Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe

Now that I am spending most of my time in Boston - Salem - Concord - Cape Ann area of Massachusetts sharing in the care of our granddaughters, I have become obsessed -- not too strong a word -- with the 19th century authors of the area.

So, it was quite exciting to see this story in the LA Times today: "The Creepy Nathaniel Hawthorne Story Edgar Allan Poe Loved."

That tale is told today by the Library of America, which as you might guess republishes classic works by American authors, from Herman Melville to Philip K. Dick. The work in question is Hawthorne's "Twice-Told Tales," a collection of short stories, which Poe reviewed five years after its publication in 1837. Poe singled out one story, "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment," as being "exceedingly well imagined and executed with surpassing ability. The artist breathes in every line of it."

Though contemporary readers might think the story has something to do with the famed German philosopher, it was written more than 50 years before he was born. Instead, it is an unsettling story of magic and manipulation, just the kind of thing that might put a smile on Edgar Allan Poe's grim face.

I've reviewed it before but if I had to recommend just one book to introduce folks to the 19th century American writers that set the foundation for American writing, I would suggest American Bloomsbury by Susan Cheever.

The second book might be The Peabody Sisters by Megan Marshall.