Michael J. Colacurcio

While he has written extensively on such subjects as Puritanism, Herman Melville, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, he is perhaps best known for his scholarship on the work of Nathaniel Hawthorne.

In The Province of Piety, Colacurcio argues against symbolist or psychologizing interpretations and maintains that Hawthorne's fiction ought to be understood primarily as historical literature, that is, as it reflects on the moral history of his native New England.

"[3] Colacurcio's Doctrine and Difference is a collection of writings that demonstrate the lasting influence of Puritan orthodoxy in the New England literary tradition, with essays on Jonathan Edwards, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Emily Dickinson, and others.

His book, Godly Letters, a study of the Puritan tradition in American literature, is described by a reviewer in The New England Quarterly as "an illuminating and deeply searching compendium that embodies the culmination of a lifelong career in research and teaching.

[6] Michael J. Colacurcio has supervised the doctoral dissertations of numerous individuals including Lauren Berlant and David Van Leer.