Summary Of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Birthmark

Would you die if it meant you could be absolutely flawless? Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in Salem, Massachusetts on July 4, 1808. He was a famous American novelist and short story writer. In 1821 Hawthorn was accepted into Bowdoin College where he was elected into Phi Beta Kappa. “The Birthmark”, one of his short stories, was published in March of 1843. During that time science was having many new discoveries. Although, many people were still unfamiliar with science and were doubtful of its importance, it was increasingly more interesting. Many scientists often fell in love with science. Not in the way someone falls in love with a person, but a different sort of love. Often times they would try to manipulate and play with nature. This is no different from how Aylmer, the main character, behaves.
A birthmark is on her left cheek that he never payed much attention to before, now, however, it bothered him. He becomes so obsessed with it that he convinces Georgiana to let him remove it. She knows that his experiments repeatedly failed. Realizing that getting the mark removed meant an almost certain death for her, Georgiana made the decision that dying was better than living with her unrealistic, perfectionist husband. Aylmer is portrayed as a man of science who is unable to separate his love for science with his love for his wife. He is stubborn and refuses to give up which leads to unfixable consequences. He inaccurately believes that beauty lies in imperfection. Aylmer’s tragic flaw is an inability to accept human failures and grasp the idea that it is nature’s flaws that, ironically, are what make the world so