" Feathertop" is a short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne, first published in 1852. The moral tale uses a metaphoric scarecrow named Feathertop and its adventure to offer the reader a conclusive lesson about human moral character. It has since been used and adapted in several other media forms, such as opera and theatre.
Plot
In seventeenth century
New England, the
Witchcraft Mother Rigby builds a
scarecrow to protect her garden. She is so taken with her own handiwork that she whimsically decides to bring the scarecrow to life and send it into town to woo Polly Gookin, the daughter of Judge Gookin, with whom Mother Rigby had unspecified prior dealings. Once the stuffed man does come alive, Mother Rigby gives him the appearance of a normal human being and provides a pipe, on which the scarecrow must puff to keep himself alive.
Judge Gookin meets the scarecrow, whom Mother Rigby has named Feathertop. Feathertop is introduced to Polly, and the two begin to fall in love. But when Polly and Feathertop gaze into a bewitched mirror, they see Feathertop reflected as a scarecrow, not as a man. Polly faints, and the now-terrified and anguished scarecrow rushes back to Mother Rigby, where, knowing himself for what he really is, he deliberately throws away his pipe and collapses in a lifeless heap. Mother Rigby reflects, "There are thousands upon thousands of coxcombs and charlatans in the world, made up of just such a jumble of wornout, forgotten, and good-for-nothing trash as he was! Yet they live in fair repute, and never see themselves for what they are," and decides that her "son" is better off as merely a scarecrow.
Publication history
Hawthorne first offered the tale to John Sullivan Dwight, who had asked for a contribution to
Sartain's Union Magazine in November 1851. He demanded $100 for it.
[Mellow, James R. Nathaniel Hawthorne in His Times. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1980: 387. ] He admitted to
John Sartain that the fee was a high one and noted, "I myself would not pay it, were I in the chair editorial".
[Mellow, James R. Nathaniel Hawthorne in His Times. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1980: 390. ] Instead, "Feathertop: A Moralized Legend" was published in two parts in
The International Magazine, edited by Rufus Wilmot Griswold, in February and March 1852.
[Bayless, Joy. Rufus Wilmot Griswold: Poe's Literary Executor. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 1943. p. 208] It was the last new adult tale Hawthorne wrote.
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The story was later collected in 1854 as part of revised edition of Mosses from an Old Manse.
In other media
"Feathertop" was adapted twice as a silent film, in 1912[Hawthorne, Nathaniel, adapted by Maurice Valency, "Feathertop," in Fifteen American One-Act Plays, Paul Kozelka, ed., New York: Washington Square Press, 1961.] Professor of Comparative Literature at Columbia University, was presented in 1955 as part of the General Electric Theater, with a cast that included Natalie Wood, Carleton Carpenter, Dick Elliott, and Emory Parnell.
The play was adapted as a silent film in 1923 under the title Puritan Passions.
MacKaye's play has also been adapted twice as an opera, also called The Scarecrow, once in 1945 by Normand Lockwood and Dorothy Lockwood, and more recently with music by Joseph Turrin and libretto by Bernard Stambler.
"Feathertop" also inspired the 1967 Columbia University Varsity Show of the same name, the last such production before the annual revue entered an 11-year interregnum.
Warner Bros. Family Entertainment released a direct-to-video Musical film titled The Scarecrow on August 26, 2000.
"Feathertop" is mentioned in Bill Willingham's comic book series Fables. He makes a brief appearance in the prose story "A Wolf in the Fold", in which he accompanies Snow White on her trip to Carpathia to convince the Bigby Wolf to join their community. He is chosen because, not being made of living flesh, his presence won't arouse the wolf's hunger. He's given a more prominent role later in the spin-off miniseries, Everafter.
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