Recently read The Blithedale Romance by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Since Hawthorne clearly inserts himself into the role of narrator, aka Miles Coverdale, and indirectly asks the question of how he is perceived by the world and how he should fit into the world, I really felt comfort in reading it. I am constantly depressed and overwhelmed and exhausted by trying to live like everyone else, so it's nice to read that Hawthorne had the exact same problem, fictionalizing his thoughts on the subject often ("The Artist of the Beautiful" is probably his other most famous work on the subject). It doesn't exactly make me feel better to consider Hawthorne's final conclusion in Blithedale, that he--and I--should simply avoid living normally in any context, but at least I know I'm not alone. The major problem here is that Hawthorne had clear talent that I do not have. So, maybe I will have to live normally and forego my writing. Oh well. Anyway, since I'm talking about it, I'll include the review that I wrote for Blithedale here and call it a day.
This book lacks much of what you might expect of Hawthorne and suffers because of it. The "romance" that Hawthorne should be most recognized for struggles mightily to fit into the narrative. What supernatural/mysterious elements that do exist are of a lower order; far less mysterious than one might hope. The character Westervelt remains a mystery to the end, but unlike Chillingworth or Judge Pyncheon in Hawthorne's other major works, Westervelt simply doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Truthfully, it's as if Hawthorne desperately wanted to write a story about his Brook Farm experience but, in writing it, found himself scrambling for some type of conflict to rescue his thoughts from being merely a long essay. His solution is a half-baked one with Westervelt and Priscilla. The cohesiveness of the plot likewise suffers because it must bear the burden of added, alien material to the text.
Aside from the fact that I was greatly disappointed in not finding Hawthorne in this romance, and the fact that the plot is a mess, there are a number of nice surprises in Blithedale. As one example, Hawthorne explores the depth of personality in his characters far more determinedly than he does elsewhere. Really authors everywhere could use Blithedale as a model for what we call "characterization." Not that any of these characters are particularly riveting or inspiring, but Hawthorne has created characters that are extremely believable, realistic, consistent, and exactly like your next door neighbor. They are timeless characters considering the timeless question of how and whether to develop a utopia. Coverdale is a typical white-collar intellectual (like myself, I suppose), Zenobia is the hypocritical graceful person who lacks any real goodness or conviction, Priscilla is the loving and emotional but loyal friend, and Hollingsworth is the closed-minded "open-minded" philanthropist that we all know and praise but really shouldn't. Typically for Hawthorne, there are very few characters introduced, and those all receive a great deal of time and analysis. The only other characters than the main four are Westervelt and Silas Foster and Old Moodie. Unlike Hawthorne, though, these characters are absolutely timeless and therefore rather educational as models or anti-models.
The major reason that the characters are timeless is that, not surprising at all in a Hawthorne piece, the driving force of the book is the question of a practical matter: creating utopia. That sounds fantastic and impractical, but considering that people try creating utopias at least once a generation, and the very notion of government and social construction, convinces us that we are all constantly involved in the same narrative. Because Hawthorne so often tackles romantic stories he rarely mixes his thoughtful and observant moralism with tangibly practical matters. In doing so he has finally reached the height of his ability in developing characters, all of whom have clear faults and strengths, and the reader is left to determine what type of character is best to live in this world with. Hawthorne purposely does not answer that question. Nor does he directly answer the question of the practicality of creating the utopia; he simply emphatically denies his own suitability for such a task in having Coverdale retreat from Blithedale.
At the end of the day, Blithedale is not a great story, sad face; but it is a great fictionalization of superb philosophical and theological pondering about the human quest for perfection, individually and socially. Of all fictional authors I've ever read, Hawthorne probably has the best mind. And thus he is well-suited for such a task as writing Blithedale. He just unfortunately lacks the novelistic skills to carry it off in a more entertaining fashion.
For anyone out there interested in an author's including autobiographical material in fiction, Blithedale is also probably the best source for getting to know Hawthorne. Since Blithedale so clearly reflects on Hawthorne's experience at Brook Farm, and Coverdale so clearly mirrors Hawthorne, you can see how Hawthorne may have responded to certain events in his life point by point. Personally, as a writer struggling to find my place in the world, I find a lot of comfort in reading Blithedale through Coverdale's narration. That's all I'll say.
Showing posts with label hawthorne. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hawthorne. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 2, 2013
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Author's Ridge
Today I finished chapter six of nine of the book about my bike trip and human trafficking. But that's not what I want to write about.
Most of what I would have written today I've already covered in the Lexington post. Yesterday, though, I traveled to other historical sites nearby to Lexington Green. I could have visited them on my way back from Lexington but, quite frankly, I had gotten lost. So back to Concord I went to visit Author's Ridge in Concord's Sleepy Hollow Cemetery where Hawthorne, Emerson, and Thoreau are all buried; I also found out that the Alcotts and some other famous people are buried there, like the guy who designed and built the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., and, though I didn't know it until later, I saw the graves of some of the men and their families who were directly involved in the first battle of the Revolutionary War at Lexington and Concord. I also went to the Old North Bridge where much of the fighting that first day occurred, which is the highlight of the Minuteman Historical National Park, and the Old Manse right next to it--the Old Manse made famous by Hawthorne's collection of stories, Mosses from an Old Manse, where he lived for a few years and that Emerson's father, the parson, built and raised young Ralph Waldo in.
I clearly was not the first person to pilgrimage to Author's Ridge. Pens, pencils, and paper were left at the base of each writer's stone. Emerson's stone was literally a stone: just a big chunk of rock that seems to have been picked up from somewhere and placed there. Some of the mementos are no doubt from admirers, but I can imagine that some were left by budding writers seeking to follow in the big three's footsteps (I acknowledge the Alcotts and their place in literary history, but they do not match the power and influence of the big three).
