Essay On Symbolism In The Birthmark

In his story The Birthmark, Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the female character, Georgiana and her corresponding traits and personalities to symbolize traditional femininity and male dominance found in earlier times. He also uses this symbolism to deliver the message to the reader that perfection is not real and should not be perused, because it will eventually lead to misery.
Aylmer, the husband of a beautiful woman, is in love with science perhaps as much as he is in love with his wife. But, he is not completely content with her. After marrying her, he is becoming more and more aware of a singular mark on her face: a birthmark with the shape of a hand. As time goes on, he comes to resent the birthmark vehemently. He hates it so much, that his disgust towards it is now even shared by his wife, Georgiana. She is so completely overwhelmed with both her husband’s and her own hatred towards her appearance, that she eventually agrees to participate in an experiment in where Aylmer promises to rid her of this monstrosity. The experiment is successful in getting rid of the mark, but it also takes away Georgiana’s life. Georgiana, representing her over exaggerated willingness to please her husband no matter what, becomes the symbol for a femininity and inferiority that Hawthorne is trying to criticize. Kelly Howes, a literary analysist, argues this same position by saying, “Georgiana is not a particularly well-rounded character… [and a] portrayal of traditional femininity.” This is evidently seen in many of Georgiana’s quotes throughout the story. For example, when Georgiana seems to make up her mind about her current “predicament” and says: “It is resolved then, Aylmer spare me not, though you should find the birthmark, take refuge in my heart instead.” Georgiana is willing to give up her life completely and disregards who she is as a person all because of her husband’s dislikes towards a small imperfection found in her face. As incredulous as this seems today, there was in fact a time when men dominated the temperance of women and their overall actions. I think this was a huge influence for Hawthorne’s writing on this piece and its feministic intentions. As Patrick Wash says, “Hawthorne lived in a secular age in which the old Puritan belief had disappeared while the new faith lay in material progress.” So this makes it evident that Hawthorne was trying to mirror his lifetime in a certain way. Georgiana’s symbolism of femininity and weakness also serves as a didactic measure. Hawthorne wants the reader to know that willingness of Georgiana to please her husband utterly is also there to underline Aylmer’s need …show more content…
As Aylmer finally attains his wish of making his wife mirror his dreamlike beautiful partner, he then suffers greatly as his wife dies before his eyes. His suffering and his wife’s death are crucial to the delivery of Hawthorne’s message. This death raises questions regardless of its obvious fictitious nature: even though there is no true logic found in the successfulness of Aylmer’s experiment to solidify the perfection in his wife, nor in the fact that she dies after this; it still manages to raise the question: why did Georgiana had to die? Well Georgiana did not have to die. The belief of attainable perfection found that was embedded in her by Aylmer did have to die. Her death is meant to teach us that perfection is a myth that must not be explored or cultivated in any