Georgiana's Birthmark example essay topic

Nathaniel Hawthorne was an author during the Romantic Period and also the Industrial Revolution in the 1850's. Love stories were popular in the Romantic Period. Man had begun to explore science, which brought forth the Industrial Revolution. In the Industrial Revolution, technology started to overtake the need for man. Hawthorne firmly believed science corrupted nature and man should not have allowed technology to take over. Hawthorne thought trying to change things in the world would only lead to consequences.

He expressed his opinions in novels and short stories. The Scarlet Letter was considered Hawthorne's greatest masterpiece and became the first symbolic novel to be published in the United States. "The Birthmark" and "Rappaccini's Daughter" were well known short stories wrote by Hawthorne. In each of these stories, a distinguished mark caused lovers to be doomed due to an unpardonable sin. Hawthorne demonstrated his belief how science would corrupt nature when he gave one character a distinguished mark. Hester Prynne, one of the main characters in The Scarlet Letter, committed the crime of adultery and was cut off from society when she had to wear to letter 'A' upon her bosom.

Society felt she was different so they did not talk or acknowledge her. In "The Birthmark", Georgiana was given a birthmark. The birthmark looked like a tiny hand and was located on her left cheek. Georgiana was extremely beautiful so this imperfection in nature was very noticeable. Females made fun of Georgiana and called her birthmark a "bloody hand". Beatrice had poison breath and touch in "Rappaccini's Daughter".

Beatrice was isolated from the world because she could not touch anyone or breathe too closely to someone. She spent most of her time in a garden built by her father. The Romantic Period caused Hawthorne to put a pair of lovers in each other his stories. In The Scarlet Letter, Hester fell in love with Dimmesdale after her husband was assumed dead. Alymer was interested in science, but he left his laboratory when he married Georgiana in "The Birthmark". A window and curiosity, in "Rappaccini's Daughter", appeared to bring Giovanni and Beatrice together.

One character committed an unpardonable sin because Hawthorne wanted to show what would happen when imperfections were not accepted and technology was used. Roger Chillingworth, Hester's assumed dead husband, in The Scarlet Letter, turned up alive and discovered his wife had an affair. He was so upset and angry that he allowed this to consume his whole life. Chillingworth was obsessed with getting revenge on Dimmesdale.

Chillingworth let revenge devour his life and once Dimmesdale died, Chillingworth had nothing left to life for and ended up dead. In "The Birthmark", Alymer loved Georgiana's beauty. He was often puzzled why nature gave her a birthmark, which caused an imperfection in her beauty. Alymer imagined his wife without the birthmark and how she could be absolutely perfect, which caused him to shudder everytime he looked at her. Alymer tried to correct nature when he attempted to remove his wife's birthmark. However, he learned you couldn't perfect nature when Georgiana died.

Rappaccini was so involved in science that he made his daughter a science experiment in "Rappaccini's Daughter". His daughter was not able to live a normal life and ended up drinking poison because she felt betrayed by her father and all she ever wanted was to be normal and experience what true love felt like. Overall, Hawthorne did an excellent job when he showed his viewpoints on the consequences of technology and not accepting imperfections in nature when he wrote these stories. In The Scarlet Letter, Hester wore the scarlet letter because of her affair with Dimmesdale and their life was shattered when Chillingworth's main goal in life became revenge. Georgiana's birthmark turned into her death mark, in "The Birthmark", when she allowed her husband to try to perfect nature.

Rappaccini's love for science, in "Rappaccini's Daughter", went too far when he gave his daughter poison breath and touch as a science experiment which caused her to be isolated from the world and ended up resulting in her death..