Dec 28, 2009

The Minister's Black Veil: A Paradigm | Author Biography

Nathaniel Hawthorne was born on July 4, 1804 in Salem, Massachusetts, the second of three children born to Nathaniel and Elizabeth Hathorne. (Their son added the "w" to the family name when he began his writing career.) In 1808, his father, a ship's captain, died of yellow fever in the distant port of Surinam. Shortly thereafter, four-year-old Nathaniel moved with his mother and two sisters, Elizabeth and Maria Louisa, from their home on Union Street to the house next door belonging to the Mannings, his mother's family. In the Manning household, Hawthorne's keen intelligence was noted...