“He had that sense, or inward prophecy,-- which a young man had better never have been born than not to have, and a mature man had better die at once than utterly to relinquish,-- that we are not doomed to creep on forever in the old bad way, but that, this very now, there are harbingers abroad of a golden era, to be accomplished in his own lifetime.”

American novelist and short story writer

Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist and short story writer. He is known for fiction that explores history, morality, and religion, often through a reflective and uneasy lens. His work helped define the American short story and remains closely associated with themes of guilt, conscience, and the past. Across his novels and shorter fiction, he returns to questions of human nature and the moral weight of experience.