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Nathaniel Hawthorne
In 2011, I finished grad school and worked at a small press that planned to publish a series of classics for young adults but folded before the books were published. Here is some front and back copy I wrote for a collection of stories by Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Salem
Salem, Massachusetts, one of the oldest white settlements in the United States, was very much aware of its history during Hawthorne’s time. Many houses were built before 1700 by Puritans, and the town’s Puritan heritage was still very much alive in thought and spirit. Salem was a port city where captains and merchants made fortunes and built beautiful mansions in the fashionable neighborhood of Chestnut Street. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s family lived in a middle-class neighborhood where the wooden-frame houses were simple and plain.
Hawthorne was well aware of Salem’s past, and it fascinated him. Salem had become a largely Puritan settlement by 1635, and Puritanical attitudes still prevailed in Hawthorne’s day. This is where witch trials took place, caused by mass hysteria. An ancestor of Hawthorne’s was a judge who helped send twenty people to death for witchcraft. Hawthorne was aware of his ancestor’s deeds, and his writing is often critical of Puritans.
Witchcraft
During the early years of colonial New England, people believed in witches and their…