Nathaniel Hawthorne once said, “I will not be a doctor and live according to men's diseases, nor minister to live according to their sins, nor a lawyer and live according to quarrels of men. So I don't see that there's anything left for me other than being an author” (Nathaniel). This statement describes Hawthorne's personality and life in a way that no other quote could. Nathaniel Hawthorne was an anti-transcendentalist writer, meaning he had a negative view of all human beings. The anti-transcendentalist movement was a pessimistic branch of Romanticism, starting in the mid-1800s and lasting until the late 1800s. Nathaniel Hawthorne was greatly influenced by his childhood, which is what made him an anti-transcendentalist, but in his novel The Scarlet Letter a bridge is created between anti-transcendentalism and utopian transcendentalism. The devastation of losing a parent at a young age can cause long-term effects that last into adulthood. When Hawthorne was four years old, his father died of yellow fever and this caused him problems. His mother became overly protective and pushed him into isolated activities, such as reading and staying indoors all day (Biography). His childhood left him shy and studious, which shaped his life as a writer. He was also not a very sociable person, had few close friends and had little engagement with others (Biography). If Hawthorne's life had not begun this way, he would never have been the person he was as an adult, and society would never have been able to see the writing he could have created. Nathaniel Hawthorne changed the literary world by introducing topics considered taboo and forbidden. He wrote an entire novel based on the five simple words: “Do not commit adultery” (Delaney). With… half of the paper… behavior. If Hawthorne's father had never died, how might his writing style be different? Would he become a writer? Works Cited “Biography of Nathaniel Hawthorne.” GradeSaver. Np 1999. Web. 6 May 2014. Clendenning, Giovanni. "Hawthorne, Nathaniel." Advanced World Book. Book of the World, 2014.Web. May 6, 2014.Delaney, Bill. The Scarlet Letter. Magill's Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition (2006): 1-2. Literary reference center. Network. May 7, 2014. “Nathaniel Hawthorne Biography.” Encyclopedia of World Biography. Advameg, Inc. and Web. May 8, 2014. "Nathaniel Hawthorne Quotes." Nathaniel Hawthorne > Quotes. Goodreads Inc, 2014.Web. May 8, 2014. "Nathaniel Hawthorne - Biography." The European Doctoral School. EGS, 1997-2012.Web. May 13, 2014.SparkNotes The Scarlet Letter: by Nathaniel Hawthorne. New York. NY: Spark, 2007.Print.