Jeppson 1 “I have laughed, in bitterness and agony of heart, at the contrast between what I seem and what I am!”: Hawthorne and Perfectionism The quest for perfection and humankind’s ability to recover from mistakes are central to psychology today. In fact, one recent study that investigated teenage and young adult suicides found that perfectionism and unrealistically high expectations played a role in these tragedies (Tornblom 242). It is tempting to view the uptick in attention towards perfection as a symptom of the increasingly fast pace of modern day society that has enhanced expectations for personal achievement and recognition. Combine this with the increased tendency of individuals to compare themselves with others via the advent of instant communication and social media, and it is easy to see why perfectionism has come to occupy a major role in contemporary society. In fact, one psychologist says that the rapid development of technology and current social climate has created the “perfect storm of self-doubt” (Jacobson). However, while most psychologists now label perfection as a potentially crippling disorder, it would be fallacious to assume that the phenomenon has only recently become problematic. While advances in neuroscience and behavioral psychology have given us more information on the potential perils of perfection, coping with failure has long been a central concern of philosophy and literature. One of the literary eras most invested in investigating humanity’s propensity to engage in potentially self-destructive tendencies such as perfectionism is Romanticism. In particular, the Dark Romanticist school of literature has long fascinated scholars for a variety of reasons. In late 18th and early 19th Century British Literature, members of this group —including Shelley, Byron, and Coleridge—amplified Gothic elements of their predecessors and contemporaries to respond to sweeping societal changes. The Industrial Revolution prompted questions related to humankind’s destiny in relation to the natural world, as rapid urbanization left once quaint, Jeppson 2 thriving villages desolate and stunning national landscapes polluted by the engines of industry. In turn, the divide between the haves and the have nots in terms of economics and social influence increased exponentially— especially in large cities. Oftentimes using the supernatural and gothic elements, the Dark Romanticist authors used their writing as a vehicle to critique society, specifically its penchant towards selfishness and greed. An ocean away, the Dark Romanticism movement took shape in North America slightly later than its English counterpart, and while the focus on critiquing societal conditions beneath a layer of compelling, intense, and often fantastical narratives continued, it took on a slightly different bent. In particular, Nathaniel Hawthorne would situate Gothic type elements in the former English colonies and give their narratives a uniquely American flare. Furthermore, he was able to investigate human psychology in a compelling fashion, offering insight into the American psyche that was both engaging and poignant. While Hawthorne would also use his literature as a means to critique aspects of society, his evaluation of the individual, human mind often became the hallmark of his work. There are many facets of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s writings that have made them central to the study of American literature over the past century and a half, and chief among these is how skillfully Hawthorne is able to explore universal aspects of human nature despite his writing taking place in a time period vastly different from the one inhabited by modern critics. One scholar describes Hawthorne’s timelessness by observing that he “launches an investigation of the relationships of fiction to the real world and indicates a subtle and complex interrelationship between the two worlds…this creates the impression that his tale has an authentic base” (Swann 62). Using this authenticity, and despite the fact that American society has perhaps moved past Jeppson 3 the strict and passionless aspects of Puritanism, Hawthorne’s work allows the reader to see that society still struggles with the same issues of cultural and interpersonal myopia that at times prevents us—like the 17th century inhabitants of Massachusetts—from understanding and accepting differences in our peers. In addition, Hawthorne’s understanding of the dark side of human nature serves as a precursor to many modern day psychological concepts, including perfectionism. One of the primary themes of his narratives is humankind’s propensity to err and whether or not humans can be redeemed from mistakes. In accordance with this statement, literary critic Constance T. Hunt made this apt observation of Hawthorne in her in-depth study of his work: Among the dilemmas that most preoccupy Hawthorne is the elusive promise of human perfection inherent in American culture. He sees this perfectionism expressed in his own time, both in Americans’ embrace of modern natural science’s promise of technological progress and in utopian political projects sustained by this promise. He does not, however, see the promise of human perfectibility as unique to his contemporary situation or solely as a response to the idea of scientific progress (Hunt 26). While Hunt proceeds to give a careful