This important new reading of a central figure in American literary history, significant in its own right, powerfully demonstrates the potential of Davis's critical approach.
Hawthorne's Habitations draws on letters, manuscripts, and the author's little studied French and Italian notebooks, to present a portrait of four fascinating locations in the middle of the nineteenth century and offer a convincing portrait of the way place informed Hawthorne's melancholy psychology and dark style.
This book is the first-ever selected edition of Nathaniel Hawthorne's letters--169 personal letters and eight letters written while Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American consul. Myerson carefully selected letters focusing on Hawthorne's relationship with famous people of the day: letters written to his wife, Sophia; letters describing everyday life in Salem, Boston, Concord, Britain, France, and Italy; letters in which Hawthorne comments on contemporary literature and his career as an author; and letters that reveal Hawthorne's thoughts and beliefs. Myerson's single-volume Selected Letters of Nathaniel Hawthorne is a welcome addition to the twenty-three-volume Centenary Edition of the Works of Nathaniel Hawthorne (OSU Press)