The Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne - 1427 Words

How Women in Literature React to Their Roles in Society Women have always played key roles in literature, from the strong heroine to the damsel in distress. Common in works published before the 21st century, and even after, women are written as the caregivers, and the homemakers for their husbands. Literary women will often play the submissive role in society and in their marriages. These women react differently to their role; some remain submissive, some are rebellious, some are breaking free, and some go down as a result of their submission. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story â€Å"The Birthmark†, provides an example of a woman who remains submissive in her role centers around a woman named Georgiana and her husband Aylmer. Georgiana is the†¦show more content†¦Her intelligence is blinded by her devotion to him so she strives to please her husband’s view of perfection. Her reward for her obedience to him is her death, because the surgery ultimately kills her. Georgiana is allotted one act of defiance toward her husband in the end of the story; right before her death she urges him to realize he has â€Å"rejected the best the earth can offer†. The birthmark has been removed and Georgiana reaches perfection, but she condemns Aylmer for not realizing her value before her death. Like Georgiana in â€Å"The Birthmark†, women often find themselves striving to reach society’s expectation of beauty and perfection. In Marge Piercy’s poem â€Å"Barbie Doll†, a young girl is finally able to reach society’s version of beauty but she must die to do so. Piercy criticizes the ways â€Å"women are socialized into stereotypical feminine behavior† (â€Å"Overview: â€Å"Barbie Doll†, para. 1) in this poem and suggests that the pressure put on women to meet certain standards of beauty and behavior is destructive. The poem opens with the birth of a â€Å"girlchild† and all the â€Å"typical toys† that go along with it. When the girl hits puberty, her classmates begin to make fun of her big nose and fat legs. The girl is intelligent and healthy, but the other children only see the imperfections in her appearance. She is told she should behave â€Å"coy† and always wear a smile, but the teasing takes itsâ €™ toll. She cuts off her nose and legs and offers them upShow MoreRelatedThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne1493 Words   |  6 PagesRomantic period authors, like Nathaniel Hawthorne, a prevalent example of a Romantic author from the 19th century, believed that people were getting too reliant on on science. Romantics were literary rebels who wrote about strong emotions, the supernatural, and the power of nature. The writing style of the previous century was known as the Age of Reason, the authors thought emotion was unnecessary; they loved science and wrote a lot of non-fiction. The romantics wanted to remind people that thereRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne Essay1615 Words   |  7 PagesA birthmark as referred to in this short story is the â€Å"Differences of temperament†, the inborn traits someone can develop. In Nathaniel Hawthorne s The Birthmark there are many different themes such as, nature versus science, and perfection. We see Aylmer struggle with his own temperament. For him the birthmark becomes the symbol of Georgiana’s flawed humanity, which he tries to alternate. Throughout the story, we come across several observances of otherness revolving around â€Å"The Birthmark†. AylmerRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne873 Words   |  4 PagesThe Birthmark is a story by Nathaniel Hawthorne the carries vast amounts of symbolism in its pages. It’s a story that you can pretty much look at anything that is involved and see how it carries some type of underlying meaning that either helps the character development or means something entirely different. The basis of the story is similar to that of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, which only came out about 20 years before The Birthmark. For the most part the story is about human imperfection andRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne1511 Words   |  7 PagesThe Birthmark Nathaniel Hawthorne like many other writers during the nineteenth century focused their writings on the darker aspects of life. â€Å"The Birthmark,† is set in New England and has a Puritan perspective. Aylmer, a well-known scientist, marries Georgiana who has a hand shaped birthmark upon her face. After some time during their marriage Aylmer and Georgiana decided to remove the mark through scientific means. Advancements in science and the ability to change nature were at the center ofRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne2570 Words   |  11 PagesRawan Jabr Professor Stafford English 102 November 9th 2014 Nathaniel Hawthorne’s â€Å"The Birthmark† â€Å"The Birthmark† is a short story authored by Nathaniel Hawthorne and published in 1848. The story is about Aylmer, a brilliant scientist who is obsessed with science and is planning to use his experiments to remove a birthmark on the face of his wife Georgiana. Aylmer’s love for science made him yearn to obtain control of the entire divinity. His wife was among his victims of science that was strongerRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne1185 Words   |  5 PagesAli Qutab Honor American Literature â€Å"The Birthmark† : Essay #4 December 30th, 2015 The Effect of Nature on the Scientific Ego of Aylmer Throughout, â€Å"The Birthmarkâ€Å", by Nathaniel Hawthorne, symbolism and imagery are used to show that Aylmer s attempt to perfect something natural is the cause of Georgiana s death and that when man manipulates something as powerful as Nature, terrible things can occur. Aylmer is a scientist whose strives for perfection and is blinded by his love for science, resultingRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne1707 Words   |  7 PagesMany of Nathaniel Hawthorne s stories are based off of morality and is heavily influenced by religious beliefs and women. Hawthorne published The Birthmark, a parable, dark romanticism, at a time when people praised the scientific method and were starting to think science could make anything possible. He set his story about sixty years earlier in the 160-year-long wake of the Newtonian Revolution, in the Age of Enlightenment, when science was gaining recognition. His story argues that, despiteRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne923 Words   |  4 PagesIn Nathaniel Hawthorne s â€Å"The Birthmark†, we find the tragic story of a woman named Georgiana who sacrificed her life for the sake of appeasing her husband, Aylmer. What did Georgiana do that it was more favorable for her to die than to continuing to displease her husband? Georgiana, who was otherwise hailed as incomparably beautiful, had a birthmark on her face. Aylmer desired this to remove this birthmark, which he considered the one thing keeping her from being â€Å"perfect†, from her face. In anRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne913 Words   |  4 Pagesstory The Birthmark, Nathaniel Hawthorne used Aylmer and his wife Georgiana to display that no person can be perfect. He does this by using Aylmer obsession with perfection and science. His wife Georgiana beauty is amazing and almost perfect, except for a crimson scar on her check that looks like a hand. Aylmer wants to remove the mark that symbolizes imperfection, sin, and mo rtality; though it could result in death. In the act, he is acting like God. Hawthorne’s argument in The Birthmark is our imperfectionsRead MoreThe Birthmark By Nathaniel Hawthorne Essay1399 Words   |  6 PagesThe Birthmark Criticism Analysis The short story â€Å"The Birthmark† by Nathaniel Hawthorne was written in 1843 at the beginning of the largest feminist movement in the United States of America which occurred between the years 1840 and 1920 (National). Furthermore, during the 1830s and 1840s there were many women who spoke out about women’s rights. They argued for many changes with one of them being a social change in their duties to be subdominant to males. They rallied around the prohibition by fighting