analysis of Hawthorne’s ability to show how aspects of the Puritan Theocracy endured into his nineteenth century, I would further assert that elements of the Puritanical conception of perfection have endured to this modern era, and thus Hawthorne’s work can continue to help contemporary readers continue to negotiate with their own fallibility. It is important to note that, for Hawthorne, perfection had a vastly different meaning than it has today. Claudia Johnson, in her influential article Hawthorne and 19th Century Jeppson 4 Perfectionism, argues that—to some extent—Hawthorne was influenced in part by Thomas Upham’s Christian Perfectionism which argued that humanity needed to turn from a focus on self to a focus on serving others. Since Upham was a young professor at Bowdoin College while Hawthorne was in attendance, many scholars have argued that his concepts of individual determinism and Christian Perfectionism influenced Hawthorne’s writing. While, of course, it is impossible to say to what extent Hawthorne’s work was motivated by Upham, there is a remarkable similarity between Upham’s idea that too much inward reflection can corrupt, or as Johnson says in her article, “Hawthorne was strongly convinced that the man who would be regenerated must make a descent into the tomb of the heart, he, like the [19th-century] perfectionists, was just as strongly convinced of the dangers of sustained inwardness” (Johnson 589). In short, in contrast to behavioral psychologists, Hawthorne’s conception of perfectionism had a religious bent to it that focused on a person’s duty to serve others rather than become trapped in an “inner hell” (590). In addition, the transcendentalist belief that perfection was attained through self-reliance and not through an organized religion would have impacted Hawthorne’s conception of perfectionism. While the idea of self-reliant individuals joining together to create a utopian community was initially an attractive proposition to Hawthorne, his own failed experiment with a social utopia would cause him to splinter from the transcendental concept of perfectionism and more closely align himself with Upham’s ideas, but with a significantly darker bent (585). Upham and other Christian perfectionists argued that man could attain perfection in three ways: he “had to be guided by love…he must live in this life rather than the hereafter, and he must be active rather than passive (587). Even though these hallmarks are clearly present in Hawthorne’s Jeppson 5 work as Johnson argues, his dark vision of humanity complicates the issue and shows the negative consequences of individuals who become too focused on being perfect. In turn, Hawthorne’s views of perfectionism and his use of negative examples of those abiding by perfectionist principles aligns himself with contemporary psychological conceptions of the term despite the fact that modern psychology, as we know it today, was nonexistent during Hawthorne’s career. There has been a bevy of contemporary analysis of the term “perfection” and whether or not it is healthy for individuals to hold themselves to such a high standard of personal performance, and recently, psychologists have gone so far as to differentiate between different types of perfectionism. In fact, based on research conducted by psychologists, many now categorize the concept into three distinct types of the perfection paradigm: self-oriented, others-oriented, and socially prescribed (Hewitt and Flett 457). Those who do not display any perfectionist tendencies and therefore do not fit into one of the three above categories are labeled as non-perfectionist (Stoltz and Ashby 415). These three categories of perfectionism—self-oriented, others-oriented, and socially prescribed—were developed by psychologists in the 1990s along with a test to determine which label best fits patients. This test, named the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS), asked clients to answer a series of questions, and then compared their scores not only to results labeled as “normal”, but also to other participants whose scores were abnormal in differing areas (Herring 144). Those who did not score high enough on the scale are often called non-perfectionist. Using this as a baseline, psychologists were then able to predict potential negative behaviors within each category of perfectionism. For example, self-oriented perfectionists are Jeppson 6 more likely to engage in self-punishment, others-oriented have very high and/or unrealistic expectations for others, and socially-prescribed sufferers have a tendency to isolate themselves from others to prevent being judged. (Hewitt and Flett 3). Because Hawthorne’s texts allow for a variety of interpretations, as they “stay open, pushing the reader simultaneously or sequentially toward seemingly opposing views, or rather toward the recognition that it cannot be a matter of one view or another but rather an inextricable web of relationships that creates complex subjects,” one can observe a variety of types of perfectionism in his writings, while also remaining cognizant of the positive and negative consequences to being obsessed with perfection (Easton 90). This allows me to postulate that, as a tribute to his understanding of human nature, Hawthorne is prescient in terms of his depiction of humanity’s struggle with obtaining perfection because each subset of