"Nathaniel Hawthorne's Intention in "Chiefly About War Matters

Bibliographic Data

ID9589807
AuthorsJames Bense (corresponding author)
Year1989
Volume61
Issue2
Pages200
Publication date1989-05-01
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Literature (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0002-9831 • E-ISSN: 1527-2117
PublisherJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/2926693
OpenAlexW2319908319
LanguageEN
Citations received5

DESPITE its notoriety among Hawthorne specialists, Chiefly iLl About War Matters remains one of the author's least known and appreciated writings published during his lifetime. Hawthorne's motive in what is alleged to have been an act of authorial self-censorship has not been clearly understood. Neither has evidence to the contrary been fully examined. Traditionally, an imprecise account of disagreements that arose between Hawthorne and his publishers has beclouded the genesis of the text, confusing elements of Hawthorne's intentional satire with reported last-minute concessions to suppress and nullify parts of the original version. The following analysis of what happened brings the essay into its proper light and takes a first step toward a critical appreciation of its true character. Although expurgations did occur, the facts derived from the evidence as a whole indicate that Hawthorne had originally devised his essay in great part as a censorship hoax. As a result of constraints he felt while trying to write honestly about the war, he created a satirical dialectic between his narrator and an imaginary editor. Through this ventriloquism, which has been misapprehended as self-censorship, Hawthorne's essay communicates the importance of maintaining freedom of speech while it is most severely tested, when the passions of a nation in turmoil threaten to suppress it

Hawthorne effect · Psychoanalysis · Cultural Studies and Interdisciplinary Research · History · Psychology · Social Psychology

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