The Prophetic Pictures (From "Twice Told Tales") — Story, Setting & Ideas

The Painter as a Mirror, Not a Historian

The catalog lists this work under “Historical fiction, American” and “New England -- Social life and customs,” yet the painter’s role is anything but documentary. He is described as a “cosmopolite” who speaks “like a native of each clime and country on the globe, except our own forests.” His travels take him to “the silver cascade of the Crystal Hills” and “the summit of New England’s loftiest mountain,” but he does not copy natural scenery except as a “framework for the delineations of the human form and face, instinct with thought, passion, or suffering.” The story’s interest lies not in recording customs but in probing interior states. The painter’s portfolio contains “the stern dignity of Indian chiefs” and “the domestic life of wigwams,” yet these are presented as raw material for his art, not as ethnographic record. The narrative repeatedly emphasizes that his true subject is the soul, not the surface of New England life.

An Unsettling Silence Around the Portraits

After the portraits are completed, the text describes a telling reaction: “Her visitors felt, that the massive folds of the silk must never be withdrawn, nor the portraits mentioned in her presence.” This instruction to avoid the paintings suggests that the canvases contain something disturbing, yet the story withholds explicit confirmation. The painter himself, returning from his travels, is haunted by “two phantoms, the companions of his way”—the images of Walter and Elinor. He “had caught from the duskiness of the future—at least, so he fancied—a fearful secret, and had obscurely revealed it on the portraits.” The word “obscurely” is crucial: the narrative never states what the secret is, leaving readers to infer from the characters’ dread. This restraint is a deliberate structural choice, not a gap in the excerpts. The story builds tension through what is not said, relying on the reader’s unease rather than explicit revelation.

The Coldness Behind the Artist’s Gift

Despite his skill, the painter is described as emotionally detached: “Though gentle in manner, and upright in intent and action, he did not possess kindly feelings; his heart was cold; no living creature could be brought near enough to keep him warm.” This characterization aligns with the story’s broader skepticism about artistic genius. The painter’s interest in Walter and Elinor is not affection but “the sort of interest which always allied him to the subjects of his pencil.” He “almost regarded them as creations of his own,” blurring the line between living people and painted images. The narrative thus questions whether the painter’s insight is a gift or a violation. The catalog subjects do not prepare readers for this cold, almost predatory portrayal of the artist. The story’s psychological complexity—its focus on the painter’s isolation and the unsettling power of his art—overshadows any historical or social detail.

Readers approaching The Prophetic Pictures as a piece of historical New England fiction will find its setting almost incidental. The story’s power lies in its ambiguity: the painter’s prophetic ability is never confirmed or denied, and the portraits’ secret remains undisclosed. Pay attention to what the characters do not say—Elinor’s evasive “Nothing, nothing,” the visitors’ silent agreement to never mention the paintings. Hawthorne uses these gaps to create a sense of dread that no amount of local color could achieve.

That rainy afternoon, Hawthorne’s painter seemed less a figure of old New England than a mirror held too close. I closed the book feeling watched by my own curiosity. Later, browsing, my hand drifted to The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories — Edition Insights—another fog, another kind of waiting. The two settled side by side, silent companions on the window seat.