CELESTIAL RAILROAD

Description

NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE’s “Celestial Railroad” can easily be read in a quick sitting and is a parody of John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress in which the allegory’s main character, Christian, appears in a dream to the author. Like Bunyan’s protagonist, Hawthorne’s Christian also tries to get “from this world to that which is to come” by fleeing the City of Destruction. But, in “The Celestial Railroad” Christian can take a train rather than make the long pilgrimage on foot, so he opts for the “easy way.” But, on the trip, the narrator notices that all the landmarks described by Bunyan are somehow altered….