Essay on the Woman Protagonist in The Birthmark -- Birthmark Essays

Woman Protagonist in The birthmark In Nathaniel Hawthornes short story, The Birthmark, the reader finds an excellent example of a woman who is so superior to her male counterpart that she has to be labeled the protagonist of the tale. This essay will demonstrate why this designation is deserved by the female character, Georgiana. In the opening paragraph of The Birthmark the fibber introduces Aylmer as a scientist whose love for Georgiana is more attractive than any chemic one. And indeed, he is such a passionate scientist that everything meaningful in his conduct has to be related to science. He is incapable of developing beyond this coif of personal growth. Georgiana, on the other hand, enters the tale as a earlier simple young lady, but soon grows and grows and grows n that most beta spiritual virtue of love. As the woman-protagonist advances in her spirituality, her unfortunate husband, Aylmer, declines in virtue. crimson after Aylmer has persuaded a beautiful woman t o become his wife, he is not capable of loving her properly, unselfishly, because he had devoted himself, however, too unreservedly to scientific studies ever to be weaned from them by any second passion. The storyteller seeks to justify this error or lack in Aylmer by explaining that it was not unusual for the love of science to rival the love of woman in its depth and absorbing energy. Already at the outset of the tale, the reader perceives that Georgiana is passing to be shortchanged in this marriage. She is exposed to the problem initially when her husband asks whether it never occurred to you that the mark upon your cheek might be removed? Aylmer is in need of physical perfection in his wife unfortun... ...memorable The fatal hand had grappled with the brain-teaser of life, and was the bond by which an angelic spirit kept itself in joint with a mortal frame. The soul of this angelic, loving woman, lingering a bite near her husband, took its heavenward flight. A true angel of womankind is ascending to heaven. The unadorned and obvious spiritual superiority of Georgiana, as compared to the retarded, backward, stunted, minimal growth therefore in Aylmer, is adequate cause for designating the lovely woman of the tale the protagonist. She possesses qualities of heroic verse dimension he does not. WORKS CITED Hawthorne, Nathaniel . The Birthmark Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia program library http//etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=HawBirt.sgm&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=1& social class=div1