perfectionism is represented in many of his works, including The Scarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables, and The Blithedale Romance. Moreover, I will also argue that his writing investigates a type of perfection yet to be categorized by psychologists, one that I will term inter-generational perfectionism. Before launching into my analysis of Hawthorne and modern psychology’s interpretation of perfectionism, it is important to make a few important distinctions. First, I am arguing that Hawthorne’s characters share remarkable similarities with the basic tenants of the various disorders on the perfectionist spectrum, not that Hawthorne began or has influenced behavioral psychology. His writing anticipated the findings of modern research despite the fact that the same vocabulary and ideas fueling his conception of perfectionism were not available or in their beginning stages of development. Just as others have argued that Hawthorne’s writings remain Jeppson 7 remarkably relevant and prescient in other avenues, I will similarly argue that there are considerable points of comparison to be made between Hawthorne’s fascinating characters and their relationship with modern day behavioral conceptions of perfection.1 This allows Hawthorne’s writing and modern psychology to coexist in a symbiotic relationship where each is able to inform and enlighten the other. In other words, while Hawthorne’s work looks forward and anticipates psychological reflections of perfectionism, modern day psychologists and those struggling with perfection paradigm can look backward and use his characters as a certain litmus test for the different types of perfectionism. Self-Oriented Perfectionism Interestingly enough, many of Hawthorne’s narratives house figures that display characteristics that would link them predominantly to one of these categories. In terms of self-oriented perfectionism specifically, Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale in The Scarlet Letter would almost certainly be diagnosed as suffering from this psychological disorder. He requires himself to be perfect, and when his standards of perfection are not met—as occurs when he commits the sin of adultery with Hester Prynne—he criticizes and punishes himself frequently in response (Kopylov 1820). Rather than express emotions outwardly, self-oriented perfectionists like Dimmesdale internalize their feelings, making them subject to experiencing extreme guilt and 1 For example, in a thought-provoking and well-researched article, Cerulli and Berry argue that “Hawthorne anticipated the increasingly complex battles for authority in twentieth- and twenty-first- century medicine” and that his writing serves as a “lens” to view modern day conceptions of medicine and the medical industry (Cerulli and Berry 125). I am making a similar argument in this paper, namely that Hawthorne did not start or influence behavioral psychology, or even that his conceptions of perfection were the same as modern behaviorialists, but rather that his writing serves as an interesting point of comparison and lens to view contemporary categories of perfection. Jeppson 8 major depression. For example, when his health begins to fail to the point that the community wonders whether or not he will die, Dimmesdale says that his death would be a result not of a physical ailment, but rather “because of his own unworthiness to perform his humblest mission here on earth” (The Scarlet Letter 100). Dimmesdale’s health deteriorating in psychosomatic fashion—as it had its groundwork in active “thought and imagination”—highlights another symptom of self-oriented perfectionism, as individuals struggling with this disorder are more likely to suffer from chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, and heart disease (103; Hewitt and Flett 8). Dimmesdale’s nature becomes even more tragic, however, when one observes the mental anguish he experiences in conjunction with his physical deterioration. By holding himself to a higher standard than those around him, “Hawthorne here indicates that Dimmesdale’s situation should be interpreted in this double sense: the intertwining of the particular and the universal, the private and the public, within a community of believers” (Hunt 29). Because his perfection obsession is intrinsic, the reverend’s guilt and anxiety becomes even more pronounced when he is around others. While one critic argues, “Dimmesdale began to suffer the consequences of his sin: a guilty heart and the hypocrisy of one who lacks the courage to admit his wrong,” I would assert that the consequences are manifested not because he lacks courage, but because he holds himself to a higher measure of perfection (Bird 67). It is only after he is able to come to terms with his fallibility that the “spell is broken,” but he has descended so far down the disastrous path of self-oriented perfection that this relief manifests itself fatally (The Scarlet Letter 209). As another scholar states, “After his violation of trust, his fall from his high vocation, and his seven years' hypocritical concealment of his sin, Dimmesdale could never have simply picked up and moved on” (Young 36). Jeppson 9 In The Blithedale Romance, Hawthorne provides an example of a female character, Zenobia, who exhibits some of the qualities of a self-oriented perfectionist. Like Dimmesdale, Zenobia eventually reaches