The Birthmark Term Paper Essay Example

is devoid of tact.Alymer’s wife’s consent to removing the birthmark serves as a test for Alymer in whether he will risk hurting his wife just to build upon his ever growing fame.

Elizabeth R.Napier states “Alymer’s resentment of the birthmark stems in part from an inability inherent in his very nature, to tolerate the union of psychical and spiritual principles in which he encounter’s with his wife” (Napier). Alymer is unable to see the natural beauty his wife possesses, rather he focuses only on her small imperfection because of his tendency to let his own plans get in the way of what should really be important.In the end of the story Alymer cures his wife of her “treacherous” birthmark, but kills her in the process proving his experiment to be a “successful failure. ” The birthmark acts as a symbol for Mother Nature’s will to have the bearer of imperfections be marked as they were created. In “Rappaccini’s Daughter” Dr. Rappaccini’s use of science to change the course of nature proves to be a detrimental failure.

Dr. Rappaccini is a botanist who has poisoned his daughter with toxic flowers at a young age in attempts to build her immunity.It is suggested that Rappaccini has done so to protect his beautiful daughter Beatrice from suitors much like the story’s protagonist Giovani. Uroff defines Rappaccini as one who “…has not subordinated human values for scientific ones, instead he has tried to use his scientific experimentation toward the human end of safeguarding his daughter” (Uroff). It can be assumed that Rappaccini wishes to “save” his daughter because he feels it is his duty to rid her world of heartbreak under

any circumstances.Since Rappaccini is referred to as fearing his plants rather than loving them, it becomes evident that he fears his daughter and what could become of her as well, due to the fact that he has turned her into one of his poisonous flowers (Rosenberry).

Giovani realizes Rappaccini’s intoxication of Beatrice and with the help of an old friend formulates an antidote to combat her poisonous presence. The antidote ironically kills Beatrice due to the fact that she had become so accustomed and imbued with being toxic. Rapaccini has disregarded the real use of science which is to cure disease and make the patient immune, not actually poisonous (Uroff).In Rappaccini’s attempts to preserve his daughter he has figuratively poisoned her by choosing for her and choosing for nature by using the scientific route to solving his problem’s rather than letting nature take care of its creations. …but its imagery surely does all that imagery can do to portray both the awful power of modern science and the moral insulation of the youthful manipulation of its deadly marvels, to whom attendant death and desolation are sincerely regrettable but for whom there is no other way of life than that which assumes for its own high purposes he tragic risks of technological process (Rosenberry) Rosenberry explains that Rappaccini’s wish to shelter his daughter may have seemed valiant, but they proved such superstitions against how science may not always be the key to curing ones “disease.

” Rappaccini’s belief in preserving his daughter was a failure and he too late realizes that humans are wrong if they believe they can improve upon nature’s ways. “Rappaccini’s Daughter” and “The Birthmark”

are seemingly parallel in numerous ways.Both stories share characters that believe their scientific adeptness is grander than that of the laws of nature and affect a loved one negatively in a self-involved experiment. Both characters also see no barrier between their work and human emotion, making them very vacant and lifeless. The two stories also shared a protagonist who refused to let the world remain as it was created, proving to be more antagonistic than the protagonist.

In the end of both stories nothing was solved by antidote and all would have been sound if only nature had been left to deal with natures duty.

Works Cited

1. Napier, Elizabeth R. Alymer as “Scheidekunstler:” The Pattern of Union and Seperation in Hawthorn’s “The Birthmark. ” South Atlantic Bulletin 1976 Pgs. 32-33,
2. Literature Resource Center, Gale 2006, Edgemont Highschool Library, Scarsdale N.Y. April 16th, 2008. <go. galegroup. com>
3. Rosenberry, Edward H. Hawthorne’s Allegory of Science, “Rapaccini’s Daughter,” American Literature Vol. 32 No 1, March 1960, Pgs. 36-46,
4. JSTOR, Duke University Press, Edgemont Highschool Library, Scarsdale N.Y. April 11th, 2008. <JSTOR. com>
5. Quinn, James / Baldessarini, Ross “The Birthmark:” A Deathmark, Hartford Studies in Literature 13.2, Gale 2006, Edgemont Highschool Library, Scarsdale N. Y. April 14th, 2008
6. <go. galegroup. com> Uroff, M.D. The Doctors in “Rappaccini’s Daughter. ” Nineteenth Century Fiction Vol. 27, No. 1, June 1972, Pgs. 61-70,
7. University of California Press, Gale 2006, Edgemont Highschool Library, Scarsdale N.Y. April 16th, 2008, <JSTOR. com>