA: Greenwood press

Publishers, 1970. Print.

25. Mather, Cotton. The Wonders of the Invisible World. [1693] Ed. George Lincoln

Burr. University of Virginia Library.Web.9th Mar. 2011.etext.virrginia.edu

26. Mather, Cotton. The Wonders of the Invisible World. [1693] 3rd ed. Ed. Samuel

Fowler. reprnt as Salem Witchcraft trial. Salem: H. P. Ives and A. A. Smith, 1861.

Print.

27. Matthiessen, F.O. American Renaissance. New York: Oxford University Press, 1941.

Print.

28. Melville, Herman. Moby Dick; or, The Whale. Ed. Luther S. Mansfield.

New York: Hendricks House, 1952. Print.

29. Mellow, James R. Nathaniel Hawthorne in His Times. Texas : Austin, 1955. Print.

30. Nevins, Allan, and Henry Steele Commager, eds. A Short History of United Iqbal 262

States.5th ed. New York: Alfred. A. Knopf, 1966. Print.

31. Nilsen, Helge Normann, “Hawthorne’s My Kinsman, Major Molineux.” Seyersted

Brita, ed. Americana Norvegica. Vol.4. Norway: Edgar Hogfeldt A/S,

Kristiansand S.1973. Print.

32. Parkes, Henry Bamford. The United States of America –A History. Rev. II ed.

Calcutta: Scientific Book Agency. Print.

33. Ralph L. Rusk, and Eleanor M. Tilton, eds. The Letters of Ralph Waldo Emerson. 10

Vols. New York: Columbia University Press, 1939.Print.

34. Sedgwick, Catharine Maria. Redwood: A Tale. New York: E. Bliss and E. White,

1824. Print.

35. Taylor, J. Golden. Hawthorne’s Ambivalence toward Puritanism. Ed. Milton

C. Abrams. Utah: Utah State University Press, 1965. Print.

36. Thompson, Daniel Pierce. The Shaker Lover, and Other Stories. Burlington: Vt.: C.

Goodrich S.B Nichols, 1948.Print.

37. Sources for Merry Mount history includes :

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "Culture." 1860. In Essays & Lectures. New York: Penguin,

1983.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. The Letters of Ralph Waldo Emerson. 10 vols. Edited by Ralph

L. Rusk and Eleanor M. Tilton. New York: Columbia University Press, 1939–.

Sedgwick, Catharine Maria. Redwood: A Tale. New York: E. Bliss and E. White, 18.

Parkes , Henry Bamford The United States –A History, 2nd ed. Revised Iqbal 263

Newyork university ,scientific Book Agency ,22Raja woodmunt street Calcutta

32. Loggins, Vernan, The Hawthornes ,

Newyork 1a. Morton’s and Bradford’s accounts of the Merry mount affair. Web. 4thFeb.

2011.

archive.org version of old aol.com site. b. More Morton on Merry mount. Web. 4th Feb. 2011. swarthmore.edu. c. Morton’s account of Native Americans Web. 4th Feb 2011. fordham.edu.

38. The Colonial Gazette. Web. 4thFeb. 2011. mayflowerfamilies.com©interactive communications,1998, 2000-2007. 39. Pagewise.4th Feb. 2011. URL: http://www.pagewise.com/disclaimer.htm.©2002 40. Revised ed. of the “New Testament of the New American Bible.” Iowa Falls: World,

1986. Web. 3rd Feb 2011. www.essortment.com Iqbal 263

Chapter VIII

Conclusion

In the previous chapters of this thesis, an attempt has been made to establish that the fictional world of Hawthorne can mean many other things to other critics but it is a definite fictional representation of the leading ideologies of his time along with the author’s special interest in his ancestral history. In examining Hawthorne’s fictional domain, the focus was on two historical centers. The first centre was the first generation of the Puritan settlers in the 17th century New England and the other centre was the 19th century America.

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s criticism in general showed a remarkable fascination for the symbolic and moral meaning, and allegorical dimensions of his fictional world. The traditional approach to Hawthorne’s fiction forcefully asserted that he had no knowledge of society and politics of his day. Yvor Winter in “Maule’s Curse, or Hawthorne and the

Problem of Allegory” [1937] focused on Hawthorne’s allegorical design. The interpretation of his work as a moral allegory, limits the meaning of his work which is written by a“ . . . sombre youth who lived in solitude and in contemplation in Salem, for a dozen years or more, before succumbing to the charm and propinquity of Miss

Sophia Peabody and making the spasmodic and only moderately successful efforts to accustom himself to daylight which were to vex the remainder of his life, was one far more likely to concern himself with the theory of mankind than with chaos, trivial, brutal and exhausting of the actuality”(Kaul 12 ). Iqbal 264

James defined Hawthorne as a moralist, whose tales “are glimpses of a great field, of the whole deep mystery of man’s soul and conscience. They are moral, and their interest is moral; they deal with something more than accidents and conventionalities, the surface occurrences of life (59). Various critical approaches to his work categorized his work as a romance, where the real and marvelous were mingled. Hawthorne had generally been regarded as a dweller in the shadows of history who weaved his tales out of the haunted memories of the Puritan past and from the depths of his own eerie, yet, warm and human fantasies. The earliest critical approaches to Hawthorne’s works found a recurring theme of the end of innocence after an awareness of one’s self and human nature which altered everything.