a tragic end. Unlike this male counterpart though, Zenobia is initially presented as a strong, confident figure who gradually descends into the depths of depression after she is scorned by her love interest, Hollingsworth. However, it is not simply unrequited love that leads to her eventual suicide, but also her inability to live with her imperfections. Zenobia, as a bold and self-assured character, is often able to influence those around her with her charisma. Unlike Dimmesdale, she does not initially seem to torture herself for her mistakes and is presented as a champion for feminist equality--or at least as much as the 19th century would allow. However, as the novel continues on, it becomes clear that Zenobia’s mistakes start to wear on her, most notably the fact that her ideals and conception of womanhood do not match Hollingsworth’s; a man she admires without question or hesitation. In short, she seems to be “an example of a person at odds with herself, a person enormously gifted and yet unable to give direction to her gifts” (McIntosh 71). For example, when the narrator and fellow member of the Blithedale community, Miles Coverdale, discusses a woman’s role in society with her, Zenobia initially presents women as man’s equal in every way. However, when her worldview is attacked by Hollingsworth who states that women are “monsters”, she acquiesces to his derogatory statements and simply says, “Let man be but manly and godlike, and woman is only too ready to become to him what you say” (The Blithedale Romance 86-87). This prompts her to question her self-conception, and leads her down a path to ruin and eventual suicide. Jeppson 10 Also similarly to Dimmesdale, the major imperfection that Zenobia cannot come to terms with is a problematic relationship. Unlike Dimmesdale however, Zenobia’s guilt stems from the fact that her former lover, Professor Westervelt, was unscrupulous and corrupt. While one could describe her new love interest, Hollingsworth, using those same terms, Zenobia’s distorted picture of herself allows her to paint a false picture of Hollingsworth’s character that she is unable to disavow. Even after Hollingsworth’s true intentions for the community are revealed, she engages in self-blame in the same vein as Dimmesdale, saying, “It was my fault, all along, and none of his. I see it now! He never sought me. Why should he seek me? What had I to offer him? A miserable, bruised, and battered heart, spoilt long before he met me!” (The Blithedale Romance 154). In fact, by the novel’s end, Zenobia’s once vivacious spirit and hearty fortitude have deteriorated in the similar psychosomatic fashion to Dimmesdale. Even more unfortunate, she becomes so despondent mentally because of her past mistakes and the belief that she is not worthy of Hollingsworth that she commits suicide. Others-Oriented Perfectionism Another subset of perfectionism that is manifested in Hawthorne’s writing is others-oriented, which occurs when an individual ascribes extremely high standards of judgement on their peers, essentially expecting them to be perfect. The character that most clearly fits this diagnosis in The Scarlet Letter, aside from Puritan society itself, is Roger Chillingworth. Although he seems willing to forgive Hester for her discretion at the beginning of the novel, he is described as a character “to whom external matters are of little value and import, unless they bear relation to something within his mind” (The Scarlet Letter 52). Clearly, however, Chillingworth’s promise to “seek this man” that remained silent while Hester was on the scaffold Jeppson 11 as he has “sought gold in alchemy” poisons him to the extent that he comes to expect perfection from figures around him. Furthermore, when he “exchanges his patronymic, Prynne, for a pseudonym, he undergoes a metamorphosis (apart from the freezing of his assets that "Chillingworth" implies)” (Reid 174). Rather than continuing to exhibit a “calm” and “kindly” temperament that he had displayed previously, he is consumed by “a terrible fascination” that “never set him free again until he had done all its bidding” (The Scarlet Letter 107). Whereas, “at first his expression had been calm, meditative, scholarly like. Now there was something ugly and evil in his face,” which others “had not previously noted, and which grew still the more obvious to sight, the oftener they looked upon him” (105). This “fascination” compels Chillingworth to dig “into the poor clergyman’s heart” and become someone who expects perfection from others (107). Just as the symptoms of self-oriented perfectionism plague Dimmesdale, Chillingworth is afflicted by many of the signs of the others-oriented category of this mental phenomenon. Due to their unrealistic expectations of others, perfectionists with an outward focus like Chillingworth are prone to experiencing negative effects in their relationships with their community, as they expect others to strive compulsively to meet their high standards (Pychyl 2). When these standards are inevitably not met, as occurred when he discovers that Dimmesdale is a human whose heart is full of “nothing save mortality and corruption,” Chillingworth becomes hostile and antagonistic because of his motivation to diminish another person’s self-worth (The Scarlet Letter 107). Despite being apprised of Dimmesdale’s guilt and the fact that he is Pearl’s father, Chillingworth