Irish Jana Irish Brother Pearce English 495 March 9, 2012 Healthy Obsession: Heart vs.

Head in Hawthorne

Passion: as a noun, this word means senses relating to physical suffering

and pain (hence its frequent use to refer to the Atonement); it also denotes a painful disorder, ailment, or affliction of the body or a part of the body. Passion is further defined as intense rage; anger; temper, and conversely, as strong affection; love. One other sense rounds out the connotations of this word: passion is an aim or object pursued with zeal; a thing arousing intense enthusiasm (OED, passion). Nathaniel Hawthorne frequently uses the word passion in his short stories. Three of these stories, Ethan Brand, The Birthmark, and The Artist of the Beautiful, examine what happens when passion turns to obsession. Obsession is defined in the OED as an idea, image, or influence which continually fills or troubles the mind; a compulsive interest or preoccupation; the fact or state of being troubled or preoccupied in this way. A further definition describes obsession as a recurrent, intrusive, inappropriate thought, impulse, or image causing significant distress or disturbance to social or occupational functioning; (also) the condition characterized by having such thoughts, impulses, or images. In The Artist of the Beautiful, Hawthorne remarks, This anxiety, perhaps, is common to all men who

Irish set their hearts upon anything so high, in their own view of it, that life becomes of importance only as conditional to its accomplishment (171). But why do people choose to set their hearts so fixedly on a goal that it creates a passion and/or obsession that causes so much pain and suffering? In his essay, Laughter in Hawthornes Fiction, Victor H. Jones claims in much of his fiction Hawthorne is concerned with, among other things, mans understanding of himself. One way in which he understands himself is by recognizing that he is not perfect, that he has a great potential for evil, and that he may in fact be evil (61). Hawthorne suggests evidence for this view in Ethan Brand when the storys namesake, this strange man[,] look[s] inward at his own heart, and burst[s] into

laughter (234), and the narrator comments laughter, when out of place, mistimed, or bursting forth from a disordered state of feeling, may be the most terrible modulation of the human voice (234). As Ethan Brand comes to understand himself, his state of feeling becomes disordered and he is unable to come to terms with what he finds in his own heart. Other critics have examined how Hawthorne portrays figures of isolation, particularly artists. Dean Wentworth Bethea posits that in The Artist of the Beautiful Hawthorne shows that the artist must initially stand up against mankind and be his own sole disciple in order to achieve independent, original vision. Yet ultimately, as the storys ending makes clear, the artist must stand together with humanity and attempt to articulate the vision gained in solitude (27). In other stories, Hawthorne also condemns or has ill fates befall those

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characters that choose to separate themselves from the world in their quest for their passion/obsession. Clearly through the stories of Aylmer and Ethan Brand obsession leads to tragic consequences; yet Owen Warland can also be called obsessed, and his story has a much less tragic ending. What do the differences between these obsessed men say about obsession and the artist? This essay attempts to examine the differences and similarities of these characters and to show the connection between the artist and obsession that Hawthorne frequently dwells on in his stories. At the start of his essay, Heat, Light, and the Darkening World: Hawthornes The Artist of the Beautiful, Bethea states Critics in agreement with [Nina] Baymand there are many, from Fredrick Crews to Millicent Bellalso assert that Owen, like Aylmer in The Birthmarkand Ethan in Ethan Brand, commits Hawthornes unpardonable sin: the voluntary separation of the head and heart, the intellect and soul (23). Bethea disagrees with this position, though as Fredrick Newberry, in The Artist of the Beautiful: Crossing the Transcendent Divide in Hawthornes Fiction, points out one must admit that Owen does not always look very good. For one thing, he seems altogether too obsessive, selfconsumed and presumptuousa foreshadowing of Aylmer in The Birthmark (79). This obsessive, self-consumed man, Hawthornes typical beginning for characters that end up destroying their obsessions, joins the ranks of Aylmer, Ethan Brand, and Giovanni and Rappaccini in Rappaccinis Daughter.

