Nathaniel Hawthorne

Twice Told Tales Nathaniel Hawthorne

Publisher Marketing: There was once a time when New England groaned under the actual pressure of heavier wrongs than those threatened ones which brought on the Revolution. James II., the bigoted successor of Charles the Voluptuous, had annulled the charters of all the colonies and sent a harsh and unprincipled soldier to take away our liberties and endanger our religion. The administration of Sir Edmund Andros lacked scarcely a single characteristic of tyranny-a governor and council holding office from the king and wholly independent of the country; laws made and taxes levied without concurrence of the people, immediate or by their representatives; the rights of private citizens violated and the titles of all landed property declared void; the voice of complaint stifled by restrictions on the press; and finally, disaffection overawed by the first band of mercenary troops that ever marched on our free soil. For two years our ancestors were kept in sullen submission by that filial love which had invariably secured their allegiance to the mother-country, whether its head chanced to be a Parliament, Protector or popish monarch. Till these evil times, however, such allegiance had been merely nominal, and the colonists had ruled themselves, enjoying far more freedom than is even yet the privilege of the native subjects of Great Britain. At length a rumor reached our shores that the prince of Orange had ventured on an enterprise the success of which would be the triumph of civil and religious rights and the salvation of New England. It was but a doubtful whisper; it might be false or the attempt might fail, and in either case the man that stirred against King James would lose his head. Still, the intelligence produced a marked effect. The people smiled mysteriously in the streets and threw bold glances at their oppressors, while far and wide there was a subdued and silent agitation, as if the slightest signal would rouse the whole land from its sluggish despondency. Aware of their danger, the rulers resolved to avert it by an imposing display of strength, and perhaps to confirm their despotism by yet harsher measures. Review Citations: Wilson Fiction Catalog 01/01/1995 pg. 298 (EAN 9780814202029, Hardcover) Wilson Fiction Catalog 01/01/2006 pg. 424 (EAN 9780375757884, Paperback) Wilson Fiction Catalog 01/01/2010 pg. 340 (EAN 9780375757884, Paperback) Wilson Fiction Catalog 01/01/2014 pg. 418 (EAN 9780375757884, Paperback) Contributor Bio:  Hawthorne, Nathaniel Born in Salem, Massachusetts, Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) is one of America's greatest writers. His classic novels include The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables, both in the dark romanticism genre, with moral messages and a Puritan influence. He also wrote short stories and non-fiction. Hawthorne, who spent significant parts of his life in The Berkshires and Concord, Massachusetts, was born with the surname Hathorne. He added the "w" to distance himself from his great-great-grandfather John Hathorne, the unrepentant Salem magistrate and chief interrogator of the accused witches during the Salem witch hysteria of 1692.