Book Review: The House of the Seven Gables (Hawthorne)
Have I read this before: I THOUGHT I had, but holy hell, I don’t remember any of this stuff. I do vaguely recall checking this book out of our junior high library, which means it was one of the first books I read on my list way back when and I was probably…twelve? Thirteen? So yeah, who remembers anything about anything involving one’s tween years?
(I do but LET’S NOT GO THERE)
Review: This was good, mainly because I like Hawthorne’s writing style. I like how the house itself was basically described as a living (and haunted) thing and how the Colonel’s portrait on the wall reacted to events taking place in the house. The ending was a bit of a letdown as I was expecting something a little more…not grandiose, necessarily, but impactful.
Favorite Part: Just the writing style. It flowed very nicely and was easy to read in the sense that the style basically prompted you onwards. I like that kind of style.
Rating: 5/10
Book Review: The Scarlet Letter (Hawthorne)
Have I read this before: No, surprisingly. This is one of those “everybody considers it a classic” books that I actually hadn’t read until now. I’m not sure why.
Review: This was better than I was expecting it to be, but that might be because my knowledge of it (apart from general references) has just been people saying “UGH I had to read this in high school and it was so booooring!”
That seems to be a theme with a lot of these books, eh?
But it was good and not at all boring! It was a lot more “modern” in its tone than I was anticipating, if that makes any sense. That is, even though the shaming of Hester was very “Puritan-esque,” it still felt like it was relevant to how people can be shunned and shamed today, especially with how peoples’ attitudes toward Hester bled over into their attitudes towards her daughter.
Favorite part: I honestly wasn’t expecting Dimmesdale to publicly confess what he’d done. Even with all the guilt he was feeling (and the way it was manifesting itself physically), I expected him to just let Hester and Pearl continue to take all the blame. It was a refreshing ending in the sense that it wasn’t what I thought would happen.
Rating: 6/10
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