The Representation of Female Characters in the Romances of Hawthorne: A Comparison with the Popular Romance Fiction of America in the Twentieth Century

Here's the abstract:

The study attempts to make a close analysis of the central female characters in the romances of the American author Nathaniel Hawthorne. This paper studies the central female characters in his romances and argues that they have gracefully adorned the feminist concerns of their times. Their radical nature and modern outlook augment the contemporary feminist’s fight for equality; perhaps to such an extent that they were more able, courageous, and confident in facing the vicissitudes of life than the male heroes in his romances. These characters reveal significant traces of proto-feminism in their actions and ideologies whereas Feminism, in theory, was non-existent during those times.The paper further compares Hawthorne’s female characters with the heroines of modern romances published in America in the twentieth century and posits that Hawthorne’s women characters were far more modern even though conceived a century ago.