The Blithedale Romance (Annotated)

This edition includes the following editors introduction:Nathaniel Hawthorne and Dark Romanticism
First published in 1852, “The Blithedale Romance” is a novel by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne. Hawthornes third novel and third major "romance," as he called the form. is set in a utopian farming commune based on Brook Farm, an intentional community outside Boston of which Hawthorne was a founding member and where he lived in 1841.
The story loosely follows the authors own experience living on the communal property and dramatizes the conflict between the communes ideals and the members private desires and romantic rivalries.
Part mystery, part romance, “The Blithedale Romance” follows Miles Coverdale (thought to be a mirror of Hawthorne himself), who narrates his experience coming to Blithedale Farm. He becomes acquainted with the group of idealists who live there.
Theres the leader of the group, the reformer Hollingsworth. Zenobia, a feminist, is the heroine of the story. Then theres Priscilla, her sister; Old Moodie, her father; and Westervelt, a hypnotist. They all have one thing in common; they came to the farm to retreat from a society they view as rotten.
In the process of getting to know the others, Coverdale becomes disillusioned by their hypocrisies and contradictions...