At his death, Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) was universally acknowledged in America and England as "the Great Romancer." Novels such as "The Scarlet Letter "and "The House of the Seven Gables "and stories published in such collections as "Twice-Told Tales "continue to capture the minds and imaginations of readers and critics to this day. Harder to capture, however, were the character and personality of the man himself. So few of the essays that appeared in the two years after his death offered new insights into his life, art, and reputation that Hawthorne seemed fated to premature obscurity or, at least, permanent misrepresentation. This first collection of personal reminiscences by those who knew Hawthorne intimately or knew about him through reliable secondary sources rescues him from these confusions and provides the real human history behind the successful writer.
