This biography of Nathaniel Hawthorne places the writer in the midst of the literary and cultural turmoil of the early republic. The author draws on Hawthorne's letters and notebooks, as well as on readings of his fiction in recreating the details of Hawthorne's life: the long apprenticeship of the reclusive young author, his romantic courtship of Sophia Peabody and his travels to Europe at the height of his literary career.