The Marble Faun (1860) was the last of the four major romances by Nathaniel Hawthorne. After writing The Blithedale Romance in 1852, Hawthorne, approaching fifty, turned away from publication and obtained a political appointment as American Consul in Liverpool, England, an appointment which he held from 1853 to 1857. In 1858, Hawthorne and his wife, Sophia Peabody, moved to Italy and became, essentially, tourists for a year and a half. 1860 is the leap year starting on Sunday. ... Nathaniel Hawthorne (July 4, 1804 – May 19, 1864) was a 19th century American novelist and short story writer. ... The Blithedale Romance (1852) was the third of the major romances of Nathaniel Hawthorne. ... Hawthorne is the name of several places in the United States of America: Hawthorne, California Hawthorne, Florida Hawthorne, Nevada Hawthorne, New Jersey Hawthorne, New York Hawthorne, Portland, Oregon Nathaniel Hawthorne is well-known as an American literary author. ... Liverpools skyline, as seen from the River Mersey. ... Royal motto: Dieu et mon droit (French: God and my right) Englands location within the UK Official language English de facto Capital London de facto Largest city London Area  - Total Ranked 1st UK 130,395 km² Population  - Total (2001)  - Density Ranked 1st UK 49,138,831 377/km² Religion... Sophia Amelia Peabody (1809–1871) was a painter and illustrator born in Salem, Massachusetts. ...

In the spring of 1858, Hawthorne was inspired to write his romance when he saw the Faun of Praxiteles in a Roman sculpture gallery. Praxiteles, of Athens, the son of Cephisodotus, the greatest of the Attic sculptors of the 4th century BC, who has left an imperishable mark on the history of art. ...

The Marble Faun is Hawthorne's most unusual romance, and possibly one of the strangest major works of American fiction. Writing on the eve of the American Civil War, Hawthorne set his story in a fantastical Italy. The romance mixes elements of a fable, pastoral, gothic novel, and travel guide. The climax comes less than halfway through the story, and Hawthorne intentionally fails to answer many of a reader's questions about the characters and the plot. (Complaints about this led Hawthorne to add a facetious Postscript to the second edition, wherein he continues to fail - purposefully - to answer most of these questions.) Its theme, characteristic of Hawthorne, is guilt and the Fall of Man. The four main characters are Miriam, a beautiful art student who is compared to Eve, Beatrice Cenci, Lady Macbeth, Judith, and Cleopatra, and is being pursued by a mysterious, threatening Model; Hilda, an innocent painter who is compared to the Virgin Mary; Kenyon, a sculptor, who represents rationalist humanism; and Donatello, the Count of Monti Beni, who is compared to Adam, resembles the Faun of Praxiteles, and is probably only half human. A civil war is a war in which the competing parties are segments of the same country or empire. ... In its strict sense a fable is a short story or folk tale embodying a moral, which may be expressed explicitly at the end as a maxim. ... Titians The Pastoral Concert Pastoral refers to the lifestyle of shepherds. ... Strawberry Hill, an English mansion in the Gothic revival style, built by seminal Gothic writer Horace Walpole The gothic novel is an English literary genre, which can be said to have been born with The Castle of Otranto (1764) by Horace Walpole. ... The following is a list of travel guides and web sites with substantial international coverage. ... Essentially, original sin is the doctrine, shared in one form or another by most Christian churches, that the sin of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden changed or damaged human nature, such that all human beings since then are innately predisposed to sin, and are powerless to overcome... God creates Adam, by Michelangelo. ... Beatrice Cenci ( 1577- 1599) was an Italian noblewoman, the daughter of the violent patriarch Francesco Cenci. ... Scene from Macbeth, depicting the witches conjuring of an apparition in Act IV, Scene I Macbeth is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, based loosely on the historical King Macbeth of Scotland. ... Missing image Judith with the Head of Holophernes, by Christophano Allori, 1613 (Pitti Palace, Florence The Book of Judith is a parable, or perhaps the first historical novel according to Jewish authorities, who do not place it among the writings of the Tanakh or Hebrew Bible. ... Cleopatra Cleopatra VII Philopator (Κλεοπάτρα θεά φιλοπάτωρ, December, 70 BC or January, 69 BC–August 12?, 30 BC) was queen of ancient Egypt. ... The term Virgin Mary has several different meanings: For the historical and multi-denominational concept of Mary, see Mary, the mother of Jesus. ... Humanism is a general term for many different lines of thought which focus on common solutions to common human issues. ... God creates Adam, by Michelangelo. ...

External links

• Free eBook of The Marble Faun — Volume 1 (http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2181) at Project Gutenberg
• Free eBook of The Marble Faun — Volume 2 (http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2182) at Project Gutenberg
• HTML full online text (http://www.litfix.com/hawthorne/marblefaun/index.html)