Irish Ronald T. Curran, in his essay Irony: Another Thematic Dimension to The Artist of the Beautiful, states figures of isolation like Ethan Brand [and others] are negative ones. Hawthornes tendency is to seek a balance of intellect and emotionsThus Owen Warland cannot too far outstrip his peersDr. Rappaccini and Aylmer. He suffers from the same imbalance (36). Melvin W. Askew, in his essay Hawthorne, the Fall, and the Psychology of Maturity, expounds the idea that innocence is a state of inexperience and ignorance the innocent or immature person, then, approaches the world as if it were raw material dedicated

solely to his personal gratification (338-9). Thus the imbalance may stem from the innocent, or rather inexperience[d] and ignoran[t] state each of these characters start in. James E. Miller, Jr. in his essay, Hawthorne and Melville: The Unpardonable Sin, examines the dangers of an overruling intellect. He claims that In the process of developing such monstrous intellects, these doomed men become the victims of a ruling passion, a monomania; they become insane in their desire to accomplish some great, single purpose. To the fulfillment of this high aim they devote all of the energies, all of the ruthless cunning of their madness (96). Combining these ideas suggests that those who are ignorant and immature will let either their monstrous intellects or their emotions hold on to their obsessions to the point of destruction. Thus, Owen Warland starts down the same path that Aylmer and Ethan Brand do, but he escapes their fate because he is not consumed by his obsession. He matures and finds his humanity, even as he grasps his

Irish obsession. Aylmer and Ethan Brand, on the other hand, stay immature and lose their humanity in their ultimately failed quests to fulfill their obsessions. Hawthornes characters indicate only the whole person, one ruled by both the head

and the heart together, can overcome an obsession. An immature person, controlled by head or heart separately, is overcome by the obsession. Ethan Brand has been labeled as Hawthornes worst sinner. Hawthorne himself has Ethan Brand say that he has committed the unpardonable sin, and while some critics debate whether Hawthorne actually believes that Brand succeeded, clearly Brand is not a normally functioning human being. When asked about his sin and his quest, Brand, standing erect with a pride that distinguishes all enthusiast of his stamp, expounds, It is a sin that grew within my own breastThe sin of an intellect that triumphed over the sense of brotherhood with manand sacrificed everything to its own mighty claims! (235). Brand is arrogantly sure in his sinfulness and happy to be free from worry about others. He has made himself different enough that the lime-burner, the townspeople, and especially little Joe, are not comfortable in his presence. But as Nina Baym, in her essay The Head, the Heart, and the Unpardonable Sin, points out sins in Hawthornes writings are forms of one sin, that of cutting oneself off from the human race by some deliberate act against one of its members. Merely to cut oneself off from mankind is not sinful (33). Brand, however, has before the story begins, acted against one of mankinds members:

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Ethan Brands eye quailed beneath the old mans. That daughter, from whom he so earnestly desired a word of greeting, was the Esther of our tale, the very girl whom, with such cold and remorseless purpose, Ethan Brand had made the subject of a psychological experiment, and wasted, absorbed, and perhaps annihilated her soul in the process. (238) This brief summary eerily echoes the expanded tale given of Aylmer in The Birthmark connecting the two men and their monomania. A remark by Hawthorne in The Artist of the Beautiful perhaps demonstrates where Brand and Aylmer gained their ability to so coldly perform their experiments: It is requisite for the ideal artist to possess a force of character that seems hardly compatible with its delicacy; he must keep his faith in himself while the incredulous world assails him with its utter disbelief; he must stand up against mankind and be his own sold disciple, both as respects his genius and the objects to which it is directed. (164) Ethan Brand seems to think he is an artist, creating the ideal sin, and cares not what the world thinks. The problem for Brand, however, is that he does not realize in his immature, selfish state, that life has already revealed the destructiveness of pursuing an existence divorced from social reality (Bethea 28). For normal human beings, both the heart and the head do the directing. Sometimes, one is stronger than the other, but social reality demands that people be rational and emotional, neither one dominating exclusively. The sin Brand commits

