The story is set during the Salem witch trials, at which Hawthorne's great-great-grandfather John Hathorne was a judge, guilt over which inspired the author to change his family's name, adding a "w" in his early twenties, shortly after graduating from college.[2] In his writings Hawthorne questioned established thought—most specifically New England Puritanism and contemporary Transcendentalism. In "Young Goodman Brown", as with much of his other writing, he utilizes ambiguity.[3]
"Young Goodman Brown" was first published in the Boston-based The New-England Magazine in its April 1835 issue. It did not include Hawthorne's name and was instead credited "by the author of 'The Gray Champion'".[4] It was finally published with the author's name in Mosses from an Old Manse in 1846.
