Themes In The Birthmark

Heathcliff has the capacity to love, in fact he loves Catherine more than anything else, but her betrayal and his rough childhood destroyed what little hope he had of becoming a good, honest human. After Catherine and Edgar 's marriage, Heathcliff is hurt and bitter. In order to get back at them, Heathcliff decides to pursue Edgar 's little sister Isabella. He is able to easily convince Isabella to marry him, but he really sees her as nothing more than a tool he can use to upset Catherine and Edgar. Heathcliff has no regards for other people 's feelings because he

He took advantage of his father’s absence to pursue his relationship with Casandra and abused the Duke’s trust. The character who I have the most sympathy for in this play is Casandra. The Duke has scorned and ignored her, treating her, according to Casandra, as if she were a piece of furniture brought in to improve the look of the house. Casandra realizes that a relationship with Frederico would be an impossible love but she imagines this love as part of her thirst for vengeance on her husband who, by ignoring her, has denied her the status and dignity of a human being.

To borrow the words of Tucker, “… Baudelaire 's intention was not to rhapsodize his mistresses as his forebears had done” (888). “Une Charogne” is an intricate anti-Petrarchan piece; Baudelaire not only mocks Petrarchan ideals of beauty, but he attacks the blason by making it his own and using the uncanny to highlight its flaws in dehumanizing women and reducing them to body parts and flesh. Baudelaire reminds readers that the reason his poem is unsettling is not only because it is about an aestheticized carcass, but because the conventions he borrows to describe the carcass, the very same ones used to describe women, are questionable and troubling. He uses Petrarchan conventions to implode its own system. By taking the blason to the extreme, he highlights its problems and showcases its true

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.

Medea, a play by Euripides, centres around a woman named Medea who is wronged by her husband, Jason, when he marries another woman and leaves Medea. The popular opinion involving this play is that Jason is a horrible person, and he was in the wrong for causing Medea all of her pain. It is important to look at this play from both sides, however, and Jason’s argument is compelling enough to show that he was not as horrible of a person for what he had done and that the choices he had made were for the benefit of his family, despite breaking his vows. Medea is the real villain of this play, and Jason is one of her many victims. He consistently speaks about his desire to protect his family and talks of reasoning with the royal family so Medea is

Shakespeare further portrays men to be the instigators of betrayal, as Hamlet forgets that he ever loved Ophelia. Through, being overcome with intense hatred and anger at his mother, Hamlet denies ever having loved Ophelia, and orders her “to a nunnery”. It is Hamlet who instigates such betrayal, as he previously says “My fair Ophelia- Nymph” through “Nymph” Hamlet is describing Ophelia as a beautiful maid, thus highlighting his love for her. Yet, his attitude thereafter is considerably callous, as he continually questions Ophelia on her “honesty”. The continual questioning reflects that of a grueling and in part contributes to Ophelia’s later madness.

Do you share my madness?” (Shelley 28). After everything he went through, Victor still thought that the quest for knowledge was worth the death of his entire family because male identity is tied to his romanticized quest, “Do not return to your families with the stigma of disgrace marked on your brows.” (215). We must ask, what shifts Victor’s purpose from a warning to a doubling down on his male hubris?

Hamlet has come to see his mother, Queen Gertrude, and ends up stabbing Lord Polonius, which ultimately leads to his death. Lord Polonius’ final words include “O, I am slain!” Even though this provides a slight amount of comic relief to the reader, it has a reverse effect on Ophelia’s mental state. Her father’s death seems to be the potent punch in this fight because she officially goes mad after this final event. This is apparent in Scene IV Act I, when Laertes has come back to visit his sister and check on her well being.

In this event, it also shows how Blanche desires to be with Mitch. This is shown by the quote “I want his respect… I want to deceive enough to make him-want me”. This even shows the illusion of how Blanche tries to repay that moment where she believes she is the person who caused her husband’s death. To correct the wrongs she has done. This behavior of her desires also shows how she is living in an illusion trying to recreate her relationship with her husband.

Because of this situation she does not know how she should react to Tybalt's death; should she be grateful that it was Tybalt and not her husband or should she hate Romeo and stand by her blood family? She knows that either way she will lose someone that she loves. So the question is: what is worse, the loss of one to whom you are blood related or the loss of one your heart choose? In conclusion, the contrast between love and hate is mostly seen in Romeo and Juliet because of their forbidden love.

It shows that our flaws make up a large part of who we are which make it very difficult to separate the two. To remove it would only result in failure. Aylmer finally is able to remove “the last crimson tint of the birthmark -- that sole token of human imperfection” (13). The mark shows that people are inherently imperfect and it’s what makes us human. Once Aylmer removes that imperfection, Georgiana dies because it is impossible to obtain perfection as a person.

Although the theme of The Birthmark, has been interpreted in different ways, I believe the theme of the story is human imperfection and the strive for perfection, which is demonstrated by the birthmark on Georgiana’s face, her husband Aylmer, and their marriage. The birthmark on Georgiana’s face symbolizes human mortality and imperfection as believed among many critics. Most criticism has accepted the rather forthright and explicit allegorical interpretation of Hawthorne's "The Birthmark" that regards the mark on Georgiana Aylmer's cheek as the external sign of her human, imperfect condition and understands Aylmer's attempt to remove it as the expression of either scientific, rational, reformist presumption, or of too aspiring an idealism.

“Humanity is just a work in progress.” This quote by Tennessee Williams accurately describes what many people believe, and consequently, why many people try to improve themselves. Even so, occasionally people can take the pursuit of perfection too far. This is the case for Aylmer and Georgiana in “The Birth-Mark,” written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. In this story Aylmer successfully removes his wife's only imperfection- a hand-shaped birthmark on her cheek, consequently making her perfect.

The story of Icarus is a well known Greek myth that depicts the dangers of untamed hubris. Within the myth, Icarus, foolishly ignores his father’s warnings on the usage of his wax wings. With reckless abandon, he flies too close to the sun, his wings melt, and the result is him tragically falling to his death. The story is a simple enough, but remains a timeless allegory remembered centuries later. Nathaniel Hawthorne, if nothing else, was a master of the art of allegory.