Irish in his monomania is Hawthornes classic division of head and heart, taken to the extreme. Passionately motivated to find the unpardonable sinto the point where his intellect and his heart are not working equallyhe is increasingly dominated by a single selfish passion which gradually absorbs all his energies, transforming

him into a monomaniac[not] motivated by a passion for knowledge or science, [he is not an] intellectual sinner (Baym 36). Ethan Brands obsession helps him make a discovery about himselfhe was perhaps innocently motivated (Jones 59), but because this innocence was the innocence of immaturity and ignorance, Brand is unable to overcome his obsession. Brand never matures to the point of being able to reconnect himself with humanity. Little Joe, though still innocent in his own way, has a maturity that Ethan Brand lacks. Joe, connected to humanity (particularly his father) can see what is wrong with Ethan. As the boy followed his father into the hut, he looked back at the wayfarer, and the tears came into his eyes, for his tender spirit had an intuition of the bleak and terrible loneliness in which this man had enveloped himself (240). Baym notes that the passion Brand feels makes it difficult for his intellect to do the directing his heart needs, though Brand doesnt realize it. He thinks his intellect is fully developed and in control but as Baym explains, This intellectual development, he muses, has disturbed the counterpoise of head and heart. He has developed a mighty intellect and his heart has ceased to partake of the universal throb. Both of

Irish these facts are true, but their sequence is wrong. When the heart

ceased to partake of the universal throb, then and only then it became possible to put the intellect to shameful useThe time-sequence emphasizes the subordination of intellect to passion. (45) In contrast to this idea of a passionate heart controlling Brand, Miller postulates that Brand is a sinner because his intellect is overcoming his heart: The sinner first elevates his intellect to a triumphant position over his heart, an act which invariably results in a consuming passion, or monomania, in which all values are sacrificed to a single overruling purposethe transgressor, intent on accomplishing his one single purpose, imposes his will, without regard for the sanctity of the human heart and soul, on others, diabolically forcing them to do his bidding. (95) Whether Miller or Baym is correct is irrelevant; if either the heart or the head gets the better of the other, monomania and loss of humanity result. This concept is clear in The Birthmark when Aylmer becomes obsessed with removing the small handprint-like birthmark on his wife Georgianas cheek. Aylmer is very similar to Ethan, though at a different point in the storyjust starting on the path to losing his humanity to his obsession. Aylmers problem with humanity seems to be its imperfection. He has repeatedly failed with the experiments he performs, and the fact that Georgiana has this one small imperfection drives him to the point of madness. Miller believes this obsession with perfection is a failure of

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visionwith all of their [Aylmer and Ethan Brands] intellectual development, they have not the vision to see beyond this shadowy scope of time (92). Because Aylmer fails to see the necessity of imperfection, he fails to be truly human. Many critics see Aylmers tale as a tale of the dangers of tampering with the soul and its connection to the body. Elizabeth R. Napier, in her essay Aylmer as Scheidknstler: The Pattern of Union and Separation in Hawthornes The Birthmark, calls Aylmer a

Scheideknstler (literally, an artist of separation). In Goethes usage,

the term came to express a preoccupation with phenomena of attraction and repulsion not in a chemical but in the psychological domain. Broadly speaking Goethestressed thedangers of attempting to separate out any single aspect of the psyche. (32) Aylmer, as immature and ignorant as Ethan Brand is about the true nature of the soul and what it means to be human, allows the birthmark to ignite his passions, trifling as it at first appeared, it so connected itself with innumerable trains of thought and modes of feeling that it became the central point of all (120). The mark so consumes his thoughts that every time Aylmer sees it, it shocks him (119). Georgiana makes an astute observation when she cries to him, You cannot love what shocks you! (119). After his dream clearly reveals the passion about Georgianas birthmark, and his obsession with its removal, Aylmer becomes aware of the tyrannizing influence acquired by one idea over his mind, and of the lengths which he might find in his

