Customer Reviews

Young Goodman Brown and Other Short Stories (Dover Thrift Editions)

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"Young Goodman Brown and Other Short Stories" brings together 7 tales by the great United States author Nathaniel Hawthorne. These stories date from the 1830s and 1840s, and reveal Hawthorne, well-known today as a novelist, to be a talented practitioner of the short story genre.

These are stories of weird science, romantic and professional obsession, thwarted love, witchcraft, guilt, and the quest for beauty. Irony and tragedy mark many of the tales. Hawthorne takes us from the rugged American frontier to a sunlit Italian garden. The title story is a strangely compelling evocation of the Salem Puritans and their obsession with Satanic conspiracies. Also impressive is "Roger Malvin's Burial," a devastating psychological tale.

If the only Hawthorne you know is the author of the justly-celebrated "Scarlet Letter," check out this collection. Overall, this book is a good choice both for classroom use and individual reading.

An incredible bargain and wonderful tales to boot, vice and virtue were never more complex or interwoven as in these Hawthorne tales. All of his stories speak to the irreversible errors of man, well not altogether irreversible. There is redemption and resolve but not for all his characters. If you are looking for spiritually driven fabulously intriguing stories, look no further. Edgar Allan Poe has a fierce rival.

In reviewing Twice-Told Tales, Edgar Allen Poe wrote: "Mr. Hawthorne's distinctive trait is invention, creation, imagination, and originality. It would be a matter of some difficulty to designate the best of these tales; we repeat, without exception, they are beautiful."

This little Dover Thrift Edition - Young Goodman Brown and Other Short Stories - offers seven interesting and varied tales by Hawthorne. Actually, only one, Dr. Heidegger's Experiment (1837), is found in Twice-Told Tales. This imaginative short story is among Hawthorne's most humorous and is often found today in short story anthologies. Accused by some of plagiarizing this story from a chapter in a novel by Alexandre Dumas, Hawthorne pointed out that his tale predated by more than twenty years that of Dumas, and that he took some pride in that Dumas chose to appropriate this fanciful work for his novel.

Five stories - The Birthmark (1843), Young Goodman Brown (1835), Rappaccini's Daughter (1844), Roger Malvin's Burial (1832), and The Artist of the Beautiful (1844) - are from the collection titled Mosses from an Old Manse. The Birthmark and Rappaccini's Daughter are tales of arrogance and obsession, whereby men of science go astray in their compulsive pursuit of knowledge and perfection.

Like many of Hawthorne's stories, Young Goodman Brown is distinctly American, drawing upon the Puritan influence in the New England colonies. I find this inventive story of witchcraft and temptation to be somewhat sobering as Goodman Brown learns that the mere act of encountering temptation, even if ultimately resisted, may have unexpected consequences.

The Artist of the Beautiful stands apart from the others in this short collection; this story of artistic passion is surprisingly modern. The psychological development and somewhat ambiguous ending is, perhaps, not entirely unlike the writings of Henry James some fifty years later.

I do not recall previously encountering either of the last two stories, Roger Malvin's Burial and My Kinsman, Major Molineux. Although Roger Malvin's Burial is a tale of guilt and ultimate retribution, it does not draw upon the Puritan heritage. Rather out of character for Hawthorne, Malvin's Burial explores the role of the frontier wilderness in New England history. Although My Kinsman, Major Molineux offers a humorous conclusion to these New England tales, this story of the revolutionary period has a serious side also.

I'm writing these comments just to say how much I recently enjoyed re-reading "Young Goodman Brown." Though the story has strong moral and religious overtones, I think it is ultimately an expression of confusion and doubt about the political aims of the colonists in 19th century New England. Hawthorne disagreed with Emerson and the Transcendentalists--he didn't believe that human nature was inherently good. Nor did he believe--as Emerson did--that Americans could forget the past and create a new, more perfect social order here in the New World. Hawthorne did agree with the Puritan notion of original sin, but he felt that their religious code was too strict: that human depravity and frailty could never stack up to it.

