Hawthorne's Conflicting Puritanism In The House Of The Seven Gables

Nathaniel Hawthorne was one of the greatest writers in America. His numerous works, including four romances, The Scarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables, Blithedale Romance, Marble Faun and other tales, had won him solid prestige in American literature. His literary fame didn't rely only on his artistry and penetrating insight into human nature, but also on his concentration on New England history and Puritanism.Born in Salem, New England, which was one of the colonies founded by Pilgrim Fathers and was shadowed by Puritanism for long, Hawthorne spent his childhood and adolescence there and the Puritanism had overwhelming influence on his inward consciousness and pessimism, which pervaded most of his works. Many studies have been made to analyze Hawthorne' pessimism and gloomy atmosphere in his writings such as The Scarlet Letter and such short stories as "Young Goodman Brown" and "The Minister's Black Veil", whereas few domestic scholars had paid much attention to his second and longest romance, The House of the Seven Gables, in this aspectAlthough most critics considered The Scarlet Letter the best among Hawthorne's writings, The House deserved more attention from researchers for its equal artistry. What's more important, The House was the book which showed Hawthorne's effort to brighten the shadow in The Scarlet Letter, and thus a more valuable book in light of Hawthorne's overall ideas on Puritanism.In this dissertation, the author tries to study Hawthorne's conflicting Puritanism with the context of The House. In Chapter One, Hawthorne's literary achievements and status in American literature as well as former researches on his biography will be summarized. In Chapter Two, the contents and some criticisms of The House of the Seven Gables and the former researches on his Puritanism will be introduced. In Chapter Three, Hawthorne's Puritanism reflected in The House will be elaborated on in details. Chapter Four will explain the causes of Hawthorne's conflicting Puritanism in The House in the social, religious and biographic aspects. Chapter Five gives the conclusion that Hawthorne had not only received considerable influence from his Puritanism inheritance but cultivated his own conflicting Puritanism, though not of his own volition; and that his conflicting Puritanism mainly derived from the innate...