Irish heart to go for the sake of giving himself peace (121). Again, the heart and the mind are both affected by the obsession; and though Aylmer recognizes the obsession, he seems incapable of changing his course. Aylmer, simply enough, is

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unable to check his compulsion to separate and distill (Napier 33). This compulsion is evidence of his lack of maturity, and of his eventual loss of his humanity. Jerry A. Herndon, in Hawthornes Dream Imagery, claims a solution to Aylmers problem exists, but Aylmer could not use the solution: he was lacking too much in the necessary quality. Because he could not love Georgiana well enough to overlook her birthmark[he] had nightmares of cutting it away which drove him to seek to perfect her at the cost of her life. If Aylmer could have learned to overcome his dream by love and thus to find beyond the shadowy scope of timethe perfect future in the present, he would have overcome his obsession, [b]ut he could not (539). Aylmer had allowed his intellect and his heart to separate too much. This separation of his own soul causes Aylmer to abhor Georgiana herself she is so unified, spirit and body, eternal and finite. Thus his experiment becomes an attempt to reorganize Georgianas psychethe final eradication of the birthmark dissolves the organizing principle of Georgianas psycheand what appears at first to be Aylmers scientific failure becomesthe ultimate figuring forth of his philosophy (Napier 34). This reorganizing is a symptom of his obsession, and if Aylmer had matured and was able to love, he would have been able to save Georgiana and himself.

Irish But he confuses perfection of love with perfection of the woman, and in tampering with her, in an attempt to modify and re-create her, he

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destroysIndeedAylmer[is] fundamentally unable to love and therefore cannot fall into humanity and maturity (Askew 341). Real love is not obsession. Real love doesnt focus on one aspect, but all aspects. This inability to love also demonstrates the danger of being a Scheideknstler. Aylmers attempt to separate out the single unknown part of Georgianas psyche indicates an ominous and tragic inability to deal with the complexity of being human (Napier 34). This failure to engage in the fundamental loving relation (Baym 41) means Aylmer is trapped in his obsessed world, unwilling to reunite the separate parts of his own psyche. Georgianas reaction to her husband also shows the damaging effects separating ones psyche can create. She lamented, and with her whole spirit she prayed that, for a single moment, she might satisfy his highest and deepest conception. Longer than one moment she well knew it could not be; for his spirit was ever on the march, ever ascending, and each instant required something that was beyond the scope of the instant before. (128) Because Aylmers intellect and heart are not working together, but are being individually consumed by his obsession, he is incapable of recognizing contentment, of understanding and stopping when he has reached happiness. His monomania continues to drive him to make rash decisions, to his detriment.

Irish As has been mentioned before, there is a simple solution to Aylmers predicament. Unfortunately, the solution requires that ones heart and head be united, for love is a state of being one can only attain if the heart and head are equal partners. This connection is clear from Askews comments on the situation: So love itself, then, is the only forgiveness, for it involves the desire to give as well as to take (seeking aid and giving it); it involves the

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realization that happiness for ones self must provide happiness for the loved one. Narcissistic action, therefore, is modified into responsible behavior to assure happiness for others so that part may answer to part and the complements join into new wholeness (339) For Aylmer, as a Scheideknstler, this joining of parts is impossible, both in himself with his mind and heartthe separate parts of his psycheand for him and Georgiana, no matter how much Georgiana wishes to unite completely with him. The concept of the psyche and its wholeness or completeness is also addressed in The Artist of the Beautiful. The butterfly Owen Warland creates is clearly a symbol. Bethea states, we should remember that psyche refers to both butterfly and soul. Hawthorne seeks thereby to legitimize Warlands art, to assert that this artist is not merely chasing an idle fancy but rather pursuing a quest that finally comes to include much more (32). In contrast, Curran asserts [T]he choice of the butterfly as the central symbol also reinforces [the] underlying irony. As a symbol of the soul, it functions as an ominous sign in Hawthornes canon, for Owens creation if his soul in the

Irish symbolic form of the butterfly suggests the Psyche myth, and in doing so, magnifies the butterflys value as a symbol of overreaching pride.

