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The Birthmark Nathaniel Hawthrone Analysis

965 Words4 Pages

Till Death Do Us Part We are expected to do anything for the ones we love, but just how far would you go? One part of wedding vows, "till death do us part," are major in most marriages, but would you be willing to risk your life for the possibility of their success? In "The Birthmark" written by Nathaniel Hawthrone, Georgiana was willing to make the greatest sacrifice for her husband, Alymer. Even if it meant risking her life to see him succeed. Alymer may be considered the stronger of the two because he's the man of the household, but Georgiana is really the stronger character, because she trusts her husband even after she finds his failed experiments, and after she realizes the obsession with the birthmark was greater than his love for …show more content…

"No, dearest Georgiana, you came so nearly perfectly from the hand of Nature, that this slightest defect, which we hesitate to term a defect or a beauty, shocks me as being the visible mark of earthly imperfection." Alymer sees this mark as something ruining an almost perfect canvas. Knowing her husband views this mark, which she believes is a charm her whole life, as a defect really hurts her self-esteem. Now something she once viewed as a charm she now is almost as disgusted by it as Alymer is. She cannot bear to look at herself in the mirror or to see her real beauty. She is very beautiful and as close to perfect as they come, but she cannot seem to look past the birthmark anymore. She wants her husband to see her as beautiful like he did before the marriage. "And she places her hand over her cheek, to hide the terrible mark from her husband's eyes." Even has she is dying one of the things she does is hide the birthmark. She does not want her husband to look at it and see the thing he despises most on her. She puts her love for her husband first even when he put science before her. She loves him even after he's proven to her science is his first …show more content…

By allowing Alymer to go through with the experiment even after she knows about all his failures makes her the stronger of the two. She wants him to succeed out of the love and trust she has for him and he fails her. Through it all Georgiana put her trust in her husband. Even as she was dying she could not bear to have Alymer look at her at the birthmark that he hated. Alymer allowed his love for science to be greater than his love for his young wife. Perfect cannot be achieved, not even science can achieve perfection. Alymer could not love her despite her flaws and he ended up losing the one person who loved him the most. This science experiment is just another failure in his book of fails. It is too late to take back what he did, but maybe it will change him for the

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While the entire focus of the story is on Georgiana's one physical flaw, it is Aylmer who seems to be irreparably flawed. An embodiment of the concept of "playing god" and a man obsessed with attaining divine perfection, he becomes unreasonably fixated on his wife's one apparent imperfection, going so far as unconsciously wanting to kill her just to dispose of it. Aylmer has been characterized by critics both as a representation of the higher nature of man, the spirit and the divine, and as a representation of ironic imperfection. Hawthorne's narrator, otherwise having a voice of his own, describes him in a strangely reverential manner:"Aylmer's slender figure, and pale, intellectual face, were no less apt a type of the spiritual element"

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Later on Aylmer would come to understand how connected the birthmark was to Georgiana, just as Aminadab had understood earlier. Selfish and blinded by his obsession he continues the course of removing the birthmark costing Georgiana her

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In The Birthmark, Hawthorne depicts the obsession for perfection, the tole it takes on one and the consequences it has. The quest for perfection is unrealistic and unobtainable as we are only mere humans incapable of reconstructing our DNA. In The Birthmark, Hawthorne tells the story of a woman named Georgiana and her scientist husband Aylmer, who are both fixated on a birthmark similar to the look of a tiny human hand. Aylmer is disgusted by Georgiana’s birthmark, wanting to please her husband Georgiana is willing to do anything for him to look at her in a normal manner “Danger is nothing to me;for life which this hateful mark

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Aylmer’s views on perfection led to the demise of Georgiana. He skewed Georgiana’s views by making it seem that if she wasn’t perfect then he could not love her. Throughout the process Georgiana was scared of her husband’s actions but she was made to believe that what he was doing was normal so she went along with it.

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Hawthorne uses imagery sense of smell to get readers to imagine the scene, “When Georgiana recovered consciousness she found herself breathing an atmosphere of penetrating fragrance, the gentle potency of which had recalled her from her deathlike faintness” (Hawthorne). “The Birthmark” also creates irony with “Aminadab, the less inferior man to Aylmer is the one who speaks sensible to Aylmer by disclaiming that if Georgiana was his wife, he would not try to remove the birthmark” (“The Birthmark”). The figurative language helps enhance the story. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s meaning for the story was a man’s strive to perfection only caused the death of his wife. Aylmer was too focused on what perfect could be, and Georgiana blindly agrees with him and decides to remove the birthmark, despite never having a problem with it.

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In the text, Georgiana demonstrates her tolerance towards Alymer, as she remains obedient, and faithful, as his experiment reveals her a narrow chance of success. She is too tolerant to him, which made her easy to manipulate and control, as Hawthorn writes, “Much as he had accomplished, she could not but observe that his most splendid success were almost invariably failures, if compared with the ideal at which he aimed” (8). Although she noticed the slight chance of success, she still viewed her husband as a god, who she must not reason with further. Jane, on the other hand was intolerant to her husband. She was aware of the mistreatment by her husband, which ultimately compelled her to get revenge against him by making him faint, as Gilman writes “Now why should that man have fainted?

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Aylmer believes that he can correct “what Nature left imperfect in her fairest work!” (4). Aylmer, who stands as a symbol for science, obsessively seeks to remove Georgiana’s birthmark and make her ideal. When mankind attempts to change nature in the pursuit of perfection, it never ends well as seen in Aylmer’s attempts at

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824 Words | 4 Pages

He provides the story with a character that identifies contrast between the others. He is Aylmer's assistant although we tend to get the impression that he may actually be smarter than Aylmer in a way. As he realizes that Aylmer has killed Georgiana, he begins to laugh. He believes that Aylmer has simply got what was coming to him. He warned him that she already is perfect and says, “If she were my wife, I'd never part with that birthmark”(208).

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Equally Aylmer and Dr. Rappiccini, both characters in Hawthorne’s works causes destruction of human life with selfish aims to perfect the woman of their choice. In the case of Aylmer’s love interest in science, just as with the case of Beatrice’s father, blinds him to the true beauty and humanity of the woman before him. Aylmer views Georgiana’s birthmark as a symbol of imperfection and tries to remove it. At the end of the story, Georgiana say, "My poor Aylmer," she repeated, with a more than human tenderness, "you have aimed loftily; you have done nobly. Do not repent that with so high and pure a feeling, you have rejected the best the earth could offer.

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Georgiana's Unhealthy Relationship In The Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne

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When Aylmer and Georgiana got married, Georgiana was taken from her mothers home, making her complete dependent on Aylmer and his opinions. In addition to this, Aylmer’s belief hat he is better than God, and has the ability to remove Georgiana’s birthmark, creates inequality in their relationship. Finally, due to Georgiana’s obsession with what Aylmer thinks of her, paired with Aylmer's rude looks and comments, leads her to do something

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Aylmer is consumed with a pursuit of perfection in his scientific studies and also in nature. The leads to Aylmer being appalled at the blemish on his wife Georgiana’s cheek. He tells Georgiana “you came so nearly perfect from the hand of Nature, that this slightest possible defect..shocks me, as being the visible mark of earthly imperfection” (216). This is the catalyst for Aylmer's seeking for perfection in his wife who is a natural being. Aylmer recognizes that there is a “fatal flaw of humanity, which Nature...stamps ineffaceable on all her productions” (216).

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