maliciously continues to needle him in a passive aggressive manner, going so far as to say he would “see him tremble,” which further situates him as an others-oriented Jeppson 12 perfectionist (75). Finally, extreme others-oriented perfectionists are also more likely to display psychotic tendencies in their treatment of others, and by the end of the novel, it is clear that Chillingworth fits this description, as he comes to represent “the black man” Hester accused him of being at their first encounter in the novel (65). With an understanding of Dimmesdale’s self-oriented and Chillingworth’s others-oriented perfectionism in place, it is easier to perceive the negative impact each character had on the other. Because their perfectionism is motivated by opposite circumstances, Dimmesdale constantly aggravates Chillingworth’s condition because the reverend is not infallible. In similitude, Chillingworth amplified Dimmesdale’s condition by constantly reminding the reverend that he was not living up to his own standards of perfection. In a profound description of the two characters complex relationship, critic T. Walter Herbert surmises that: Arthur Dimmesdale and Roger Chillingworth depict the fragments into which men’s souls are broken by [masculine] convention, and he explores the complex fabric of their interaction. Roger and Arthur spend more time with each other than either spends with Hester Prynne, and as the narrative unfolds, they are more intimately involved with each other’s lives than with hers. These inseparable opposites decide to live together, and in the end they die together (Herbert 72). By connecting Dimmesdale and Chilingworth together and analyzing their struggles with different facets of the perfection paradigm, Hawthorne is able to display not only the adverse effects of perfectionism in a singular sense, but also how those effects can be magnified when two opposite types of perfectionists are forced to constantly interact. Jeppson 13 This foiling of perfectionist characters also occurs in The House of the Seven Gables, as Hawthorne is able to successfully contrast the antagonists—Jaffrey Pyncheon—with one of the protagonists, namely Holgrave. In this narrative, Jaffrey represents an others-oriented perfectionist who holds others to impossibly high standards in similar fashion to Chillingworth. In contrast to The Scarlet Letter and its self-prescribed perfectionist Dimmesdale, Holgrave serves as the foil to Jaffrey by acting as a non-perfectionist, or an individual that does not subscribe to any of the perfectionist categories. Whereas Jaffrey Pyncheon is a judge and a high standing member of the community, Holgrave is a daguerreotypist who is often viewed negatively by others. However, the narrative contrasts Jaffrey’s others-oriented perfection— which is at the root of his need to torture his cousins Hephzibah and Clifford—with Holgrave’s rejection of the hypocritically high standards adorning the Puritan community. In fact, he attributes the judgmental nature of people like Jaffrey to be “at the bottom of most of the wrong and mischief which men do” (House of the Seven Gables 174). Continuing the pattern of antagonists of his novels being others-oriented perfectionists, Hawthorne crafts perhaps his most nuanced villain in Hollingsworth, a member of a burgeoning utopian community in The Blithedale Romance. His distinction as a character is partly because, in contrast to Chillingworth and Pyncheon, Hollingsworth is not immediately recognized as being ignominious or having evil designs. As Nina Baym stated in her analysis of the novel, “His motives may seem exalted, but his relation to the property and the people who live on it is no less materialistic or ruthless than Pyncheon’s” (Baym 286). This ruthlessness is largely due to the fact that he holds those around him to impossibly high standards, all the while ignoring his own imperfections--a staple characteristic for others-oriented perfectionists. He wants to Jeppson 14 establish a facility to reform outcasts and criminals, which seems to be a noble enough goal, but the means by which he pursues that goal and his hypocritical treatment of others allows his “over-ruling purpose” to negatively affect those around him. In fact, Hawthorne’s depiction of Hollingsworth also provides a working definition for an others oriented perfectionist, as he states, “They have no heart, no sympathy, no reason, no conscience. They will keep no friend, unless they make them the mirror of their purpose; they will smite and slay you, and trample your dead corpse under foot, all the more readily, if you take the first step with them, and cannot take the second, and the third, and every other step of their terribly straight path” (The Blithedale Romance 51). In short, others-oriented perfectionists like Hollingsworth pervert a potentially wholesome concept by expecting others to embrace and adhere to it without question. In similar fashion to how Chillingsworth bewitches Dimmesdale, Hollingsworth’s tendency to highlight and exploit weaknesses in others makes him a prime candidate to negatively affect a self-oriented perfectionist. Even though there are considerable differences in his narratives and carefully crafted nuances in his characters, the seemingly deliberate of Chillingsworth, Pyncheon, and Hollingsworth suggest that Hawthorne recognized that holding