The Maypole Of Merry Mount

“The Maypole of Merry Mount” is a short story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne that was first published in a gift book in 1832. It was subsequently published in 1837 as part of a collection of Hawthorne’s short stories, Twice-Told Tales. The story is a fictional retelling of the history of the 17th century British colony, Mount Wollaston—also called Merry Mount—which later became Quincy, Massachusetts. Some of the account is true—such as the struggle for existence between the pseudo-pagan Merry Mounters and John Endicott—as depicted in a history mentioned by Hawthorne at the outset of the story; however, Hawthorne also notes that he has reimagined this tale into an allegory of sorts, blending artifice with reality. The short story therefore embodies a work of historical fiction, as Hawthorne has reimagined the history in order to serve his own authorial ends.

A large portion of these authorial ends serve to indicate the false happiness of the Merry Mounters. These colonists, who are described as being overwhelmingly young and beautiful, only seem to pursue the “counterfeit”(Paragraph 4) happiness of vanity: they wear elaborate clothes, participate in festivities they do not seem to care about, and are never serious about anything at all—all in a hedonist pursuit of happiness. The narrator alludes to the fallacy of this type of shallow happiness several times throughout the short story, most often in the contemplations of Edith and Edgar. The narrator seems to suggest that real love cannot exist when the participants in a relationship are pretending to be happy; because Edith and Edgar represent real love, they are honest with one another, acknowledging that their future happiness will be mitigated by sorrow. The narrator casts this knowledge as integral to true happiness, which he calls troubled joy. This troubled joy has none of the frivolous naiveté of happiness but rather is more satisfying because it acknowledges the necessary balance between joy and sorrow. The narrator seems to argue that one must have sorrow in order to experience joy and vice versa, suggesting the universe exists to balance these ideas with one another.

The narrator introduces the characters of the Puritans in order to overthrow the Merry Mounters’ false idols of happiness, as embodied by the Maypole. Although strict and rigid in their piety, the author believes that the Puritans embody Thought and Wisdom, especially in the figure of John Endicott. Reflection is seen as an integral part of spirituality here as Edgar and Edith reflect on the fallacies of their community, eventually turning to the purity and logic of Puritanism without even remembering their old community. However, this transformation is not without sacrifice, as some of the revelers must meet the divinely inspired punitive justice of Endicott in order to rectify their evil ways. The narrator repeatedly equates the Merry Mounters with beasts, and it is through Endicott’s punishments that they might be remade in God’s image and be turned into men. Endicott symbolically cuts Edgar’s hair into the Puritan pumpkin shape to demonstrate Edgar’s coming of age; he is no longer the fanciful child of the past but rather becomes a worthy man in God’s eyes.

Similarly, the Merry Mounters are disrobed of their fanciful clothing in a way that symbolizes the destruction of their false values. This Puritan emphasis on conservative dress reflects a mindset that is both universal and shallow. True, the conservative dress does connote equality within the community; however, the emphasis on appearance and the necessity for uniformity in appearance also alludes to a kind of superficiality as far as the Puritan religion is concerned. The idea that a divine power would be invested in the vesture of its constituents imbues divinity with a superficiality that is inherently human in nature, thereby rendering the infallible fallible. This similarity between Puritan and Merry Mount concern with appearance then presents an interesting contradiction as far as the piety and deep spirituality of Puritanism is concerned, one that reflects the author’s belief that evil exists as humanity’s fundamental characteristic.