The House of the Seven GablesFThis enduring novel of crime and retribution vividly reflects the social and moral values of New England in the 1840s. Nathaniel Hawthorne's gripping psychological drama concerns the Pyncheon family, a dynasty founded on pious theft, who live for generations under a dead man's curse until their house is finally exorcised by love. Hawthorne, by birth and education, was instilled with the Puritan belief in America's limitless promise. Yet - in part because of blemishes on his own family history - he also saw the darker side of the young nation. Like his twentieth-century heirs William Faulkner and F. Scott Fitzgerald, Hawthorne peered behind propriety's façade and exposed the true human condition. |
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Alice Pyncheon ancestor appeared arched window artist beautiful behold better breath brought carpenter chair Chanticleer character cheerful child Clif Clifford Colonel Pyncheon countenance Cousin Hepzibah cried daguerreotype Daguerreotypist dark dead dear death door dream eyes face fancied father feel figure flowers garden gaze gentleman girl guest hand happy harpsichord Hawthorne's heart Holgrave human idea Jaffrey Pyncheon Jim Crow Judge Pyncheon Judge's kind lady live look man's mansion Marble Faun matter Matthew Maule Maule's mind Miss Hepzibah morning Nathaniel Hawthorne nature never old house once parlor passed past perhaps person Phoebe's picture poor Hepzibah Puritan Pyncheon-elm Pyncheon-house Pyncheon-street romance Salem Scarlet Letter scowl secret seemed sense Seven Gables shadow smile Sophia Peabody spirit stept stern stood story strange street sunshine things thought town turned Twice-Told Tales Uncle Venner voice Waldo County whole witchcraft woman young youth zibah