others to unfairly high standards is potential cornerstone for an antagonist. In Hollingsworth case, however, he also preys upon the attraction that Zenobia and her half-sister Priscilla have for him to heighten their propensity for critical introspection. Coverdale even goes so far as to compare Hollingsworth to a “Puritan magistrate, holding inquest of life and death in a case of witchcraft,” and Zenobia to a, “sorceress herself, not aged, wrinkled, and decrepit, but fair enough to tempt Satan with a force reciprocal to his own” (147). This reciprocal force, although not explicitly labeled by Coverdale, could be seen as Hollingsworth propensity to hold others to Jeppson 15 unrealistic standards and Zenobia’s habit of holding herself accountable to both her own lofty ideals and those of Hollingsworth. In other words, Hollingsworth catalyzes Zenobia’s downward spiral to her gloomy fate by making her more aware of her imperfections. This dual force, Hollingsworth’s others-oriented perfection and Zenobia’s self-oriented perfection, leads to the downfall of the Blithedale pastoral. Since this novel, perhaps more so than any of his others, contains an extreme amount of autobiographical context, Hawthorne may be suggesting that humanity’s habit of expecting too much from others and themselves can ruin any hope of achieving a purely harmonious community. One scholar goes so far as to state that, “If Hawthorne criticizes the utopian impulse on the ground that it does not really succeed in avoiding the evil of the great world, he also implies that another trouble with Utopianism is that it does not bring its followers into a sufficiently close relation with the evil of the great world” (Howe 175). While I partially agree with this assessment, I would further assert that it is not so much that Hawthorne’s utopian experiment--both his real world Brook Farm and his fictional Blithedale--did not have evil elements in them to begin with, but rather that the “evil of the great world” is revealed and augmented by perfectionist tendencies. Socially-Prescribed Perfectionism Like many of her counterparts in the Scarlet Letter and various characters in Hawthorne’s other works, Hester Prynne must also deal with perfectionism, but in her case, it seems as if an antiquated mode of thinking in Puritan society results in her feeling constantly judged and harassed. Victims of such harsh condemnation are susceptible to suffering from socially-prescribed perfectionism, which is aptly nicknamed “Puritan” perfectionism. Throughout the novel, she is conscious of others opinions of her, even to the point that she is able to sense Jeppson 16 disdain or sympathy emanating from the townspeople simply by looking at them. Although she isolates herself from the community—which is often a symptom of dealing with socially-prescribed expectations—she also beheld “the rigid countenances contorted with scornful merriment, and herself the object” (The Scarlet Letter 49). Also, parents suffering from this particular perfection paradigm report increased levels of stress when either their parental abilities or their children do not meet society’s expectations. Hester is ever conscious of how “different” Pearl is from other children in the community, and she recognizes that others are judging her based on her daughter’s inability to conform to social standards. In addition, “When strangers looked curiously at the scarlet letter,--and none ever failed to do so,--they branded it afresh into Hester’s soul; so that, oftentimes, she could scarcely refrain, yet always did refrain, from covering the symbol with her hand,” but the fact that she was able to resist the compulsion to adhere to societal demands of shame shows that, in contrast to Dimmesdale and Chillingworth, she is able to adapt to her circumstances and use them as motivation to move forward (72). However, despite the fact that she recognizes problematic aspects of Puritan society and is able to adapt to them in a sense, she never escaped from the unhealthy situation even though she has many opportunities. In fact, she goes so far as to return to Boston at the novel’s end, which prompts renowned literary scholar Herald Bloom to surmise that, “Persons who speculate the most boldly often conform with the most perfect quietude to the external regulations of society” (Bloom 7). Despite the fact that she willingly returns to Boston and their rigid, overtly-idealistic expectations for her, Hester can be seen as an even stronger character than if she had decided to run from her past and escape judgement that would aggravate a socially-prescribed Jeppson 17 perfectionism. In fact, her ability to face her demons, unlike Dimmesdale, allows her to treat her perfectionism in a healthy way. As Hunt states in her analysis of her connection to Puritan society and her decision to return to Boston: The anonymity of exile does not provide her with the conditions in which to live the purposeful life she intended for herself. Her spiritedness and independence of mind, which contributed to her erotic rebellion, are displaced, and in many respects irrelevant, away from this specific moral community of faith. She returns older and, it seems, less ambitious about radical reform of the community. Yet her return is an exceptional act of independence. Her penitence is unfinished because her sin and its punishment were never a matter of