Isolated Souls

Nathaniel Hawthorne is often regarded as the most outstanding writer of American Romanticism in the 19^th century, but the rich connotations of his works have transcended the confinement of Romanticism. Prior to the appearance of his masterpiece, The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne had established his fame in American literature via his exquisite short stories. Most of his stories dwell on the theme of sin and evil. He especially explores the roots and the consequences of sin by showing the moral and psychological effects on the human conscience. Even though those stories seem to have simple plots, they reveal the complex hidden unconscious motivations that lead to mental conflict, or conflict with others.Twice-Told Tales and Mosses from an Old Manse are his representative collections of short stories which won him favorable criticism. The collections include historical sketches and tales displaying the skillful techniques that characterize Hawthorne's later works. His stories are widely acclaimed for their insightful characterizations and the allegorical themes of sin, anguish, and alienation. In this paper, from the perspective of psychoanalysis, the author has chosen seven representative ones from the two collections, which particularly concern the deep mystery of man's soul and conscience. In spite of their differences, these seven stories nevertheless have much in common.For a long time critics have paid great attention to Hawthorne's masterpiece The Scarlet Letter, exploring its themes, emotional depths and literary prowess and so on. But most of his wonderful short stories have not received adequate attention, and the resemblances among them have seldom been discussed. While materials on the themes and craftsmanship of the writer Hawthorne and his masterpieces are widely available, comments about his short stories are comparatively scarce. A number of critics have mentioned not only The Scarlet Letter but also touched on some short stories from the perspective of psychoanalysis briefly in their essays, but only a few of them have made a close and detailed analysis of isolation in them. Nevertheless, it is that message in those essays that has fascinated me and compelled me to pursue such a challenging topic for my thesis.In the analysis of the seven selected stories, the focus of this thesis is on the isolated experiences of the protagonists that derive from their alienation to different degrees from reality, society or other people, or even from their own self, which eventually have resulted in tragedy: isolation, loss or even death. Through the lens of evil or the development of sin and punishment, not only the psychic conflicts of the characters but also the relation between alienation and isolation as well as their causes and consequences are unveiled. The conflicts embody themselves mainly in three dimensions: a. individual versus individual, displayed in "Birthmark", and "Rappaccini's Daughter"; b. individual versus society, in "Young Goodman Brown", "The Minister's Black Veil" and "Roger Malvin's Burial"; c. self-alienation, in "Ethan Brand", and "Wakefield".