What most drew her attention was Aylmer himself. He was nervous and pale as death as he worked on preparing a liquid. Only one thing remains to be tried and if that fails, we are ruined! He led her back to her room where she waited once more, alone with her thoughts.
She hoped that for just one moment she could satisfy her husband's highest ideals. But she realized then that his mind would forever be on the march, always requiring something newer, better and more perfect.
To test the liquid, he placed a drop in the soil of a dying flower growing in a pot in the room. In a few moments, the plant became healthy and green once more. I am happy to put my life in your hands. Aylmer sat next to his wife, observing her and taking notes. He noted everything -- her breathing, the movement of an eyelid.
He stared at the birthmark. And slowly, with every breath that came and went, it lost some of its brightness. He opened the window coverings to see her face in daylight. She was so pale. Georgiana opened her eyes and looked into the mirror her husband held.
She tried to smile as she saw the barely visible mark. With so high and pure a feeling, you have rejected the best the Earth could offer. I am dying, dearest. It was true. The hand on her face had been her link to life. As the last trace of color disappeared from her cheek, she gave her last breath. Blinded by a meaningless imperfection and an impossible goal, Aylmer had thrown away her life and with it his chance for happiness.
In trying to improve his lovely wife, he had failed to realize she had been perfect all along. It was adapted and produced by Dana Demange. Your storyteller was Barbara Klein. Now it's your turn. The reader can see the elements of fiction come alive in this story, from the setting and point of view to the diverse characters and theme. It is set in a house and partly in a laboratory and a small alcove.
Georgiana finds herself in the alcove when she wakes from her faint. The setting helps with the mood of the story and gives the reader a better emotional connection with the story. Aylmer is the main character of this short story, but there is never a set point of view. In this particular short story, there are three characters: Aylmer, Georgiana, and Aminadab.
The story says that he was often seen with soot from the furnace and acid covering his face and fingers. When he was clean, though, it says he had a fine countenance.
Throughout the entirety of the story, he is intent on finding the potion that would cure his wife of the horrible birthmark.
It suggests that Aylmer had a choice in deciding upon the meaning of the birthmark. According to the narrator, what is the origin of this meaning? If Aylmer hopes to connect with a higher level of spirituality through his marriage to Georgiana, then the birthmark, by holding Georgiana back from the highest level, also inhibits his spiritual growth.
That it stands as an obstacle to his own spiritual aspirations helps to explain his eagerness to remove it. Aylmer as Scientist: Paragraph 22 When did Aylmer make his greatest discoveries? What effect did those discoveries have on his career? How does the work we see Aylmer doing as an old man in the story reflect the work he did when young? This latter interest, which he held even as young man, suggests the extent to which Aylmer has long desired to refine, purify, and, in effect, spiritualize, the base elements of nature.
In the story he has redirected this purifying impulse away from rocks, minerals, and water to flesh, blood, and bone. What field of study confronts Aylmer with his greatest professional setback?
The study of the human body. Through it he discovers the limits of his ability to understand nature. Paragraph 51 She sees it as a failure. What language indicates that Aylmer shared this judgment? What is the difference between the way other scientists see Aylmer and the way he sees himself? Yet he sees himself as a failure. There is a gap between his public image and private sense of himself.
Georgiana, as she read, reverenced Aylmer and loved him more profoundly than ever, but with a less entire dependence on his judgment than heretofore. Paragraph 55 In sentences 1 and 2 Aylmer tells us what this experiment means to him. What does it represent? It represents his ultimate triumph, the one that will make him genuinely worthy of worship, thereby closing the gap between his public image of success and his private sense of failure. Aylmer has spent a career trying to understand and control nature, yet he judges that career a failure.
He came to understand the limits of science when, studying the human body, he realized how thoroughly nature defends its secrets from even the most learned inquiry. Accessed August 18, National Humanities Center 7 T. Alexander Drive, P. Phone: Fax: nationalhumanitiescenter. Text Type Literary fiction; short story. Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Birthmark" has a variety of different themes. One of the most prominent themes is Aylmer's need for perfection. His need for perfection can be seen when Aylmer says: "No, dearest Georgiana, you came so nearly perfect from the hand of Nature, that this slightest possible defect, which we hesitate whether to term a defect or a beauty, shocks me" Hawthorne.
While other people saw Georgiana's Birthmark as more of a sign of life, when Georgiana says: "To tell you the truth. Nathaniel Hawthorne is an author whose major fiction writing has influenced the literary world greatly during the course of the nineteenth century.
His work during the Romantic period represents his world view through a specific style of writing. While his literature is particularly dark in tone, his short stories show a variety of symbols, themes, and characters. Once in awhile, mostly when I look at myself in the mirror, I question if there is some way to purge myself of these disfigurements. Hawthorne illustrated a short story similar to my complication, in which he believed that there must be.
It is a story with a simple plot but intense thematic complexity. There are only three characters but each of them displays a certain psychological depth and symbolic importance.
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