the actions of an isolated individual. Her return signals her recognition of the deep interdependence between her self-understanding and Puritan Boston (Hunt 31). Because she is able to recognize that she is not perfect while also being conscious of her need to be part of Puritan Boston, Hester is able to adapt to her circumstances and condition. In turn, this highlights another distinction within the larger label of perfectionism, as modern day researchers have distinguished between adaptive and maladaptive forms of the psychological phenomenon. Adaptive perfectionism “is characterized as a normal, healthy type of perfectionism and is defined by deriving satisfaction from achievements made from intense effort but tolerating the imperfections without resorting to the harsh self-criticism that characterizes maladaptive perfectionism” (Stoltz and Ashby 414). In contrast, maladaptive perfectionism is much like the scenarios described in the prior analysis of Dimmesdale and Chillingworth, as perfectionists in this vein cannot overcome critical interpretations of themselves or others. Clearly, Hester falls into the adaptive field, as she not only resists feelings Jeppson 18 of shame induced by public condemnation, but also uses the scarlet letter as a “passport into regions where other women dared not tread. Shame, Despair, Solitude! These had been her teachers,—stern and wild ones,—and they had made her strong, but taught her much amiss” (The Scarlet Letter 165). Her ability to learn from both her mistakes and others’ responses to them allows her to progress and even become a contributing member of society despite feeling societal-prescribed perfectionist tendencies. Similarly to Hester, Hephzibah—one of the protagonists of House of the Seven Gables— is subject to socially-prescribed perfectionism. Like Hester, she isolates herself for many years from the rest of the community because she feels as if she is not living up to the zealous Puritan standards in part because of the past errors of her family. As it states in the text, “In her grief and wounded pride, Hephzibah had spent her life in divesting herself of friends; she had willfully cast off the support which God has ordained his creatures to need from one another” (House of the Seven Gables 72). Rather than risk public condemnation, Hephzibah closes herself off to Puritan society, and only emerges out of her seclusion when her economic circumstances leave her with no other options. Furthermore, both Hester and Hephzibah are able to eventually overcome their socially-prescribed perfectionist tendencies and eventually re-enter society. For Hephzibah, this happens through the aid of her niece Phoebe, while for Hester, it happens in part because of her daughter Pearl. Eventually, Hephzibah progresses so much that she is able to stand up to her others-oriented perfectionist cousin Joffrey and command him to give up his “loathsome pretense of affection” for her brother Clifford (212). Lastly, Hester and Hephzibah’s characters not only compare favorably to modern behavorial psychology’s research on perfectionism, they also serve Jeppson 19 as evidence of the Christian Perfectionism that was manifest in Hawthorne’s own time which argued for a turn away from isolation and inwardness towards serving others and being part of a community. In contrast to Hester, however, Hephzibah’s societally prescribed perfectionism partly stems from her comparing herself to her ancestors. Whereas Hester’s perceived inadequacies compared to the rest of society are a result of guilt stemming from her adulterous relationship, Hephzibah is conscious of her ancestral past and that she may not be living up to the Pyncheon name. Therefore, her perfectionism is amplified not only by her relationship to the Puritan community, but also her relationship to both her living or deceased relatives. Intergenerational Perfectionism This brings me to a fourth type of perfectionism that plays a large role in Hawthorne’s writing, one I will term “intergenerational perfectionism.” In much of Hawthorne’s work, the characters are not only motivated to subscribe to a perfectionist paradigm by their high standards for themselves, their high standards for others, or the high standards of their community, but also by the high standards created by their family name. While there are vague mentions of familial history in The Scarlet Letter, this type of perfection is more readily apparent in Hawthorne’s other works, including The House of the Seven Gables and The Blithedale Romance. Much of the conflict in this narrative centers around the relationship between various characters to their past. Some feel obligated to live up to their history, while others are conscious of the mistakes their ancestors have made and their obligation to atone for them. For example, part of Hephzibah’s inflammatory relationship with her cousin Jaffrey, besides the fact that he amplifies her socially-prescribed perfectionist tendencies by being an Jeppson 20 others-oriented perfectionist, is his propensity to remind her of the past misfortunes of her family. While Hephzibah feels pressure to live up to her surname, she also recognizes that her family has made mistakes. Jaffrey is a consistent reminder to her of these mistakes, and he conjures in her mind “whatever she had heard, from legendary aunts and grandmothers, concerning the good or