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His artwork becomes a symbolic self-portraitSuch egocentric artistic expression suggests Ethan Brand and Aylmer and therefore functions as a foreshadowing devicethe pride before the fall. (42) But Owen does not actually fall. Yes, his creation is destroyed; however, unlike the first several times, when Annies child destroys the butterfly, Owen is calm. This serenity does not suggest a fatal flaw-filled pride, but an overcoming of the pride Owen might have originally possessed. Owen Warland is still a sinner. He is not really a fully functioning individual, especially at the beginning of the story. When he starts losing customers because of his different methods of treating the clocks (adding music and painting faces), Hawthorne tells us that while a misfortune, it was probably reckoned among his better accidents by Owen Warland, who was becoming more and more absorbed in a secret occupation which drew all his science and manual dexterityThis pursuit had already consumed many months (162). Owen is very passionate about his butterfly, and it affects his relationship with humanity. Still, Baym points out, greater and lesser sinners may be distinguished in Hawthornes work according to the relative preponderance of selfish or selfless passions in their make-up (35). Owen does have selfish tendencies, but in one of his soliloquies we learn his reason for his obsession: If I strive to put the very spirit of beauty into form and give it motion, it is for [Annies] sake alone (162). In this way, Owen joins a group

Irish described by Baym in these words: Less culpable are those who balance their selfish passions with social love, for only these can regret the injuries they cause

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(35). Unlike those who are either unmoved by the hurt they initiate or who actually desire to trigger pain in others (Baym 35), Owen still chases butterflies in the field in order to get a closer look at them but never to catch them, never to kill thembecause for Owen their playful motion, their very life, is essential to the spirit and beauty he would catch in his artistic creation (Newberry 91). Owen has an obsession with beauty and the soul as surely as Aylmer and Ethan Brand do, but a different kind of obsession. Several critics assert that, unlike Aylmer and Ethan Brand, Owen Warland does not isolate himself, but the society he inhabits does not extend him any understanding, sympathy, or niche. He is rejected and alienated, (Bethea 24) isolation ultimately forced upon him (Jones 61). In this isolation, Owen is free to obsess over his psyche (in Greek meaning both soul and butterfly), but Owen chooses not to remain in isolation when he succeeds in his quest. In this way, Owen is not a monomaniac such as Brand or AylmerOwen instead resembles any other man with human yearnings, but separated from the multitude by a peculiar lot and by his societys obsession with pragmatism (Bethea 26). It is important to note that Bethea believes the society has an obsession just as surely as Owen does. Owen simply does not share that obsessionhe has found a different passion to follow. As Newberry notes, This is not to say that Owen rejects their version of reality. He doesnt. Clearly, his own version sometimes includes theirs, as witnessed by his

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ability to repair clocks(86). Owen simply has another version of reality, one more deeply concerned with the soul than most in this pragmatic society, including Peter Hovenden, who lauds the blacksmith and his practical work as the best (160). This vision of the soul Owen attempts to capture in his butterfly is what holds his heart and his head together, even with his obsession. When Annie accidentally breaks the butterfly, the artist seized her by the wrist with a force that made her scream aloud. She was affrighted at the convulsion of intense rage and anguish that writhed across his features (167). But instead of striking out at Annie, as one might imagine a person would do if obsession has detached heart and intellect, Owen has a different reaction. The next instant he let his head sink upon his hands. Go, Annie murmured he; I have deceived myself, and must suffer for it. I yearned for sympathy, and thought, and fancied, and dreamed that you might give it me; but you lack the talisman, Annie, that should admit you into my secrets. That touch has undone the toil of months and the thought of a lifetime! It was not your fault, Annie; but you have ruined me! (167) Someone with either the heart and its passion in control, or with the mind and its cold intellect driving the actions, would do something inhumane. But Owen does not rage. He does not hit. He simply admits that he made a mistake in trusting Annie, and asks her to leave. He does not even blame her for the ruin she has caused. This

