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 In one of his public disavowals of autobiography, Nathaniel Hawthorne informed his readers that external traits "hide the man, instead of displaying him," directing them instead to "look through the whole range of his fictitious characters, good and evil, in order to detect any of his essential traits." In this multidimensional biography of America's first great storyteller, Edwin Haviland Miller answers Hawthorne's challenge and reveals the inner landscapes of this modest, magnetic man who hid himself in his fiction. Thomas Woodson hails Miller's account as "the best biography of this most elusive of American authors."

Samuel Steward and the Pursuit of the Erotic: Sexuality, Literature, Archives examines one of the most fascinating sexual renegades of the twentieth century and the social, cultural, pedagogical, and erotic projects with which he was engaged. This innovative collection, edited by Debra A. Moddelmog and Martin Joseph Ponce, examines the life and work of Samuel Steward at their most daring and controversial. Samuel Steward—writer, literature professor, visual artist, tattoo artist, sexual archivist, unofficial sexologist, and vernacular pornographer—gave voice and vision to some of the central concerns of twentieth-century U.S. gay culture and politics. These essays frame Steward not merely as an associate or a lover of more well-known luminaries but as a significant cultural figure in his own right, one whose work anticipated some of the current aims and methods of queer studies.
With work by prominent scholars in queer, transgender, and sexuality studies, and with topics such as the queer archive, hoarding, masochism, the queer mystery, race and desire, sexology, and gay pornography, Samuel Steward and the Pursuit of the Erotic will appeal to a wide range of readers across a variety of disciplines invested in queer experience. Closing on a personal recollection from one of Steward’s last close friends, the volume will also appeal to readers interested in the personal aspects of this fascinating, idiosyncratic figure’s multifaceted life.