evil fortunes of the Pyncheons, – stories which had heretofore been kept warm in her remembrance by the chimney-corner glow that was associated with them…” which often prompts her to enter into a “somber” and “melancholy” mood (42). Thus, Hephzibah experiences many of the negative symptoms of perfectionism not only because she feels pressure to live up to Puritan social standards, but also because she must either live up to or make amends for the behavior of her relatives and ancestors. Interestingly enough, Hawthorne is able to recognize the cyclical nature of the Pyncheon struggles, and even goes so far as to say that this intergenerational comparison and competition had the “energy of a disease,” one that Behavorialists would now categorize as psychological in nature (30). Through the inclusion of characters that psychologists would now diagnose as one of the subsets of perfectionism, Hawthorne is able to illustrate how these various subsets can also be motivated by personal and familial history. This occurs so frequently in his narratives, that “it [is] implied that the weaknesses and defects, the bad passions, the mean tendencies, and the moral diseases which lead to crime are handed down from one generation to another, by a far surer process of transmission than human law has been able to establish in respect to the riches and honors which it seeks to entail upon posterity” (240). In other words, Hawthorne prescience is manifested in his ability to show that perfectionist tendencies, like other psychological issues, Jeppson 21 could be handed down from one generation to the next—often because each generation feels pressured to live up to or surpass the deeds of their ancestors. Although the generational focus in The House of the Seven Gables is on familial ancestry and has a Puritan bent to it, Hawthorne’s gaze is widened in The Blithedale Romance. In fact, the professed goal of the utopian community is to return to a paradisiacal existence reminiscent of Eden. In so doing, their vision of perfection combines both the Transcendentalist and Christian conceptions of the term, meaning that individuals were expected to be self-reliant in their various activities in order to provide for the greater good of the community. This goal, in part, is to atone not only for the misfortune and mistakes of their progenitors, but also for the entire human race dating back to Eve’s original sin. Furthermore, each of the members of the community had “found one thing or another to quarrel with” in terms of their personal history that led to their desiring to be part of Blithedale, but they also had the grand--and perhaps naive--design of giving “up whatever we had heretofore attained, for the sake of showing mankind the example of a life governed by other than the false and cruel principles, on which human society has all along been based” (48, 16). Thus, the community sought to absolve the past sins of humanity and return to a pastoral state free from “pride” and “striving to supply its place with familiar love” (16). However, the human foibles they sought to escape--including an unfair and unkind treatment of self and others--begin to emerge in Blithedale, especially when the various forms of perfectionism are represented. In this sense, whereas intergenerational perfection in The House of the Seven Gables resulted in the “sins of the father being visited upon the children,” the sins of the children become too much to overcome because of the community’s perfectionist tendencies (Baym 286). In turn, this shows Jeppson 22 that Hawthorne “had become disillusioned with a society transcending into perfection, possibly because he recognized the problems inherent in trying to achieve perfection on a personal level” (Thomas 167). In summary, Hawthorne’s ability to capture mankind’s struggle with perfectionism not only highlights his understanding of human nature, but also accounts—in part—for why his writing has remained an integral part of the American literary canon. Since he was able to understand multifaceted and complex psychological concepts like perfectionism and describe different types of this mindset (self-oriented, others-oriented, and socially prescribed) a century and a half before they were given a name in scientific studies, he was able to connect with his reader’s soul in an intricate and meaningful way. In addition, Hawthorne was able to investigate the perfectionist pressure applied when people feel compelled to live up to the standards set by their relatives—a phenomenon that can be described as intergenerational perfectionism. As the editor of The Cambridge Companion to Nathanial Hawthorne pertinently states: Indeed, many currently practicing Hawthorne scholars would claim that the value of Hawthorne’s texts lies precisely in the opportunity they offer to understand a clearly defined and bounded historical moment, while others might argue that the capacity of his texts illuminate the lives of his current readers derives not from his command of universal human truths but from the fact the cultural formations he saw coming into being are still powerfully within us (Millington 2). One of those formations, no doubt, is the Puritan obsession with perfection that, for good or ill, still remains an integral part of modern day society just as it was during Hawthorne’s time. 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