What's Inside
This collection gathers various accounts of colonial life, where historical record blends into psychological unease. Hawthorne surveys New England, documenting figures like a soldier of King James II, a man who abandons his house for two decades to watch it from the next street, and a family gathered in the Notch of the White Hills. Whether tracking religious outcasts, treasure-seekers in the White Mountains, or the rituals of a Shaker settlement, the narratives remain tethered to the weight of inherited burdens and the strange, quiet shifts in domestic fate. Each piece acts as a ledger of regional memory, moving between the moral texture of the past and the sudden, unasked-for interventions that steer a human life.
Works & figures
- Sir Edmund Andros
A stern governor who forces his will on colonial residents. (in “The Gray Champion”)
- Wakefield
A man who leaves his marriage for two decades of silence. (in “Wakefield”)
- David Swan
A traveler whose life is shaped by accidents he never notices. (in “David Swan”)
- Father Ephraim
A dying Shaker elder who must select his community's new leader. (in “The Shaker Bridal”)
What it's really about
- Moral inheritance
- Past actions defining the present life.
- Seclusion
- Isolation as both a choice and a prison.
Why it's memorable
- A gilded Indian sentinel, bow bent and arrow drawn, stands fixed atop the Province House, aiming eternally at the weathercock on the Old South Church spire.
- A mountain family laughing before a landslide changes everything.
Where to start
Start with The Great Carbuncle to see how Hawthorne balances the absurdity of human greed against the vast indifference of the White Mountains.
For your book club
- Is Wakefield's decades-long absence a mental break or a cruel experiment?
- Does the author prefer historical myth or the quiet misery of neighbors?