The Birthmark: A Short Story

Decent Essays
Soon after the marriage Alymer starts noticing the birthmark in his wife’s cheek, which he takes it as a defect in her beauty and decides to remove it with his scientific invention. On the other hand for Georgiana, the birthmark was beauty and a sign of blessings but after listening to her husband about the birthmark she decides to remove it just to make her husband happy. Alymer has already think of removing it and this request from his wife encourage him more to try his discovery even though he was not sure of its result. As Georgiana was taken to the lab for treatment, she wander around the labs and it arouses different feelings of confident, love, doubt and anger. She now hates her birthmark, which was once a sign of blessings and charm.

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Short Story Essay The short stories “Dr. Heidegger’s Experiment,” “Rappaccini’s Daughter.” and “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne all revolve around the idea of unusual or unnatural use of science. These three stories include a scientist who conducts an experiment or works towards a goal to change something that occurs naturally and is not in need of change. Based on the characters and plots of these short stories, Nathaniel Hawthorne shows that the use of science for unnatural purposes, or playing god, is immoral and dangerous.…

    • 674 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Georgiana's cheek is shaped in the way of a tiny hand, however when her husband is adimit about getting rid of her birth mark she realizes that it is harming her beautiful face. No matter what the shape of her birth mark is, I believe that her husband would still be adamit of getting rif of the birth mark because he wants her to be the most beautiful woman in the world. The birthmark becomes more visible by the time Georgiana and her husband leave their home for the labratory, in order to hide the birthmark from anymore scrutiny they decide that the labrotoary is the safest place. Imperfection is a normal thing in life, however what Georgiana was being accustomed to was harsh critism and the lack of admiration for being different or unique.…

    • 208 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Consequently the short stories of Young Goodman brown & the birthmark published and written by Nathaniel Hawthorne illustrates the historical context, religious views, societal conditioning and biographical and scientific construct that comes to play in all aspect, shapes and forms that reveals the culture we live in today society. In today society there several things that goes on in secrete or behind close doors many in which the average person is typically not aware about. Although as individuals we should not be confined to worry ourself over what is concealed or hidden behind closed doors, but rather we should be concerned to worry about what goes on in the dark. Why? generally because, what is usually not seen is evidently what is considered not to be good. During an…

    • 621 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In “The Bridegroom” by Ha Jin, the struggle about family, reputation and homosexuality within the cultural norms. Ha Jin shows a good example for the Eastern people because it opens their eyes by showing them conflicts between the value of society and individual preference. Because the Eastern culture is different from the Western on society and the peoples understanding. In the Asian countries often society effects on the way people think. This short story is about a girl named Beina who was the daughter of Cheng’s dear friend who has passed away.…

    • 512 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Flawlessness, the most unattainable thought in which we all pursue to achieve. Many are obsessed with perfection. In our attempts, we utilize compulsiveness as an instrument to impart the most astounding gauges or execution conceivable. This approach to accomplishing our objectives has positive and negative results. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story The Birthmark, he exposes how Alymer, a neurotic perfectionist (a person who strives for unrealistic goals and is dissatisfied when the task is not achieved), deals with his wife’s flaw.…

    • 792 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    A theme is an abstract, general idea that should not be too specific. "It is a general ideal rather than one that describes the characters, plot, or settings unique to one story" (Norton, 385), and these different literary elements are used by writers to make comments on these themes. "The Birthmark" by Nathaniel Hawthorne and "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien both carry the themes about love and death. In "The Birthmark", Hawthorne uses Aylmer and Georgiana, a couple, to ask questions about love.…

    • 669 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “The Birth-Mark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a short story that carries an important moral. In the story, Aylmer sets out to achieve perfection. He does not consider the consequences of his actions due to the fact that he is too overtaken by reaching ultimate, physical perfection. He is obsessed with his wife’s external appearance to the extent that a small birthmark, considered beautiful by many, deeply bothers him. He wishes to remove it because he believes that it spoils her otherwise perfect beauty.…

