Nathaniel Hawthorne's Short Story 'The Birthmark'

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s shorty story “The Birthmark” coveys a message how perfections is not everything. Hawthorne tells a story of how a man who is obsessed with fixing all of failures, and will go to the ends of the earth to right his failures. The story hits on the theme of man versus the natural world, and how people will do whatever to themselves to make them look perfect. Even though people will go to great lengths to make themselves look a “perfect”, it is the imperfection that make them human.

Summary

“The Birthmark”, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, tells a story of a scientist named Aylmer who married a woman with a hand shaped birthmark on her face. Aylmer is a scientist who is completely in love with his work. Ever since he became

Hawthorne’s short story is a prime example of how people will go to the greatest of lengths to make themselves look a certain way to please people. For example, Hawthorne said,” He had studied the wonders of the human frame, and attempted to fathom the very process by which Nature assimilates all her precious influences from earth and air, and from the spiritual world, to create the foster Man, her masterpiece” (Hawthorne 214). Aylmer wanted to challenge something that nature made to fit a mold that is not achievable. I believe that no one is perfect, there is no such thing as someone being perfect. Everyone has imperfections, and that is what makes everyone human. It is the imperfections that give people confidence. Ig everyone was perfect, then the world would be one lonely place to live

Like Georgiana’s birthmark, I felt insecure on the way I looked on the outside. I did not like the way I looked and was ready to take extreme measures to make my body fit the mold I had envisioned for myself. Hawthorne said,” The scenery and the figures of actual life were perfectly represented, but with that bewitching, yet indescribable difference, which always makes a picture, an image, or a shadow, so much more attractive than the original” (Hawthorne 215). When someone looks at themselves in the mirror, they pick out every single flaw they can find. In my mind when I looked at myself in the mirror I envisioned this less fat and attractive human being with a new find level of confidence. Much like Georgiana, I was will to go to great lengths to change something about myself that I just needed to accept and change the right way.

Conclusion

“The Birthmark” is an incredible short story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The story tells a story of a man that is determined to right all of his wrongs by trying to change something nature had made. Instead of trying to accept Georgiana’s imperfections, Aylmer wants to make remove them. This essay gives the perfect example to how people think they can change their body to make themselves perfect. The world needs to know how to accept the imperfections because that is what