Analysis of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter” and Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven”

Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe in the Era of Dark Romanticism

Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe were among the American’s best romance writers in the era of Dark Romanticism. The works of these two American romantic writers have stood the test of time and are among the most read in today’s stories more than in their time. Both Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe were among the first writers dive into the human mind and produce the psychological literature. The era of Dark Romanticism analyses the conflict existing between good and evil, the psychological impacts of guilt and evil, and the madness and derangement of human minds. Both Hawthorne and Poe successfully captured the elements of romantic writings, yet each one of them approached these elements in a completely different manner. Though these author share some qualities in their works on romance, they were extremely different people. Both Poe and Hawthorne show a lot of similarities and differences especially in their lives, their approaches to writing, and writing themes.

Similarities between Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe

Among the similarities between the two authors is the way in which they thought and wrote. Both Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne were among the finest romantic writers in the mid-eighteen hundred century. Both writers were born at the beginning of the eighteenth century though Poe died earlier than Hawthorne. Both writers were part of the American’s Dark Romanticism period, which reached its peak in the mid-nineteenth era. Both authors included nonrealistic and supernatural aspects in their writings.

Gothic Works of Poe and Hawthorne

Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne also created works that could be considered Gothic. Most of Poe’s works fall into the gothic category, while Hawthorne’s Young Goodman Brown and The House of the Seven Gables are among the writings that fall into this category. Both of these writers were short story writers. Also, both of these romantic writers theorized regarding literature. This is indicated in Hawthorne’s aforesaid romantic definition and Poe’s ideas regarding the impacts of the ideal short story.

Psychological Impact in the Works of Poe and Hawthorne

Poe and Hawthorne used the human mind as the instrument responsible for the human’s demise rather than the actions. Both romantic writers believed and understood that the human mind played a massive role in the person’s destruction. For example, Hawthorne’s romantic work, “The Scarlet Letter,” talks about a woman who had to wear a scarlet because she was an adulterer. Also, Poe’s, ”The Town Minister,” talked about the man who took responsibility for his sins by punishing himself because he could not get pregnant like a woman.

Symbolism and Imagery in the Works of Poe and Hawthorne

Additionally, both authors chiefly employed the use of symbolism in their works. Hawthorne, for instance, applied the use of items such black veils, haunted houses, poison bushes, and scarlet letters to symbolize the secret of evil. Poe too used a lot of symbols including vulture eyes, harlequin costumes, ravens, catacombs, coffins, black cats, and decaying mansions to represent the evil minds of his characters. Also, both Poe and Hawthorne utilized the use of imagery, that is, the dark and light imagery. For instance, Hawthorne’s ”The House of Seven Gables,” thrives with the use of light and dark imagery. Poe’s ”The Raven“ and ”The House of Usher“ also flourishes in the use of this kind of imagery.

Differences between Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe

While Poe and Hawthorne agreed with their predecessors such as Emerson’s belief that spiritual facts lied behind nature’s appearances, both authors disagreed that these facts had to be necessarily good. Hawthorne, for instance, in his work suggested that his predecessors merely took the ecstatic and mystical aspects of the Puritan thinking and ignored the darker side, the Calvinistic sense of the intrinsic evil of the nature of human and the Calvinistic view of predestination. Poe’s work also explores the darker side and its conflicts with the harmless.

Different Writing Preferences

Through these two writers showed some similar qualities, they differed in some aspects. For instance, while Poe aspired to be a great poet, Hawthorne was typically a novelist. Hawthorne set some of his major writings in the colonial time, with interests in the Puritans and Salem, since he had at least one relative who was involved in the prominent witch trials. On the other hand, Poe set most of his writings in the contemporary era in which he wrote. According to Halliburton, Poe’s narrators were often unreliable and descended into madness, with his works interested in the psychological ramifications of dismay and the causes that made people commit such evil crimes. Besides, Hawthorne’s writings seemed more conservative in their usage of omniscient narrators in the third person perspective.

Views on Life

Moreover, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s and Edgar Allen Poe’s approach to life significantly differed. Poe, for instance, was a depressed and extreme alcoholic who in his life had lost a lot. Poe thought that man was destroyed because of the loss. Poe’s celebrated poem, ”The Raven,” regards a man’s origin into insanity. On the other hand, Hawthorne seemed to be a happy man with a stable family. Unlike Poe, Hawthorne felt that man was capable of overcoming the evil. For instance, Hawthorne’s romantic work, ”The Scarlet Letter,” regards one woman who overcame and stuck it into the system. Edgar Allen Poe seems to be more of an idealist because of his psychological issues associated with works. On the other hand, Hawthorne is seen as a realist since his writing intentions were to eliminate dilapidation and to preserve morality.

Different Interpretations of the Dark Side of Humanity

Also, Hawthorne, as a didactic and moralistic writer, analyzed the darker regions of the soul, which he referred as ”the truth of the human heart“, in showing the intrinsic evil of his characters like Roger Chillingworth of The Scarlet Letter, who spiritually transformed into what he termed as ”a friend“. Poe, On the other hand, found this darker side more in the psychology of human beings. Therefore, to show the impacts of human evil, Poe used the unreliable narrator who at the end of it was terrorized by his awareness of his mind’s incongruous works and the real dismay that lay in what people were capable of. This aspect is shown with narrators like those of ”A Tell-Tale Heart“ and ”A Cask of Amontillado“ who could often scream out while in their horrifying realizations.

Influence of Gothic Conventions

Though both authors used Gothic conventions to showcase the darker side of humanity, Poe often used these concords in a subverted way since only the human beings could create terrible actions like those in ”The Cask of Amontillado“. Hawthorne’s ”The House of Seven Gables,” was more conservative in its application of Gothic conventions.

Conclusion

In conclusion, while Poe and Hawthorne seem to have some stimulating and fundamental similarities and differences, both writers contributed significantly to the American literature. Their works are among the best in history, and the most read in the present literature.

Works Cited

Halliburton, David. Edgar Allen Poe: A Phenomenological View. Princeton University Press, 2015.

Schlagheck, Dennis, and Catherine Lantz. Hawthorne Works. Arcadia Publishing, 2014.

Wang, Chao, Xiaoyi Xiao, and Bao Liu. ”Symbolic Analysis of Animal Images in Edgar Allan

Poe’s Works.“Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal 5.3 (2018).