When I was in high school, in common with probably 90% of high schoolers in this country, we read Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter. I hated it then, but lately I've been thinking that maybe I misjudged it -- maybe high school was just too young for Hawthorne. So when audible started offering a hugely discounted edition of The House of the Seven Gables with a wonderful reader, it seemed like a great chance to give Hawthorne another shot.
Unfortunately, I'm still not a Hawthorne fan. On a scene-by-scene basis, Seven Gables is fantastic, and the narrator did the scenes full justice. But the whole hangs together very badly -- as wonderful as the individual scenes are, the actual story is not told in any of them; instead, all the important narrative happens off-stage. We know that there's some bad blood between Cliford and Judge Pyncheon -- but the actual cause is thrown away in an aside at the end. Cliford and Hepzibah flee the scene of the crime, making themselves look guilty -- and then turn around and come back before anyone notices (and even that decision is made off-stage). And so on -- every time there's a dramatic moment to be had, Hawthorne can't let us see it; instead, we hear about it later, usually in some off-hand comment.
I've also begun reading The Landmark Herodotus, a very nice edition of the Histories, full of maps, which are so useful in understanding the flow of events, as well as 22 (!) appendices to round out the narrative. I'm finding it fascinating reading, but I've got a long slog ahead of me. I'll have to write more as I get through more of the book.
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