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saintly reaction shows the equal, leveling influence of a united heart and head, or in other words, a complete and whole psyche. In The Artist of the Beautiful the people said that Owen wasted the sunshinein wandering through the woods and fields but Hawthorne says, the chase of butterflies was an apt emblem of the ideal pursuit in which he had spent so many golden hours (166). Then Hawthorne asks the crucial questionbut would the beautiful idea ever be yielded to his hand like the butterfly that symbolized it? (166). Finally, after years of toil and multiple starts and stops and restarts, Owen finishes his beautiful butterfly. Instead of trapping himself in his rooms and never showing anyonesomething he could easily justify since no one has shown any lasting interest in or love for Owens obsessionhe seeks out Annie and her family, attempting to share his discovery of his soul. When Annie asks if the created butterfly is alive, Owen replies, Alive? Yes, Annie; it may well be said to possess life, for it has absorbed my own being into itself; and in the secret of that butterfly, and in its beautyis represented the intellect, the imagination, the sensibility, the soul of an Artist of the Beautiful! (174). In his essay, Hawthornes The Artist of the Beautiful, James W. Gargano posits our last view of him is dramatically crucial. Up to this moment, he has been in imbalance, and even derangement. Like anyone else in conflict, he has contrasted unfavorably with those around him who live safely and comfortably (228). As was stated in the beginning of this essay, there are many points where Owen doesnt

Irish look good, where it is easy to compare him to the obsessed monomaniacs Aylmer and Brand. But the appearance of the butterfly in the last scene, with all of the transformative possibilities symbolized by butterflies generally, coincides with a

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noticeable change in Owenduring an intervening two years or more elided by the text, Owen has unmistakably matured. Gone are his callow petulance, quavering and narcissism (Newberry 90). Owen is a complete individual, now reaching out to engage in the society of those who had mocked and rejected him. He has lost his obsession with the butterfly, and by extension, with his soul. The finished symbol that has manifested the beautiful is no longer an obsession with Warland, for his spirit now possess(es) itself in the enjoyment of reality, a crucial passage in the story (Bethea 30). This new reality is Hawthornes view of the artist. Gargano claims his description of Warland compels us to see the artist not as a bodiless spirit but as a human being who is prepared to accept with tranquility the fragility of [life]The artist has learned to view life sub specie aeternitatis [in relation to the eternal]; he has not locked himself up in a lofty and exclusive spiritual tower (230). This is the essential difference between Owen and Aylmer, between Owen and Ethan: Owen refuses to hide from reality, to lock his soul away from humanity, even as it rejects him. As the last lines of the story suggest, Owen has caught a far other butterfly [soul] than this [now broken mechanical creation]. When the artist rose high enough to achieve the beautifulhis spirit possessed itself (177). Owen is vastly different from Aylmer and Ethan, who each attempt to wrest their souls and the

Irish souls of others in order to find and contain them. Owen gently chases his psyche, letting neither his heart nor his intellect overpower the other. This balance of heart and head, even with an obsession, allows Owen to be actively engaged in living; indeed I would go so far as to suggest that his is an intense life of exploration and discovery (Gargano 227). Owen matures and loses his innocent obsession with himself, while still recognizing and acting out against the negative qualities of society. Bethea declares, The Artist of the Beautiful finally affirms Owen Warland as the most viable artist figure in Hawthornes canon. Warland, unlike Aylmer [or] Branddoes stand up again mankind and, finally, with humanity, or perhaps more accurately, he engages forcefully with a society (34). Owen learns to use love and his own complete soul to handle the trials and imperfections of life, to handle the fact that life doesnt happen in eternity. For Ethan Brand and Aylmer, who chose to become passionate and obsessed instead of learning to mature and love, life was pointless, especially when their

