Unknown In American Literature

Nathaniel Hawthorne was a popular author during the nineteenth century, the time in which Romanticism had a significant influence upon literature. The literary genre of romanticism has six main components: the individual, imagination, personal and social intuition, nature, emotion, and the unknown. The unknown is typically portrayed as death as throughout the time period in which Romanticism was prominent as death was a mystery. While humans can understand the events that occur whilst they live, they know nothing of what happens during death or after death has occurred. Do human beings simply decay in the earth in which they are buried or, perhaps, become spirits and live eternally watching over the Earth they have left? Hawthorne addresses
these questions in his novels, using life and death to illuminate the differences between the known and the unknown. Nathaniel Hawthorne, in The House of the Seven Gables and The Marble Faun, uses life and death to portray the Romantic fascination with the unknown.
Throughout these novels Hawthorne exemplifies the unknown in both common and uncommon ways of thinking. The uncommon unknown involves a collective insight. Nathaniel Hawthorne, in The House of the Seven Gables, leaves Clifford Pyncheon’s past completely hidden from both readers and characters in the novel. This hidden truth exemplifies the need to let the unknown become known, as Clifford Pyncheon is an unhappy figure. This behaviour can be attributed to his unknown past. Similarly, in The Marble Faun, Miriam’s past is entirely unknown to the reader. Hawthorne leaves Miriam’s past hidden to show the unknown’s simplicity, as well as showing that it can affect one’s mental as both Clifford Pyncheon and Miriam lose their grip on sanity: “The sick in mind … are rendered more darkly and hopelessly so by the manifold reflection of their disease, [as] they are compelled to inhale the poison of their own breath, in infinite repetition” (Hawthorne, The House of the Seven Gables 98). Miriam’s mental state deteriorates slowly at first, and then, with a figure from her past appearing, collapses. In contrast the common unknown is based around the characters’ lives appearing in his works.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novels the common unknown creates divides for an assortment of characters.
In The House of Seven Gables the Pyncheon family is isolated from the rest of the society that they live amongst. The town is unaware of the family’s true past, but are frightened by the circumstances surrounding the Pyncheon family’s perceived history The mystery surrounding Clifford Pyncheon was particularly worrisome for the members of the society. In The Marble Faun, an analogous situation occurs. Miriam’s unknown past affects her deeply, which loosens divide the bond the four artists have shared from the novel’s beginning. Miriam and Donatello unite to hide Miriam’s fateful history and the mysterious circumstances surrounding the death of a figure from her past. These hidden secrets split the former colony of artists, leaving the question of whether the unknown should become known to resolve all
conflicts.
In the Romanticism Hawthorne often portrays the unknown as the act of death. Where the unknown is death, the known is life. Hawthorne portrays life in a multifarious of ways throughout his novels. In The House of the Seven Gables, Hawthorne portrays life as a wondrous event that brings hope and happiness to all whom embrace it; “‘In the midst of life – in the throng of our fellow beings! Let you and I be happy!’” (The House of the Seven Gables 179). Hawthorne offers the thought that if one embraces the known, and therefore is less fretful about the unknown life becomes a more joyous and purposeful experience: “to the strong passion of her life” (20). Hawthorne also suggests that focusing upon the known makes life become more fulfilling and inspiring for the individual.
In contrast to Hawthorne’s portrayal of the unknown as death, he delineates the known as life. In The Marble Faun this contrast is evident. However in the novel he focuses more upon how the character’s youth affects their personality and the people surrounding them. Donatello is portrayed by Hawthorne as the most youthful character of the four artists; “‘with a real and commonplace young man like Donatello’” (The Marble Faun 5). Donatello is a stereotypical young man in many significant ways. However, the most common way his youth it portrayed by Hawthorne is his apparent lack of “strict obedience to conventional rules” (6). He shows a distinct disregard for societal rules and is much more carefree than the rest of his fellow artists. The common fear of the unknown does not affect Donatello. Instead he possesses the ability to move through life in a pleasant manner. Youth, life, and the known are all directly connected, and Hawthorne uses these connections to exemplify the importance of the known.
