The Birth Mark by Nathaniel Hawthorne



The Birth Mark by Nathaniel Hawthorne

Introduction

The Birth Mark is written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. This is a short story, which was firstly published in 1843. The main theme of the story is romance. This short story was appeared in a collection of short stories “Mosses from an old Manse”. This collection of Hawthorne's short stories was published in 1846. This story is themed on the human psychology for perfection and beauty (Wright, 2009). In this paper, we will discuss the psychological perspective of human nature in the story.

Discussion

The short story “The Birth-Mark” shows a psychological effect in a sexual relationship. In this story, the birth mark is not an issue to the husband even after marriage. The story places an emphasis on the sexual guilt of the husband which is disguised as apparent cosmetology. It has been contended by some critics that the major story's theme is that the perfection of human is achievable only in death and thus it is unreachable. This can be observed when the trademark foreshadowing appears in the dream of Aylmer for cutting out the marks. In that dream, he realizes that the birth mark was associated to the heart of Georgia which is elected by him to cut in his effort to remove the birthmark (Sterling, 2009).

The Birth-Mark is the representation of several factors in the whole story. Two major representations include mortality and imperfection. Georgiana is a woman and is mortal due to the imperfection. In this story, we can also take the birth mark as a symbol of death. Nobody is perfect and nobody has the power to prevent himself from fatality.

The birth mark shows the belief of Hawthorne that an imperfection of human cannot be separated. It is the nature of human to be imperfect. ...