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obsession was destroyed or doubted. As Hawthorne states in The Birthmark, the momentary circumstance was too strong for him; he failed to look beyond the shadowy scope of time, and, living once for all in eternity, to find the perfect future in the present (131). Obsession is living for the moment with no sense of eternity. The world and time begin and end with the obtainment of the object of desire. Owens cure for his obsession is to live beyond his obsession, to be ok with its passing away. This might be what the Beautiful actually is. And even though he

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tried to share it, the Beautiful is not truly understandable by those who, like Annie and her family, havent had to learn to keep their heart and head together, to join the psyche into completeness. Perhaps this is why when the butterfly was laughed at (yet again) and an explanation was demanded, Owen doesnt explain how much people would actually pay for the butterfly, but the artist smiled and kept the secret to himself (175). The Beauty of a complete soul that has survived the threat to heart and head created by obsessionthis is Hawthornes picture of the Artist of the Beautiful.

Irish Works Cited

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Askew, Melvin W. Hawthorne, the Fall, and the Psychology of Maturity. American

Literature. 34.3 (1962): 335-343. JSTOR. Web. 7 March 2012.

Baym, Nina. The Head, the Heart, and the Unpardonable Sin. The New England

Quarterly. 40.1 (1967): 31-47. JSTOR. Web. 6 March 2012.

Bethea, Dean Wentworth. Heat, Light, and the Darkening World: Hawthornes The Artist of the Beautiful. South Atlantic Review. 56.4 (1991): 23-35.

JSTOR. Web. 6 March 2012.

Curran, Ronald T. Irony: Another Thematic Dimension to The Artist of the Beautiful. Studies in Romanticism. 6.1 (1966): 34-45. JSTOR. Web. 7 March 2012. Gargano, James W. Hawthornes The Artist of the Beautiful. American

Literature. 35.2 (1963): 225-30. JSTOR. Web. 5 March 2012.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Artist of the Beautiful. Nathaniel Hawthornes Tales. Ed. James McIntosh. New York: W.W. Norton &Company, 1987. 159-177. Print. ---. The Birthmark. Nathaniel Hawthornes Tales. Ed. James McIntosh. New York: W.W. Norton &Company, 1987. 118-131. Print. ---. Ethan Brand. Nathaniel Hawthornes Tales. Ed. James McIntosh. New York: W.W. Norton &Company, 1987. 231-243. Print. Herndon, Jerry A. Hawthornes Dream Imagery. American Literature. 46.4 (1975): 538-545. JSTOR. Web. 5 March 2012.

Irish Jones, Victor H. Laughter in Hawthornes Fiction. College Literature. 5.1 (1978): 57-61. JSTOR. Web. 5 March 2012.

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Miller, James E., Jr. Hawthorne and Melville: The Unpardonable Sin. PMLA. 70.1 (1955): 91-114. JSTOR. Web. 6 March 2012. Napier, Elizabeth R. Aylmer as Scheidknstler: The Pattern of Union and Separation in Hawthornes The Birthmark. South Atlantic Bulletin 41.4 (1976): 32-35. JSTOR. Web. 6 March 2012. Newberry, Fredrick. The Artist of the Beautiful: Crossing the Transcendent Divide in Hawthornes Fiction. Nineteenth-Century Literature. 50.1 (1995): 78-96. JSTOR. Web. 5 March 2012. obsession, n. OED Online. 3rd Ed. 2004. Web. 9 March 2012. passion, n. OED Online. 5th Ed. 2005. Web. 9 March 2012.