Young Goodman Brown's experience in the woods is a phantasmagoric journey into the nightmare of colonial America's flawed past and also a revelation of the ultimate frailty and corruption of human nature that doomed both the Puritan and Transcendentalist social experiments to failure. Younger-generation New Englanders--such as Young Goodman Brown and probably Hawthorne himself--wondered why they really came to America and, given the failures of the past, what kind of future New England society might have. Lost in the woods, so to speak.

Some nice Hawthorne shorts for a low low price. What more can you ask for? It's a bargain and a fine read.

Nathaniel Hawthorne, as a writer and artist, has a
unique effect upon me as the reader. I am a bit put off
by his keep-your-distance...this is my stage, my characters,
my plot...you may observe, learn, but not participate
as experiencer...approach. Thus he is the master artist,
displaying his wares...and they are wondrous. The other
effect of Hawthorne upon me, is that I seem to feel that
his works are as carefully crafted, visualized, and
fatefully fulfilled (using all the motifs, symbols,
and foreshadowing--as well as irony, psychological
insight, and artistic deftness of creative imagination
and clever nuance) as Wagner's operas. Though "Young
Goodman Brown" seems a bit (just a bit,) too blatant
with the symbols and allegory, yet there is something
also immensely satisfying and complete in the intricate
way in which all the parts fit together. "The Artist of
the Beautiful," for me, is the supreme creation in this
collection of stories.
It is Hawthorne's insights, both about human
psychology and artistic awareness and limitation, that
amaze and please me. Here is an excerpt from the haunting
tale, "The Birthmark," in which a perfectionist husband
attempts to remove a small birthmark from his wife's
cheek so she will be completely perfect. The husband
is Aylmer; his wife is Georgiana. The wife chances upon
the volumes which Aylmer has, and one of them is a record
of all of his own experiments. "But to Georgiana, the
most engrossing volume was a large folio from her
husband's own hand, in which he had recorded every
experiment of his scientific career, its original aim,
the methods adopted for its development, and its final
success or failure.... The book, in truth, was both the
history and emblem of his ardent, ambitious, imaginative,
yet practical and laborious life. He handled physical
details as if there were nothing beyond them; yet
spiritualized them all, and redeemed himself from

materialism by his strong and eager apiration towards
the infinite. In his grasp the veriest clod of earth
assumed a soul. * * * The volume rich with achievements
that had won renown for its author, was yet as melancholy
a record as ever mortal hand had penned. It was the sad
confession and continual exemplification of the
shortcomings of the composite man, the spirit burdened
with clay and working in matter, and of the despair
that assails the higher nature at finding itself so

miserably thwarted by the earthly part. Perhaps every
man of genius, in whatever sphere, might recognize the
image of his own experience in Aylmer's journal."
The greatness of that insight is that it not only
applies to Aylmer, but it also obviously is something
which Hawthorne as an artist of the imagination
had grappled with himself -- while still having to live
in the practical world of matter, being assaulted by
its harassments, sicknesses, weakenings, dangers,
limits...and being forced to scratch out something by the
way of making a living for himself and his dependents.
Yet he feels somehow compromised and humiliated by the
ironic joke of having the transcendent consciousness
and soul imprisoned in the body's corruptible matter.
Here is Hawthorne the Artist expressing it so well
in "The Artist of the Beautiful": "He knew that the
world, and Annie as the representative of the world,
whatever praise might be bestowed, could never say the
fitting word nor feel the fitting sentiment which should
be the perfect recompense of an artist who, symbolizing
a lofty moral by a material trifle, -- converting what
was earthly to spiritual gold, -- had won the beautiful
into his handiwork. Not at this latest moment was he
to learn that the reward of all high performance must be
sought within itself, or sought in vain."
The insight and artistic sensitivity and psychological
understanding more than outshine the stand-offish
stage manager and manipulator of effects.

This product came on time, was in good condition and inexpensive. My school bookstore wanted me to pay twice as much as I paid at Amazon. Save your money and buy this book at Amazon.

This short story is full of intrigue. I am a lover of mystery and suspense. Young Goodman Brown has twists and turns that will surprise you. I recommend this short story for anyone who loves intrigue.