The general impressions of his being an isolated and shadowy figure are doubtlessly exaggerated and his tales are analyzed in the same light. Against these traditional readings of Hawthorne’s fictional world, this thesis attempts to supply readers with a sense of milieu in which these tales were written. Allegory and symbolism are the devices used by Hawthorne which owe their birth to Swedenborg, a widely known writer among English Romantics and American Transcendentalists in the 19th century to convey multi-layered meaning hidden in a culture and society. According to Swedenborg’s doctrine of “Correspondences” all objects of the physical world are expressions of thoughts and feelings of which they are perpetual symbols. Hawthorne’s contemporary

Emerson poetically expounded this point in his pamphlet Nature in 1836 and a similar doctrine was preached by the French socialist, Charles Fourier.

The leading ideology of Hawthorne’s time was “transcendentalism”. Hawthorne never avowed its principles in his works but its tenets bespoke themselves unashamed in Iqbal 265 his tales through events and characters. Hawthorne lived in close proximity with many renowned transcendentalists at Concord and the present thesis focused on the extent of their influence on him as a man and writer. Sophia Peabody recollected, “Mr. Emerson delights in him; he talks to him all the time, and Mr. Hawthorne’s looks answer. He seems to fascinate Mr. Emerson. Whenever he comes to see him, he takes him away, so that no one may interrupt him in his close and dead –set attack upon his ear” (Mather

159).

The clash of dominant and repressed class encourages artistic expression to imitate objective reality. There is a definite political structure and ideology embedded in

Hawthorne’s fiction. His self is fashioned as a sophisticated response to a whole series of cultural problems in his time. His characters Zenobia, Priscilla, Hollingsworth, Hepzibah

Pyncheon, Jaffrey Pyncheon, Holgrave, Phoebe, Hester Prynne, Donatello, Rappaccini,

Baglioni are not merely characters but representatives of specific ideologies.

Hawthorne’s allegiance to democratic ideologies provided him with a balanced perspective while studying Puritan history. He found that Puritans acted as a kind of military dictators in enforcing laws based on their religious convictions. The church was their governing body and ministers were their agents as chosen people of God to rule the common man in every sphere. In their pursuit of Utopia, the Puritans in the 17th century brutally suffocated and devoiced all voices of dissonance. Even trivial matters were promulgated as theological dogma; slight offences were considered sin against God. The differences of opinion became differences of faith, innovators became heretics and critics of power were declared blasphemers. Under these undemocratic conditions, Hester’s sin of adultery becomes a sin against state in The Scarlet Letter. Iqbal 266

As transcendentalism places an individual self at the centre of experience, individualistic Hester never tries to evade the moral accountability of her adultery. In this text, Governor Bellingham and John Wilson are projected as prowess of legal training. Their words reflect the view of the whole colonial authority and the governing outlook of people. Like her antecedent Anne Hutchinson of the 17th century, Hester challenges the male hegemony of her culture. She dares to extricate herself from the dictatorial regime of the spiritual leaders to follow the guidelines of her heart. As a dissenter, she tries to undermine the strength of established system of the government.

Hester is expelled from the colony like Ann Hutchinson by ministers and rulers to maintain status quo.

In the character of Hester Prynne, Hawthorne has projected the issues of romantic individual under a despotic regime. She represents a new woman who emerged in the 19th century under the guidance of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, Martha C. Wright, and Mary Ann McClintock. These female activists worked incessantly to redefine gender roles in sexual politics in the 19th century. This expounded ideology of the new woman is further projected and elaborated in the character of Zenobia in The Blithedale Romance.

Zenobia ventures to challenge the long-established social customs in the field of marriage and sexual relations. She rejects the conformist ideology governed by male pedagogy. It is interesting to note that these self opinionated and self assertive females like Hester Prynne and Zenobia behave and act according to the unwritten code of conduct for females at the end emerge as conformists.

The treatment of these assertive females betrays Hawthorne’s apprehension regarding prospective matriarchy in his own domestic world and the fear of ink stained Iqbal 267 amazons for his career. The demand for changed legal and political status of females in the wake of women’s right movement and romantic individualistic theory of transcendentalism is in the background of his cultural productions.

In spite of Hawthorne’s dismissal of any influence of transcendentalist philosophy on him, his character Donatello in The Marble Faun like Hester Prynne emphasizes the importance and role of the individual conscience. They celebrate the value of intuition in the matters of moral guidance and inspiration irrespective of external restrain and formal guidance as has been discussed in Emerson’s essay on “Circle”. In delineating his character, the author is guided by the writings of Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson regarding the role of conscience in a civilized society.

