" They haunted Mr. Emerson as they haunted Shelley, and Hawthorne
had to see much of them. But they neither made a convert of him, nor
irritated him into resentment. His long-enduring kindness to the
unfortunate Miss Delia Bacon, an early believer in the nonsense about
Bacon and Shakespeare, was a model of manly and generous conduct. He
was, indeed, an admirable character, and his goodness had the bloom on it
of a courteous and kindly nature that loved the Muses. But, as one has
ventured to hint, the development of his genius and taste was hampered
now and then, apparently, by a desire to put himself on the level of the
general public, and of their ideas. This, at least, is how one explains
to oneself various remarks in his prefaces, journals, and note-books.
This may account for the moral allegories which too weirdly haunt some of
his short, early pieces. Edgar Poe, in a passage full of very honest and
well-chosen praise, found fault with the allegorical business.
Mr. Hutton, from whose "Literary Essays" I borrow Poe's opinion, says:
"Poe boldly asserted that the conspicuously ideal scaffoldings of
Hawthorne's stories were but the monstrous fruits of the bad
transcendental atmosphere which he breathed so long." But I hope this
way of putting it is not Poe's. "Ideal scaffoldings," are odd enough,
but when scaffoldings turn out to be "fruits" of an "atmosphere," and
monstrous fruits of a "bad transcendental atmosphere," the brain reels in
the fumes of mixed metaphors.
Pages:
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217