Hawthorne Nathaniel. The House of the Seven Gables

Webster’s Thesaurus Edition for PSAT, SAT, GRE, LSAT, GMAT, and AP English Test Preparation.INTRODUCTORY NOTE
In September of the year during the February of which Hawthorne had
completed "The Scarlet Letter," he began "The House of the Seven Gables."
Meanwhile, he had removed from Salem to Lenox, in Berkshire County,
Massachusetts, where he occupied with his family a small red wooden house,
still standing at the date of this edition, near the Stockbridge Bowl.%
"I sha'n't have the new story ready by November," he explained to his
publisher, on the 1st of October, "for I am never good for anything in the literary
way till after the first autumnal frost, which has somewhat such an effect on my
imagination that it does on the foliage here about me-multiplying and
brightening its hues." But by vigorous application he was able to complete the
new work about the middle of the January following.
Since research has disclosed the manner in which the romance is interwoven
with incidents from the history of the Hawthorne family, "The House of the
Seven Gables" has acquired an interest apart from that by which it first appealed
to the public. John Hathorne (as the name was then spelled), the greatgrandfather
of Nathaniel Hawthorne, was a magistrate at Salem in the latter part
of the seventeenth century, and officiated at the famous trials for witchcraft held
there. It is of record that he used peculiar severity towards a certain woman who
was among the accused; and the husband of this woman prophesied that God
would take revenge upon his wife's persecutors. This circumstance doubtless