My guest today is author Diana Rubino. She brings us a post that is timely for this season but also informative, as she tells us about her new book, For the Love of Hawthorne, and why she wrote it.
Welcome Diana!
FOR
THE LOVE OF HAWTHORNE
Nathaniel
and Sophia Hawthorne called themselves Adam and Eve as he suffered the shame of
his family’s connection to the Salem Witch Trials.
Meet Diana
My passion for history and
travel has taken me to every locale of my books and short stories, set in
Medieval and Renaissance England, Paris, Egypt, the Mediterranean, colonial
Virginia, New England, Washington D.C. and New York. My urban fantasy romance,
FAKIN’ IT, won a Top Pick award from Romantic Times. I’m a member of Romance
Writers of America, the Richard III Society and the Aaron Burr Association. My
husband Chris and I own CostPro, an engineering firm based in Boston. In my
spare time, I bicycle, golf, play my piano, devour books of any genre, and
spend as much time as possible living the dream on my beloved Cape Cod.
About FOR THE LOVE OF HAWTHORNE
Salem,
Massachusetts witnessed horrific and shameful events in 1692 that haunted the
town for three centuries. Accused as witches, nineteen innocent people were
hanged and one was pressed to death. Judge John Hathorne and Reverend Nicholas
Noyes handed down the sentences. One victim, Sarah Good, cursed Noyes from the
hanging tree: “If you take away my life, God will give you blood to drink!” She
then set her eyes on Judge Hathorne. “I curse you and your acknowledged heirs
for all time on this wicked earth!” Hathorne was not only Sarah Good’s
merciless judge; he also fathered her son Peter and refused to acknowledge him.
In 1717,
Nicholas Noyes choked on his own blood and died. Every generation after the
judge continued to lose Hathorne land and money, prompting the rumor of a
family curse. By the time his great great grandson Nathaniel was born, they
faced poverty.
Ashamed of his
ancestor, Nathaniel added the ‘w’ to his last name. His novels and stories
explore his beliefs and fears of sin and evil, and he based many of his
characters on overbearing Puritan rulers such as Judge Hathorne.
When Nathaniel
first met Sophia Peabody, they experienced instantaneous mutual attraction.
Sparks flew. He rose upon my eyes and soul a king among men by divine right,
she wrote in her journal.
But to
Sophia’s frustration, Nathaniel insisted they keep their romance secret for
three years. He had his reasons, none of which made sense to Sophia. But
knowing that he believed Sarah Good’s curse inflicted so much tragedy on his
family over the centuries, she made it her mission to save him. Sarah was an
ancestor of Sophia’s, making her and Nathaniel distant cousins—but she kept
that to herself for the time being.
Sophia Peabody’s home next to Charter Street Burying
Ground, resting place of Judge Hathorne, Salem, MA
Sophia
suffered severe headaches as a result of childhood mercury treatments. She
underwent routine mesmerizing sessions, a popular cure for many ailments.
Spirits sometimes came to her when mesmerized, and as a spiritualist and
medium, she was able to contact and communicate with spirits. She knew if she
could reach Sarah and persuade her to forgive Judge Hathorne, Nathaniel would
be free of his lifelong burden.
Sarah Good’s
son Peter had kept a journal the family passed down to the Peabodys. Sophia
sensed his presence every time she turned the brittle pages and read his words.
John Hathorne’s legitimate son John also kept a journal, now in the Hawthorne
family’s possession. Living on opposite sides of Salem in 1692, Peter and John
wrote in vivid detail about how the Salem trials tormented them throughout
their lives.
Nathaniel
finally agreed to announce their engagement, and married Sophia on July 9, 1842.
They moved into their first home, The Old Manse in Concord, Massachusetts.
Wanting nothing else but to spend the summer enjoying each other, we became
Adam and Eve, alone in our Garden of Eden, Sophia wrote in her journal.
The Old Manse, the Hawthornes' first home as newlyweds
As success
eluded Nathaniel, they lived on the verge of poverty. After being dismissed
from his day job at the Salem Custom House, he wrote The Scarlet Letter, which
finally gained him the recognition he deserved. But the curse he believed Sarah
cast on his family still haunted him. In the book he asks for the curse to be
lifted.
The House of the Seven Gables, Salem, MA, built in
1668
Sophia urged
Nathaniel to write a novel about the house, knowing it would be cathartic for
him. While they lived in Lenox, Nathaniel finished writing The House of the
Seven Gables. The Gothic novel explored all his fears and trepidations about
the curse. He told Sophia, “Writing it, and especially reading it aloud to you
lifted a tremendous burden off my shoulders. I felt it physically leave me. I
carried this inside me since my youth and couldn’t bring it out to face it. And
I have you, and only you, to thank.”
