earticle

영어

This article examines Nathaniel Hawthorne’s attempt to find a new idealistic society and establish a new relationship between members of the community in his The Blithedale Romance. The novel was written based on Hawthorne’s own experience in Brook Farm, which aimed for a transcendental utopian community. This novel is Hawthorne’s bitter criticism of his contemporary society in the sense that the people leave their ancestors’ god-blessed country to start a new ideal society. Hawthorne presents the experience and the individuals of the community through the eyes of Coverdale, the narrator, who participates in the ideal community to attain vitality to be a ‘major poet’ and to build up new identity. The narrator observes the complicated relationships among the three important characters: beautiful, voluptuous Zenobia,
iron-willed philanthropist Hollingsworth, and frail and conventionally obedient Priscilla.
Zenobia symbolizes the vitality that everyone in the society longs for; however, not only Hollingsworth but Coverdale rejects her even though he is much attracted to her. Because of her unconventionality, Zenobia’s chance for a new life is destroyed by both men and the society. After she commits suicide, others in the novel loses hope they had when they first became a part of the Blithedale community. Consequently they desert the community and their experiments end as a failure. With the frustration of experimenting the ideal community Hawthorne indirectly tells the readers to consider a way to establish a new better society themselves. The readers need to look beyond the surface of the novel to grasp Hawthorne's true message in The Blithedale Romance.