Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist, short story writer and well-known exponent of the genre of dark romance who rose to prominence in the 19th century and was considered among the noted authors of his time. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1825 but according to his own admission, he was not a keen student. He worked as the editor of the magazine ‘American Magazine of Useful and Entertaining Things’ before taking up a job in the Boston Custom House. His first novel ‘Fanshawe’ was published in 1828 but Hawthorne was not satisfied by his efforts. Hawthorne’s forte when he started off was in short stories and his stories were published in several periodicals of the time. However, his first success as a novelist was with the novel ‘The Scarlet Letter’, published in 1850. His other notable works include ‘The House of the Seven Gables’, ‘The Marble Faun’, ‘The Romance of Monte Beni’, ‘The Blithedale Romance’ and other short story collections. Hawthorne was one of the noted thinkers of his time and his writings, novels, thoughts, short stories and books were very well received by his audience. Excerpts from Nathaniel Hawthorne’s books, short stories, novels and other writings have become popular quotations and are frequently quoted by people. Following is a collection of some famous sayings and quotations by Nathaniel Hawthorne which have been collected from a vast sea of his work.
No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
She had not known the weight until she felt the freedom.
Love, whether newly born or aroused from a deathlike slumber, must always create sunshine, filling the heart so full of radiance, that it overflows upon the outward world.
Words - so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
I cannot endure to waste anything so precious as autumnal sunshine by staying in the house."
[Notebook, Oct. 10, 1842]
She wanted—what some people want throughout life—a grief that should deeply touch her, and thus humanize and make her capable of sympathy.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
To do nothing is the way to be nothing.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
No summer ever came back, and no two summers ever were alike. Times change, and people change; and if our hearts do not change as readily, so much the worse for us.
Our Creator would never have made such lovely days, and have given us the deep hearts to enjoy them, above and beyond all thought, unless we were meant to be immortal.