But he did not
believe the curse could be lifted.
Sophia invited
renowned spiritualist John Spear to The Gables. She explained that she needed
to complete one final step to convince Nathaniel the curse was lifted.
Read More About John Spear
http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2014/06/the-bizarre-mechanical-messiah-of-john-murray-spear/John
Spear
John Spear urged
Nathaniel to forgive Judge Hathorne. “You don’t have to say it out loud,” John
said. “Just forgive him in your heart.”
Nathaniel
whispered his forgiveness.
John,
Nathaniel and Sophia went to Judge Hathorne’s gravesite to give the journals
proper burial.
Grave of Judge Hathorne, Charter Street Burial Ground,
Salem, MA
Why I wrote FOR THE LOVE OF HAWTHORNE
I live near Salem and have been to all the
Hawthorne landmarks there, and in Concord. The House of the Seven Gables has
been my favorite house in the world since I'm a kid. I've always felt a strong
spiritual connection to Salem, and always wanted to write one of my books set
there, including the witch trials.
I read several of his books and stories, to get a
better background on him. Nathaniel wrote from the heart, about his true
beliefs, and his loathing of how the witch victims were treated. He did
consider it disgraceful, and it certainly was. He added the 'w' to his last
name to distance himself from the judge. That tormented him and his family all
his life. It must have been cathartic to him to have his writing as his outlet.
Visit
Salem
www.salem.org
I was
fortunate to get a private tour of the House of the Seven Gables when I was
writing the book; two of the guides, Ryan Conary and David Moffat, showed
me around, and it was fabulous.
Click
here to see their book about the house.
The Wayside, the only home the Hawthornes ever owned, in Concord,
MA
Nathaniel added that room at the top for his writing studio
An Excerpt From FOR THE LOVE OF HAWTHORNE
(Sophia and Nathaniel’s visit to his cousin Susan Ingersoll at The House of the
Seven Gables)
I
went over to a curio cabinet and swept my eyes over the items on the shelves—a
china doll wearing a calico dress, a stack of gold cups and saucers, a red and
blue glass checkerboard propped up to display its surface…and a wooden hammer
on the top shelf. Upon closer inspection, I saw it was a gavel that judges use
in trials. Out of curiosity I picked it up and a shock ran through me as if
electrified. Dear God, was it that
gavel?
I
dropped it to the rug. It landed with a thump. I bent to retrieve it. Somehow I
knew it wouldn’t shock me this time—that was only an initial warning. “Something
about it made me want to touch it, to pick it up and hold it.”
Nathaniel
approached me. He stared at the gavel in my hand, horror darkening his eyes.
His lips parted but no words emerged. I knew what he was thinking—the curse. He
turned to his cousin, pointing at the gavel, his arm trembling.
Susan
hurried over to us, took it from me and placed it back on the shelf. “Yes, it’s
Judge Hathorne’s. What happened, Sophie? Are you all right?”
I
looked down at my open hands, palms up. They burned as if I’d touched a hot
poker. “That gavel—it carries something evil. Has anything happened to you with
this, Susie?”
Nathaniel
backed away and before Susan could answer me, he grasped her arm. “I begged you
to get rid of that accursed thing! You know it shouldn’t be here!”
She
looked from him to me, heaving a deep sigh. “I’m not inclined to dispose of it,
Natty. It’s a family heirloom, notwithstanding its past.”
He
gripped the chair, his face drained of color. “It’s downright evil. You know
what he used that thing for.”
She
held her hands up in surrender. “Very well, I’ll conceal it.” She took it off
the shelf and slid it behind the checkerboard.
“That
should not be in this house!” He stood his ground, his eyes fixed on the
checkerboard as if it would melt in such close proximity to that horrid object.
“It’s
fine there, Natty. It’s concealed from sight now.” She looked at me and
gestured for me to sit again. I sat and gulped my sherry.
“Nathaniel’s
always overcome with distress at the witch trials.” Susan explained what I
already knew.
“And
so should you be,” he cut in.
“If
I must speak for Judge Hathorne, I heard stories of him from my grandfather.”
Susan looked from Nathaniel to me. “The whole hysteria that caught up the judge
was started by unscrupulous men to further their own riches. But spectral
evidence was still admissible. No sane person could believe that blithery.”
Purchase FOR THE LOVE OF HAWTHORNE
http://getbook.at/LoveOfHawthorne
Connect with Diana
My Website
www.dianarubino.com
My Blog
www.dianarubinoauthor.blogspot.com
Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/DianaRubinoAuthor/?ref=hl
Twitter
https://twitter.com/DianaLRubino