To show the direct contrast between the known and the unknown, Hawthorne uses death to portray the unknown in both The House of the Seven Gables and The Marble Faun.
Hawthorne, in The House of the Seven Gables, portrays the character’s ages using physical descriptions and metaphors: “streaks of grey among her hair, like silver ribbons” (The House of the Seven Gables 35). Hawthorne refers to Hepzibah Pyncheon, an older woman. As she is older and closer to death than the younger generation of characters, her emotions and personality resemble her fear of the unknown. Hawthorne portrays this fear of the unknown in Hepzibah’s isolation and actions. She is harsh in her words and actions, leading many in her society to disregard her. Phoebe, initially, is young and full of life. However, after spending time amongst the Pyncheon family and their unknown past, she feels as if she has grown older: “I have grown a great deal older, in this little time. Older, and I hope, wiser, and – not exactly sadder, but, certainly, with not half so much lightness in my spirit's!” (149). The unknown has had a deepening effect on her
mentality.
Romantic authors used death to exemplify the motif of the unknown. In The Marble Faun, Hawthorne focuses upon death. To some the act of death is seemingly apparent, but Hawthorne attempts to prove otherwise: “‘Death,’ said her persecutor, ‘is not so simple and opportune a thing as you imagine’” (The Marble Faun 56). Hawthorne states, with the persecutor’s death, that death is more complicated than it appears. Hawthorne attempts to portray that whilst death takes a long time to set in and become known, it has been acting upon humans from the moment of their birth: “‘Such a length of time leaning on his arm in the very act of death.’” (8). Therefore the unknown has slowly become known to the readers and characters of the novel, from the very beginning.
Combining his ideas of the known and unknown, Hawthorne creates a different effect, than if the two ideas were to remain separate. Instead of one idea being more prominent than the other, they work in harmony; as if they belong in yin-yang relationship. In The House of the Seven Gables Hawthorne uses the idea of death to reveal information about both the characters involved and the plot itself; “it is very singular how the fact of a man’s death often seems to give people a truer idea of his character” (The House of the Seven Gables 218). Whilst death is a great part of the unknown idea, in this circumstance Hawthorne humanises death, by showing its natural aspect, in order for the known to become the prominent idea. In The Marble Faun, Hawthorne expands on this yin-yang idea: “showed a touch or two that were actually life like and death like” (The Marble Faun 25). A person can be alive and dead at the same time, and, something can also be known and unknown at the same time. Hawthorne also suggests that human beings can learn from the unknown; “‘in the study of my art, I have gained many a hint from the dead which the living could never have given me’” (112). By understanding that not everything has a rational answer, more becomes known. Hawthorne states that the unknown does not always behave in the manner in which it is most commonly portrayed by society: frightful. Perhaps the unknown can become known.
Human beings are often frightened by the romantic ideal of the unknown. As a society, humans fear concepts that they cannot understand or comprehend. The unknown is simply incomprehensible and daunting. Yet, the desire to comprehend the unknown is compelling. Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the ideas of life and death to explain the theory of the unknown. The unknown surrounds all forms of life as everything in this world is either known or not. This question has troubled the human race throughout history, and the desire to explain the phenomena that occur daily has only grown stronger. As most people understand the concepts of life and death, those subject matters are commonly used to explain the unknown. Because of this, literature has always contained the idea of the unknown as a way to explore the universe and questions of what is out in the universe, whilst remaining in a contained environment and creating something understandable to all. Hawthorne was an author more than a hundred and fifty years ago, yet the questions he posed are still congruous with the inquisitions in the modern world. The concept of the unknown will only ever stop being relevant once all is known, and as the universe is an infinite concept, no one knows when that will be. The unknown will continue to be pondered, researched, and written about by human beings throughout the rest of history.