Showing results by author "Nathaniel Hawthorne" in All Categories

Dr. Heidegger invites four elderly friends to his macabre study. He claims to his friends to have found liquid from the fountain of youth! The friends are skeptical, but choose to drink the liquid anyway.

Basil Rathbone reads Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story about the minister of a small town who suddenly and without explanation starts to wear a black veil.

The relentless curse on the Pynchon family of Salem, Massachusetts, which has inhabited the House of the Seven Gables for generations, is resurrected two centuries later by their descendants - with surprising results.

The Scarlet Letter is generally considered to be Nathaniel Hawthorne’s masterpiece. Set in 17th-century Boston, it follows the plight of Hester Prynne, a young woman who bears a child out of wedlock, refuses to name the father, and is condemned to wear a scarlet "A" for the rest of her life. With The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne reaches back to America’s Puritan roots to probe themes of lust, sin, guilt, and redemption. This Essential Classics edition includes a new introduction by Professor Vivian Heller, PhD, in literature and modern studies from Yale University.

Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in 1804 in Salem, Massachusetts. A descendant of judge John Hathorne, who oversaw the 1692 Salem Witch Trials, he wrote several works inspired by Puritan New England, with themes of guilt, sin and retribution. This collection contains his classic novel, The Scarlet Letter, as well as four other stories.

Immerse yourself in the captivating world of Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter." Set in Puritan New England, this timeless classic delves into themes of sin, guilt, and redemption. The story follows Hester Prynne, a woman branded with a scarlet letter "A" for adultery, as she navigates the complexities of societal judgment and personal redemption. Hawthorne's exquisite prose and rich symbolism bring the characters to life, while exploring the human condition with profound insight.

Hawthorne approached the Romantic notion of the ability of science to destroy art (or beauty) in the form of fictive "horror stories" of biological research out of control. This story is the best of that group. A devoted scientist marries a beautiful woman with a single physical flaw: a birthmark on her face. Aylmer becomes obsessed with the imperfection and his attempts to remove it via his scientific skills, thus rendering his bride perfect.

The narrative of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Young Goodman Brown unfolds like a horror film, as the pious protagonist goes to an appointment in the woods near the town of Salem. The author’s use of tongue-in-cheek humor serves to intensify the ultimate horror of the story. One by one, a series of revelations shakes Brown to the core.

Nathaniel Hawthorne was born on 4th July 1804 in Salem, Massachusetts, a town synonymous with the earlier Salem Witch Trials. It was instrumental in Hawthorne’s later use of American Gothic and dark romanticism in his writing. The Birthmark is a classic tale from Hawthorne’s pen. Georgina has a small red birthmark on her cheek. Her husband, a brilliant scientist and philosopher, becomes obsessed with what he thinks is this blemish on her beauty.

Some gatherings stay with you—not for what was shared, but for what was carefully left unsaid. This banquet glitters with politeness, warmth, and something colder beneath the surface. In the silence between the courses, sorrow sits dressed in holiday cheer. A festive tradition, unsettling by design.

Few horror stories are as chilling as the ones written by Victorian writers. This collection of eight enduring stories, some well-known, others less familiar, carry you to all corners of the world where terrors lurk. Featuring work by H.P. Lovecraft, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Edgar Allan Poe and Vernon Lee, experience the skin-crawling undead, a pestilence that leaves no one unaffected, imagined horrors that emerge from disturbed minds and others that require no imagination at all....

Complete with seven short stories, this is the definitive anthology for Nathaniel Hawthorne fans. Hawthorne’s dark romanticism and cultural commentary made him a staple of 19th-century American literature. Dive into the works that made him famous, such as the chilling “Young Goodman Brown”. Hawthorne delved deep into the human soul with his work, and now you can delve deep into his soul with this collection.

Immerse yourself. Savor the best storytelling from the greatest authors of the supernatural. The haunting language and brilliant rendition create an extraordinary atmosphere.

Nathaniel Hawthorne's retelling of the story of King Midas, who thought he loved gold more than anything! For all ages - not too hard for younger listeners, and not too simple for older ones. From A Wonder Book for Boys and Girls.

A dark, many-gabled mansion in a small New England village—haunted by fraudulent dealings, accusations of witchcraft, and sudden death—houses the distinguished Pyncheon family. They are plagued by a centuries-old curse that casts the shadow of ancestral sin on its last four members. The arrival of Phoebe Pyncheon from the country breathes fresh air and sunshine into their musty, decaying home, but will her arrival come too late to rescue the family from a gloomy future?

There are stories that stay quiet, even after you finish them. Roger Malvin's Burial is one of those. It's not about war, though it begins there. It's about what a man carries when no one's watching—what he tells no one, not even himself. Hawthorne doesn't accuse. He simply opens a door and lets us stand in the silence. This story doesn't resolve. It echoes.

The American literary tradition has, in a far shorter span of time than others throughout history, achieved a glowing and glittering reputation. From its transatlantic roots it has absorbed the sons and daughters of other cultures, other lands and made them part of her own. Within this melting pot of styles, genres and wordplay one fact stands out: In the American short story, literary tradition has a strong, vibrant and almost inclusive history, if you know where to look.

One evening, against the wishes of his frightened wife, young Puritan Goodman Brown embarks on a mysterious errand that leads him through the skeletal woods to a Black Mass being held by his fellow townsmen. His life is forever changed by contact with the evil congregation. And his horror is amplified by the attendance of one participant in whom he had placed his greatest trust.

Scarlet is the colour of sin, and the letter ’A’ stands for ’Adultery’. In the 1600s, in Boston, Massachusetts, love was allowed only between a husband and a wife. A child born outside marriage was a child of sin. Hester Prynne must wear the scarlet letter on her dress for the rest of her life. How can she ever escape from this public shame? What will happen to her child, growing up in the shadow of the scarlet letter? The future holds no joy for Hester Prynne.

Twice-Told Tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne is an 1837 collection of stories that had previously appeared in literary journals like Atlantic Souvenir and The Token. The stories explore ideas of pride and sin through allegory in a New England setting. Contemporaries of Hawthorne, including Edgar Allan Poe and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, praised the book. Twice-Told Tales includes stories like "Sunday at Home", "The Wedding-Knell", "The Minister's Black Veil", "The Maypole of Merry Mount", "The Gentle Boy", "Mr. Higginbotham's Catastrophe", and more.