Mesmerism and Hawthorne: Mediums of American Romance (Appalachian Echoes) - Hardcover

Coale, Samuel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0817308962 ISBN 13: 9780817308964

Publisher: The University of Alabama Press, 1998

Synopsis

In Mesmerism and Hawthorne, Coale examines the mesmerist-spiritualist craze and relates it specifically to the way in which Hawthorne wrote fiction. Although many critics have discussed mesmerism as a theme in Hawthorne's work, few have analyzed the use of mesmerism as an influence on the very structure and texture of that work. For Hawthorne, mesmerism provided a fertile circumstance, complete with its sense of enchantment and the necessity of breaking its spell. The powers and techniques of mesmerism offered Hawthorne a way of describing the fiction he was trying to create. In effect what he described as the romance participates in the very acts of mesmerism it invokes and thematically or morally opposes. Thus, in creating his romances, Hawthorne employed his own mesmerist-like strategies in texts that participate in the very medium he abhorred. In effect, Coale concludes, Hawthorne's romances constitute a form of mesmeric expression themselves. Coale's examination of the processes of mesmerism - the creation of the trance, the entry into its dreamlike state, the psychology of idolatry produced by this procedure - clearly reveals the affinities between mesmerism and Hawthorne's art and discloses the power and scope of Hawthorne's distinctly American romance.

About this title

Review:

"Professor Coale's illuminating study of mesmerism traces a central thread running throughout Nathaniel Hawthorne's life and art and reveals how Hawthorne's interest in, and concern for, mesmerism helped to shape both his theory and practice of fiction. This book will stimulate fruitful readings or rereadings of Hawthorne's work."--John L. Idol, Jr., Clemson University

Synopsis:

The author explores the profound influence the mesmerist and spiritualist "craze" of the 1840s and 1850s had on Hawthorne's artistic vision and fictional techniques. Despite abhorring the "pseudosciences" as incarnations of witchcraft, their effect on the creation of his romances can be traced.

About this edition

• Publisher: The University of Alabama Press
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0817308962
• ISBN 13: 9780817308964
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 224