How Did Nathaniel Hawthorne Influence Society

In the 1800’s, America was beginning to grow, in all aspects, but especially in literature. Nathaniel Hawthorne was one of the most influential American authors during this time period. He was a novelist and a short story writer whose work contained American themes and greatly contributed to American nationalism. Hawthorne was born in Salem, Massachusetts on July 4th 1804, to a Puritan family. He was raised under Puritanism which later influenced most of his writing. Hawthorne grew up with his mother by his side because his father died when Hawthorne was only four. He attended Bowdoin College and graduated in 1825, where he met and became close friends with future president Franklin Pierce. Hawthorne had been interested in reading and writing his whole life, he wrote before, during and after college. After graduating, he married Sophia Peabody in 1842, had three children and continued to write in Concord, Massachusetts. Hawthorne’s work “confronted reality”. He focused on human nature, especially the dark side. …show more content…
He published this novel in 1850. Published during the transcendentalism era in a Puritan society, a time where religion and philosophy thrived, The Scarlet Letter was a controversial novel. This novel based on his own views of an American Puritan society that was built on sins, guilt, sorrow, and consequences. Hawthorne incorporates influences from his own childhood and his own beliefs into this novel. He believed that sin results in the isolation of sinners, “Thus the young and pure would be taught to look at her, with the scarlet letter flaming on her breast, -- at her, the child of honorable parents,-- at her, the mother of a babe, that would hereafter be a woman, -- at her, who had once been innocent, -- as the figure, the body, the reality of sin” (Hawthorne, 82). This novel established his fame and reputation as a novelist in America. The Scarlet Letter remains a classic