Nathaniel Hawthorne

In June 1642, in the Puritan town of Boston, a crowd gathers to witness the punishment of Hester Prynne, a young woman found guilty of adultery. She is required to wear a scarlet "A" ("A" standing for adulteress) on her dress to shame her. She must stand on the scaffold for three hours, to be exposed to public humiliation. As Hester approaches the scaffold, many of the women in the crowd are angered by her beauty and quiet dignity. When demanded and cajoled to name the father of her child, Hester refuses. As Hester looks out over the crowd, she notices a small, misshapen man and recognizes him as her long-lost husband, who has been presumed lost at sea. When the husband sees Hester's shame, he asks a man in the crowd about her and is told the story of his wife's adultery. He angrily exclaims that the child's father, the partner in the adulterous act, should also be punished and vows to find the man. He chooses a new name - Roger Chillingworth - to aid him in his plan.

A Wonder Book and Tanglewood Tales, for Girls and Boys By Nathaniel Hawthorne

"Egotism; or, The Bosom-Serpent" is a short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne. George Herkimer visits his old acquaintance, Roderick Elliston, who is rumored to have a snake residing in his bosom. Herkimer says he brings Elliston a message from Elliston's wife Rosina, but Elliston retreats into his house before receiving it. Elliston and Rosina had separated four years earlier. Soon, people noticed a green tint to his skin and often heard a hissing sound coming from his bosom. Elliston sought the attention of others and pointed out the snakes they possessed within their own bosoms. His relatives placed him in an asylum, but his doctors decided his affliction did not demand confinement. After learning this, Herkimer returns to Elliston, who says his self-contemplation has nurtured the serpent. Rosina appears and suggests that he "forget himself] in the idea of another". They touch and Roderick is healed.

"Young Goodman Brown" is a short story published in 1835 by American writer Nathaniel Hawthorne. The story takes place in 17th century Puritan New England, a common setting for Hawthorne's works, and addresses the Calvinist/Puritan belief that all of humanity exists in a state of depravity, but that God has destined some to unconditional election through unmerited grace. Hawthorne frequently focuses on the tensions within Puritan culture, yet steeps his stories in the Puritan sense of sin. In a symbolic fashion, the story follows Young Goodman Brown's journey into self-scrutiny, which results in his loss of virtue and belief.

"The May-Pole of Merry Mount" is a short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne published in 1832. It tells the story of the colony of Mount Wollaston, or Merry Mount, a 17th-century British colony located in what is now Quincy, Massachusetts. The people of Merrymount, whom Hawthorne calls the "crew of Comus", celebrate the marriage of a youth and a maiden (Edgar and Edith). They dance around a may-pole and are described as resembling forest creatures. Their festivities are interrupted by the arrival of John Endicott and his Puritan followers. Endicott orders for the people of Merrymount to be whipped. Stricken by the newlyweds, he spares them but orders they put on more conservative clothing. He also orders the youth to cut his hair in the "pumpkin shell" style in order to reflect the Puritan's strictness.

"Wakefield" is a short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne, published in 1835. How is it possible for a person to be swallowed up so completely by a big city that he is able to live undetected for twenty years within one block of his wife's residence and never bump into any of the friends who believe him to be dead? That he would wish to do it at all is strange enough, but the fact that this story is regarded as one of Hawthorne's finest creations shows that many readers are able to identify with Wakefield.... Wakefield is not only a psychological study but also a sociological study.

Full text. Owen Warland is a young watchmaker who devotes his life to the creation of a beautiful mechanical butterfly which he presents to his friend Annie as a wedding gift. Annie and her family are not artists and they are unable to appreciate the beauty of Owen's butterfly or to understand why he wasted so much time making it when he could have been doing something more useful. Each character in the story represents a different side of human nature and it's interesting to see how Owen's butterfly reacts differently to each of them. A beautifully written short story with the message that not everything in life needs to have a purpose - some things are worth doing just for the sake of doing them. Despite being ridiculed by the other townspeople, Owen doesn't let other people's opinions stop him in his pursuit of spiritual happiness.

This is a short story book. Grave figure, with a pair of mysterious spectacle son his nose and a pen behind his ear, was sea tedat a desk in the corner of a metropolitan office. The apartment was fitted up with a counter, and furnished with an oaken cabinet and a Chair or two, in simple and business-like style. Around the walls were stuck advertisements of articles lost, or articles wanted, or articles to be disposed of; in one or another of which classes were comprehended nearly all the Conveniences, or otherwise, that the imagination of man has contrived. The interior of the room was thrown into shadow, partly by the tall edifices that rose on the opposite side of the street, and partly by the immense show-bills of blue and crimson paper that were expanded over each of the three windows.

Full text. Part fairy tale, part Gothic horror story, "Rappaccini's Daughter" is an inspired tale of creation and control. Giovanni Guasconti, a student at the University of Padua, is enchanted to discover a nearby garden of the most exquisite beauty. In it abides a young woman, perhaps the most beautiful Giovanni has ever seen; yet as he looks out from an upstairs window, he soon learns that the garden--and the matchless Beatrice--are not the work of Mother Nature but rather the result of a monstrous abomination of creativity.