8 h 55 minAudiobook4 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What happens when love becomes worship, and the past refuses to stay in shadow?
In Idolatry, his 1874 Gothic romance, Julian Hawthorne, son of Nathaniel Hawthorne, brings love close to danger through obsession, ancient mysteries, and forbidden feeling. The title points toward worship given to the wrong thing: a person, a dream, or an idea that can take hold of the mind.
This Victorian romance belongs to a tradition of old secrets, shadowed settings, and strong passions. Its slower pace gives mood and scenery room to unfold. Hawthorne invites a patient reading, one that makes space for openly expressed feeling and the troubling pull of the past.
What you’ll discover
- Love close to danger Explore a Gothic romance where forbidden love and obsession bring desire into unsettling territory.
- The meaning of idolatry Consider the title's troubling suggestion: devotion can fasten on the wrong person, dream, or idea.
- A past that presses Enter a tradition where ancient mysteries give present feelings a deeper, darker weight.
- Atmosphere worth lingering in Take time with shadowed settings and descriptions that let mood gather around strong emotion.
- Feeling in the open Meet a Victorian style that states passion plainly rather than keeping it carefully hidden.
Who will love it
For readers who love atmospheric Victorian fiction, strong passions and old secrets, and anyone interested in the Hawthorne family's place in American letters.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- It grows from the Gothic romance tradition
- Obsession is the engine of the genre
- The past casts a long shadow
- How to read it today
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Götzendienst
by Julian Hawthorne · 1874
Love becomes worship in a Gothic romance where old secrets and obsession turn devotion into danger.
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From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1 of 4
It grows from the Gothic romance tradition
Gothic romance began in the late eighteenth century with tales of haunted houses, hidden rooms and troubled hearts. Writers such as Ann Radcliffe and later Edgar Allan Poe shaped what readers expected. The setting is often old and strange, and the mood is one of unease.
In America the form took its own colour. Nathaniel Hawthorne used it to ask about guilt, secrecy and the weight of inherited sin, and he called many of his longer stories romances rather than novels. A romance, in his sense, was free to bend reality a little in order to show the heart more clearly.
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Who was Julian Hawthorne?
Julian Hawthorne was an American author and journalist, the son of the novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne. He wrote many novels and stories, along with essays and a biography of his parents, and he died in 1934.
What is a Gothic romance?
A Gothic romance is a story of strong feeling and mystery, often set among old houses or hidden histories. It aims to create unease and suspense while following love, fear and the pull of the past.
What does the title Idolatry mean?
Idolatry means giving worship or devotion to something that does not deserve it. In a romance, the word suggests love or desire that grows so strong that it becomes a kind of worship.
The author
Julian Hawthorne
1846–1934 · American novelist and journalist
Julian Hawthorne was an American novelist and journalist, born in Boston in 1846. He was the son of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Sophia Peabody Hawthorne. He wrote novels, short stories, biographies, and journalism. His novel Idolatry appeared in 1874. He lived in Europe and the United States and died in San Francisco in 1934.
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