Nathaniel Hawthorne was a key American novelist and short story writer of the Romantic period. 'The Christmas Banquet', originally published in 1844, is a classic example of Hawthorne's preoccupation with the darker side of human nature. Many of the earliest ghost stories, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.