What is the best way to teach Hawthorne? For Dale Salwak, teaching is all about intersections between an author’s life history and our own. In The Life of the Author: Nathaniel Hawthorne, Salwak looks back over his own career of nearly fifty years teaching Hawthorne. He not only describes Hawthorne’s developmental experiences in various sites but also details his own pilgrimages to visit them: Salem, Concord, Boston, Brunswick, Maine, the Berkshires, Lenox, West Newton, West Roxbury, Liverpool, London, Paris, Florence, and Rome. Visiting these places enabled Salwak to imbibe the spirit of the author and gain a feel for Hawthorne’s nuanced responsiveness to place, setting, and tone. In this book we encounter the voice of a dedicated professor who has lived his life loving Hawthorne, plumbing his depths, visiting his haunts, and communicating to the best of his ability the many layers within Hawthorne’s writings. Part biography and part...

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