The Birthmark Essay

Professor Michael Frangos English 24 January 2016 “The Birthmark” is a story that centers around a scientist named Aylmer, and his beautiful wife Georgiana. Georgiana who is as Aylmer says “ you came so nearly perfect from the hand of Nature that this slightest possible defect, which we hesitate whether to term a defect or a beauty, shocks me, as being the visible mark of earthy perfection” (212) we learn has just one flaw, a birthmark on her check. Hawthorne’s story emphases on the obsession

what he is not and cannot be. This is where the adaptation of “sameness” plays a role in the governing of Aylmer’s character. We see Aylmer’s struggle with this birthmark when Georgiana confronts him about his dream he had one night: He had fancied himself with his servant Aminadab, attempting an operation for the removal of the birthmark; but the deeper went the knife, the deeper sank the hand, until at length its tiny grasp appeared to have caught hold of Georgiana’s heart; whence, however, her

Elise Florez English 102 Mrs. Boy 10 April 20244 Character Analysis of “The Birthmark” In a society where cosmetic surgery is common and even encouraged by some, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Birthmark” depicts how one imperfection can result in obsession, pressure to conform, and participating in people-pleasing tendencies. Nathaniel Hawthorne was raised in Puritan culture, however, he despised their teachings and hypocrisy. During the 1800s, his writings exhibit the expectation to conceal and hide

Aylmer, the husband is a scientist who believed in nature. Georgiana is the wife, who has a small red birthmark on her check. Most men found this mark is attractive to them. However, Aylmer thinks it would make Georgiana look flawless if she remove it. In the whole story, Aylmer is trying to persuade Georgiana to remove the birthmark, finally the wife took the elixir and after she woke up, the birthmark was gonna and she tells Aylmer she is dying. After reading the story, I think the husband it too obsess

more beautiful than nature. According to Jules Zanger, Hawthorne’s short story, “suggests his resistance to the expansive materialism of America 's new technology as well as to the excessive spirituality of its philosophers.” The short story, “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne articulates the obsession with human perfection through symbols, characters’, and narrator. Aylmer, a man devoted entirely to his science, marries Georgiana, a beautiful young woman with a single “earthly imperfection” (291)

The Nathaniel Hawthorn story “The Birthmark” is a about a scientist who strives to fix the imperfections of human nature. Not only does he kill his wife during the process, his attempt to have any control over human nature dies as well. This story is ironic in the way Hawthorne uses his symbolism in his characters to portray. Judith Fetterley says, "The Birthmark demonstrates the consequences to women of being trapped in the laboratory of man 's mind, the object of unrelenting scrutiny, examination

“The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne’s ideas and themes still reflect today’s society even though it was written in the mid 1800s. During this time period people thought that science could take them anywhere. He based the story in a century before the time he was in. Everything is steadily changing today, just as it was in the 19th century. Except the things changing are very different. We have technology that changes every single day for example. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s ideas including life, beauty

stories, plays, and poems. All of which have to do with love someway and somehow. I’m choosing to compare “The Birthmark”, “Othello”, and La Belle Dame San Merci”. Each of these all have something in common which is their treatment of obsessive love. In the Gothic Romanticism short story of “the Birthmark” Alymer has an obsession that is stronger than his obsession with Georgians birthmark. This is his obsessive love with science. Though he has had scientific experiments that were not successful it

beautiful woman with a tiny, hand-shaped birthmark, he becomes fixated on finding a way to remove her cosmetic “defect.” However, in an attempt to dissolve Georgiana’s birthmark, she is given an elixir vitae that Aylmer has concocted, Georgiana ’s perfection lasts seconds before she dies. Although the character development falls short or even stagnant, Georgiana,

The Birthmark by Nathaniel Hawthorne is trying to communicate some important ideas about a variety of themes, he articulates a few weighty themes around this brief argument: the struggle between science and nature. In a story full of successful and almost magical scientific experiments, it is intact nature itself that is more powerful than any creation made by man. As is to be expected, this path to perfection also includes the creation of life and the victory over death. In the birthmark Aylmer