Why did I go there? Well, first of all, because I can. As a writer I love that I live in a place so full of literary history, a place where it is possible to label Hawthorne, Emerson, and Thoreau as "the big three," a place that, because of them, is alive with words. On my hometown's Main Street, right next door to our Town Hall, sits a church where Emerson and Twain among others have preached. About a 45-minute bike ride could bring me to the Wayside Inn made famous by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in his collection of poems, now called "Longfellow's Wayside Inn" serving as a restaurant, inn, and museum; a lovely little place. Not far at all from the Old Manse and the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery is Walden Pond memorialized by Thoreau. Simply put, it's friggin cool to be able to visit all these things whenever I darn well please... and to do so on my bike is even better because the big three, Thoreau especially, would no doubt appreciate my spirit.
My post on my trip to Lexington said, if I remember correctly, something along the lines of, "If a writer can't write with such vivid images and historical force behind him, then he isn't a writer." That remains true. If seeing where Hawthorne and Emerson and Thoreau spent time and wrote and seeing their final resting places, so close to each other, cannot inspire words to swell up inside of me then I am not a writer.
Besides, I think it absolutely necessary that every writer or artist of any kind take at least one pilgrimage of some sort in their life. Maybe that means flying across the ocean to the Louvre or maybe it means taking a few hours out of the day every so often on a bike to visit the stomping grounds of the big three Concord men. Or maybe it's visiting a grandmother's grave that you have yet to actually see. Whatever it is, the act of pilgrimage is so crucial to what a writer/artist does. Now that I'm writing this I can't exactly say why but I know it's true. If a writer thinks that he can isolate himself and just sit down and write then he is entirely mistaken. Indeed anyone hoping to become successful should surround themselves with the spirits of those gone before. Indeed anyone hoping to have personal, emotional, and spiritual well-being should pilgrimage--I am an individualist through and through yet I acknowledge that all of us do not feel whole, often leaving a part of ourselves in the past in regret or love, or simply living life without knowing what it is that can make us whole. We must pilgrimage. Mine just happened to be to some cool place called Author's Ridge.
Most of what I would have written today I've already covered in the Lexington post. Yesterday, though, I traveled to other historical sites nearby to Lexington Green. I could have visited them on my way back from Lexington but, quite frankly, I had gotten lost. So back to Concord I went to visit Author's Ridge in Concord's Sleepy Hollow Cemetery where Hawthorne, Emerson, and Thoreau are all buried; I also found out that the Alcotts and some other famous people are buried there, like the guy who designed and built the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., and, though I didn't know it until later, I saw the graves of some of the men and their families who were directly involved in the first battle of the Revolutionary War at Lexington and Concord. I also went to the Old North Bridge where much of the fighting that first day occurred, which is the highlight of the Minuteman Historical National Park, and the Old Manse right next to it--the Old Manse made famous by Hawthorne's collection of stories, Mosses from an Old Manse, where he lived for a few years and that Emerson's father, the parson, built and raised young Ralph Waldo in.
I clearly was not the first person to pilgrimage to Author's Ridge. Pens, pencils, and paper were left at the base of each writer's stone. Emerson's stone was literally a stone: just a big chunk of rock that seems to have been picked up from somewhere and placed there. Some of the mementos are no doubt from admirers, but I can imagine that some were left by budding writers seeking to follow in the big three's footsteps (I acknowledge the Alcotts and their place in literary history, but they do not match the power and influence of the big three).
Why did I go there? Well, first of all, because I can. As a writer I love that I live in a place so full of literary history, a place where it is possible to label Hawthorne, Emerson, and Thoreau as "the big three," a place that, because of them, is alive with words. On my hometown's Main Street, right next door to our Town Hall, sits a church where Emerson and Twain among others have preached. About a 45-minute bike ride could bring me to the Wayside Inn made famous by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in his collection of poems, now called "Longfellow's Wayside Inn" serving as a restaurant, inn, and museum; a lovely little place. Not far at all from the Old Manse and the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery is Walden Pond memorialized by Thoreau. Simply put, it's friggin cool to be able to visit all these things whenever I darn well please... and to do so on my bike is even better because the big three, Thoreau especially, would no doubt appreciate my spirit.
My post on my trip to Lexington said, if I remember correctly, something along the lines of, "If a writer can't write with such vivid images and historical force behind him, then he isn't a writer." That remains true. If seeing where Hawthorne and Emerson and Thoreau spent time and wrote and seeing their final resting places, so close to each other, cannot inspire words to swell up inside of me then I am not a writer.
Besides, I think it absolutely necessary that every writer or artist of any kind take at least one pilgrimage of some sort in their life. Maybe that means flying across the ocean to the Louvre or maybe it means taking a few hours out of the day every so often on a bike to visit the stomping grounds of the big three Concord men. Or maybe it's visiting a grandmother's grave that you have yet to actually see. Whatever it is, the act of pilgrimage is so crucial to what a writer/artist does. Now that I'm writing this I can't exactly say why but I know it's true. If a writer thinks that he can isolate himself and just sit down and write then he is entirely mistaken. Indeed anyone hoping to become successful should surround themselves with the spirits of those gone before. Indeed anyone hoping to have personal, emotional, and spiritual well-being should pilgrimage--I am an individualist through and through yet I acknowledge that all of us do not feel whole, often leaving a part of ourselves in the past in regret or love, or simply living life without knowing what it is that can make us whole. We must pilgrimage. Mine just happened to be to some cool place called Author's Ridge.
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