In the character of Chillingworth and Dimmesdale in The Scarlet Letter,

Hawthorne projected and illustrated the doctrine of compensation as dealt at length by

Emerson in his essay on “Compensation”. In The Blithedale Romance, Hawthorne expressed his distrust for self- styled reformers through denunciation of Hollingsworth’s character. Hollingsworth turns into a violent and reckless detractor when the subject of the reformation of criminals engrosses his feelings and he plays havoc in the lives of other characters.

Reform movements were inspired by the philanthropists’ dream of total regeneration of the community. All embracing perfectionism was one of the notable features of the early 19th century humanitarianism. Reformers pinned their hope upon the model community. Hawthorne’s tales “Shaker’s Bridal” and “The Canterbury Pilgrims” were also inspired by his first hand experience of Shaker establishments at New

Hampshire and Hancock which he had visited personally and found them ridiculous and Iqbal 268 impractical. Like Hawthorne, his contemporary Emerson also found that the reformers propagated the very evil they proclaimed to remedy.

Reforms have their high origin in an ideal justice, but they do not retain

the purity of an idea. They are quickly organized in some low, inadequate

form, and present no more poetic image to the mind, than the evil tradition

which they reprobated. They mix the fire of the moral sentiment with

personal and party heats, with measureless exaggerations, and the

blindness that prefers some darling measure to justice and truth. Those

who are urging with most ardor what are call the greatest benefits of

mankind, are narrow, self-pleasing, conceited men, and affect us as the

insane do. (Leopold and Link 325-326)

In the 19th century with the emergence of the democrat Jackson on the political firmament, the political and social paradigms shifted. The aristocratic privileges were on the verge of elimination and democracy was on the rise. It was the subject of his novel

The House of Seven Gables. The fictional projection of the rivalry between the proletarian Maule and aristocratic Pynchon in the novel was written in the backdrop of contention for gaining privileges between commonalty and nobility in the 19th century.

In this changed social set up, hereditary class privileges were nullified and individual talent and capabilities bespoke themselves aloud. Hawthorne’s close association with the emerging democratic ideology, his friendship with Franklin Pierce and Horatio Bridge counted for his preference of republican mode of government but with certain reservation about professional, selfish, and unethical politics. In delineating Iqbal 269 the character of Jaffrey Pyncheon, Hawthorne indulged in caricaturing his political opponents who contrived his expulsion from the Salem custom house.

Holgrave’s tryst with mesmerism as lecturer in The House of the Seven Gables and

Zenobia’s alliance with mesmerist Westervelt provided Hawthorne with an opportunity to discuss the nefarious aspect of this science which emerged in the 19th century as corollary of reform in the field of medicine. Hawthorne distrusted the various currents of western esotericism, especially spiritualism, as it was an intrusion into man’s soul.

Examples have been given from Hawthorne’s epistles to his sweetheart Sophia to prove the points discussed in the previous chapters.

The incipient democratic spirit of the Puritans opposed aristocratic English society but they themselves turned atrocious and undemocratic in trampling peoples’ right to think and act on their will in the new colony. Hawthorne’s tales “The Maypole of Merry

Mount” and “Endicott and Red Cross” are centered on the issue of Puritan rigidity and narrowness. Hawthorne’s democratic temper and his pragmatic vision enabled him to see how democratic and spiritual idealism of the puritan degenerated into a kind of moral bigotry, despotism and self righteous pride. This harsh and unsocial rigidity of puritan society is the object of his criticism in The Scarlet Letter and “The May Pole of Merry

Mount”.

In Hawthorne’s novels and tales, living characters and forces struggle to express their historical identity. With a modern foresight, Hawthorne could see economic motive and power politic behind the migration of Puritan to the new world and the persecution of

Quakers, instead of imputing only religious motive for it whether it was the case of Iqbal 270

Colonel Pyncheon of The House of Seven Gables, Endicott in “Maypole of Merry

Mount” or Tobias Pearson in “The Gentle Boy”.

Hawthorne’s selected tales in this thesis depict the nuance of a particular historical moment. “The Gentle Boy” displays Hawthorne’s ambivalence towards Puritanism. His tales “My Kinsman Major Molineux” and “The Gray Champion” are written in the background of colonial rule and growing agitation against civil authority in the wake of the revocation of the Massachusetts Charter.

Hawthorne belonged to Puritan heritage but he was capable of questioning the very institutions, ethos and ideology which nurtured him. Against the background of solitary expatriate as had been projected by older critics of Hawthorne’s works, a new

Hawthorne is discovered in the recent readings of his tales. This redeemed Hawthorne is embedded in his rich cultural context and politically volatile world. The present reading has made an attempt to reestablish Hawthorne’s relationship with American culture. His character as a writer has been reincarnated in this twenty first century reading. It will be appropriate to conclude this thesis with a quote of T.S Eliot “in one thing alone

Hawthorne’s more solid than James: he had a very acute historical sense. His erudition in the small field of American colonial history was extensive and he made most fortunate use of it. But men had that sense of past which is peculiarly American but in Hawthorne this sense exercised itself in a grip on past itself; in James it is sense of the sense”

(kaul 4).

Iqbal 271

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