    • 999 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Weak, domestic, and familial are some of the words women in the nineteenth century were defined as. The societal expectations of wives during the nineteenth century included separate spheres, roles that they had at home, devotion they showed towards their husbands, and education they had. In the short story, “The Birthmark”, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, published in the nineteenth century gives an internal view of roles between women and men. Aylmer a men that craved science experiments, science being the main source for him, science being the one for him, he compared his love for science with the love of Georgiana, his wife. Georgiana a young woman, fancied by many men, and was very beautiful, but she had a charm on her left cheek that was seen…

    • 1283 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    A humans’ desire to defy Mother Nature can sometimes cause a problem to another human if it cannot be controlled. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story, “The Birthmark” illustrates a Man versus Nature theme as mans desire to fix what Mother Nature created leads him on a quest towards perfection. Humans are imperfect beings; therefore, they cannot be perfect despite their attempts through science. Furthermore, if one reaches perfection then they are no longer considered human. Thesis Statement: In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story, “The Birthmark,” the main character Aylmer pursuit for perfection conflicts directly with human mortality, ultimately resulting in the death of his wife, Georgiana.…

    • 1336 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Alymer is a brilliant scientist and is well known in the science community. According to the narrator, He was very successful as an inventor and created many potions and perfumes but his experiments always fell short of his goals. He could never fully reach what he intended for, which was really his only flaw as a scientist. As a person, he has many flaws and is too worried about his love of science rather than the love of his wife. Georgiana, Alymer’s wife, is “the perfect wife” in the story.…

    • 1261 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    A Birthmark is Not an Imperfection Try and think of the most perfect person you have ever met. Think of their hair, their beauty, their athletic abilities, their home life, etcetera. All of this is only what you can see at the surface, but there is even more to a person that you cannot see. Everyone has their own story of heartbreak, pain, and times of inadequacy. Nobody is perfect, not even that person who you have been crushing on for months.…

    • 1268 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Nathaniel Hawthorne’ s short story, “The Birthmark”, demonstrates a war between the artificiality of science and the spirituality of religion. Hawthorne uses the characters Aylmer and Aminadab as symbols of ideologies and mindsets epitomized in Romanticism. Romanticism, as classified in the “The Birthmark”, is interested in the matters of imagination and artistic expression, straying from the science-driven Enlightenment philosophies that concentrate mainly around reason, logical thinking, and the strive to gain more knowledge. Aylmer’s attempt to remove the birthmark on the face of his wife, Georgiana, supplements his belief that nature can be altered or corrected. Aylmer’s ultimate defeat reflects the end of the Enlightenment era and start…

    • 1062 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    No one is ‘perfect’. Perfection is a word we misuse to describe those who we think are above us in terms of power, beauty and much more. We often criticize those around us and ourselves due to our infinite imperfections while we should be focusing on other aspects of life. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story “The Birthmark”, the primary focus is on human perfection as the protagonist tries to restructure the face of his wife, but it ultimately leads to her demise. This story is a mirror of life since it depicts that humans are flawed beings by our appearance or the way we are obsessed with finding flaws in others, and we should embrace others and our flaws.…

    • 1108 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    The heart of a story lies in the moral. Once a story has been read, the reader must understand the moral, in order to appreciate the story. Sometimes a story 's moral can be explained with a cliché. Washington Irving 's Rip Van Winkle, can be captured by the cliché, you reap what you sow. Rip 's life was not fruitful, as many years were wasted, causing him to not reap any rewards.…

    • 1220 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In my birth experience interviews I included myself as a first natural birth experience in the hospital here in Phoenix, then I interviewed my sister-in-law in Italy, Genova, as a second C-Section birth experience with an epidural, and third I interviewed a friend, Anne, here in Phoenix of her fourth birth experience, home birth. I was 27 years old when I had my daughter Sara on Sept. 8 1998. I came from Sicily that I was four months pregnant. I broke the water around 3:15 AM, woke up my husband and took a quick shower, I had no pain yet. We went to the Paradise Valley hospital and the pain started feeling quick and strong, I was pacing, my mother in law told me about the epidural and advised not to ask for it, for she thought was…

    • 783 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays