...Student’s name: Professor’s name: Course title: Date: Symbolism in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Birthmark Literature is more than a description of a single life story; its aim is to work universally. In this sense, symbolism of any text is a link that unites the factual and metaphoric plans. So, Hawthorne’s symbolism in Birthmark is his way to tell the readers more than he actually says by writing a science fiction story. The character trying to remove his wife’s birthmark is an example of human obsession with perfection, which makes the modern world sick. Yet, imperfection is the sign of being alive, so it is impossible to reach perfection without dying. Besides, the characters of Aylmer and Georgiana are symbols, too, and embody science and nature, respectively. Finally, the symbolism of the story reveals the issue of repressed and sick femininity. Speaking of symbolism, it is quite natural that it is Georgiana’s birthmark that is the core symbol. Aylmer is a successful scientist whose discoveries border on the supernatural. He seems to be quite happy with his beautiful wife, yet it suddenly strikes him that her birthmark is a spot that tars her beauty. As a researcher and alchemist, he is obsessed with achieving the maximum result, and it is true that artificially created objects can be flawless unlike living people. However, he is so deepened into the realm of science and technology, that he sees his whole life through that lens, and is unable to appreciate nature as it is...
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...Hawthorne’s Life through Symbolism Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American writer who is very well known for his use of symbolism. In many of Hawthorne’s short stories, he uses symbolism to express the conflicts he faced within his life. Some of these short stories include “Young Goodman Brown,” “Minister’s Black Veil,” “The Birthmark,” and “Rappaccini’s Daughter.” Within his work, Hawthorne tells great tales where each character faces a different issue in which they must make a decision such as one’s that Hawthorne had to make. Some decisions Hawthorne made in his very own life were his families’ beliefs of Puritanism and if he should follow their beliefs, conflicts with learning about his father and grandfather, marrying his wife, and how he remained isolated, a recluse, away from the world. In “Young Goodman Brown,” Hawthorne uses symbolism to tell the story of a young man who goes on a journey from his innocent world into an evil world. In the beginning of the story the reader is introduced to two characters, Young Goodman Brown and his wife, Faith. Hawthorne uses their names as the first piece of symbolism, Young Goodman Brown means a young man, who is good natured, and his last name “Brown” also means he is dull and just blends in the background. Morgan 2 Brown is married to Faith, whose name is also symbolic. Faith’s name is used as not only Goodman Brown’s wife, but it is also used as his faith. This is shown when he says, “My love and my Faith,” (Young Goodman Brown...
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...symbols to describe their thought. In our reading, “Birth-mark” and “A wall of fire rising”, writers use some representative symbols, such as the birthmark and the balloon, to show his theme statement. Symbolism is one obvious figure of speech using in the two articles. In those two articles, there are some similarities and differences between the function of symbolism. The different symbol methods result in various effects on readers’ feeling and understanding to the articles....
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...Symbols in stories can give you a lot of information that you didn’t have before, or it could serve as a source of irony in a story. Overall symbols have many different places in stories and can be used for many different things. The three stories that we read “The Birth-Mark,” “A Wall of Fire Rising,” and The Yellow Wallpaper” all used many different sources of symbolism. Just like how in “The Birth-Mark” the birth-mark was a symbol of human imperfection, in “A Wall of Fire Rising” the balloon was a symbol of freedom, and in “The Yellow Wallpaper” the girl in the wall symbolized John’s wife. In “The Birth-Mark” the girl that had the birthmark was considered to be perfect, with her only flaw being the birth-mark. The birthmark then showed how every human, no matter how close, is not perfect. “With the morning twilight Aylmer opened his eyes upon his wife’s face and recognized the symbol of imperfection” (Hawthorne 213-214). This symbol set up the entire story by making it so that Aylmer wanted to get rid of his wife’s birthmark. At the end of the story the birthmark was removed, but she died, symbolizing that no one in this world is perfect. The balloon in “A Wall of Fire Rising” symbolized the freedom...
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...conveys his message through his main characters Aylmer, a scientist and lover of nature, and his beautiful wife, Georgina, who bears a small, crimson colored, hand-shaped birthmark upon her left cheek. Despite the amount of love that Aylmer has for his wife, he can’t help but to become engulfed with the mark that stains his wife’s cheek that keeps her from being perfect. Being a man of science he decides to create an elixir to remove her one flaw. “The Birth-Mark” is a story filled with potent symbolism to illustrate the scientist’s superficial endeavor, destructive irony, and a theme that provides us with moral allegory. The birth mark represents various things throughout the story, the most predominate symbol in this story is Georgina’s birthmark, which symbolizes the imperfection of human nature and mortality. Georgina was admired by many men, for she “came so nearly perfect from the hand of Nature” (Hawthorne 291), but the only man she craved admiration from was Aylmer, who was not able to get past the slightest defect that blessed her cheek. The presence of the crimson stain deeply takes over his mind and dreams, it deeply disturbs him because it reminds him of his wife's humanity and mortality when he is on a quest for divine perfection. Though the birthmark is undoubtedly the bluntest use of symbolism in this story, Aylmer and Aminadab, Aylmer’s under worker, demonstrate symbolic characterization. In a few instances, Aylmer is...
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...2014 ‘Battle Royal’ and ‘The Birthmark’ These are two short stories that at first seem to be absolutely unrelated in composition and text. The first story ‘Battle Royal’ and the second one ‘The Birthmark’; upon reading both stories, it would be easy for someone to feel that they are about as distant from one another as two short stories could get. However, I have read and reflected on both and while they are different, they are also so very similar. The similarities, though best found by the reader and not by someone else’s summary will most probably be construed differently by each reader. These stories are set in two entirely different eras. The Battle Royal is set in the 30s well after slavery was abolished yet while racism was strongly prevalent. It was during this time that African-Americans were fighting for equality and trying to overcome bigotry and hatred. We find our young protagonist to be one that is fighting for equality and yet accepting of what can be deemed as near torture in order to prove his perseverance. In the story The Birthmark we find the setting to be in the late 1700s, as author is writing during the 1840s and speaks in the very first sentence of Aylmer living at the end of the last century (Hawthorne, 2014, 303-316). This was a time of extremely strong faith in men of science; these same men were put on pedestals as nearly being close to gods. It is this thinking that causes Aylmer to think he can remove the birthmark and Georgiana to have the blind...
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...The Comparison of Inner Conflicts of Nathanial Hawthorne’s Characters By: Francisco Avilez ENC 1102 Nathaniel Hawthorne’s stories consist of individuals that suffer from inner conflicts that are caused by sin, pride, untested innocence, hidden guilt, perverse secrecy, cold intellectuality, and isolation. In his stories “The Minister’s Black Veil", “The Birth Mark” and “Rapaccini’s Daughter” all suffer from pride, perverse secrecy, and sin. In these tree stories, Hawthorn’s characters use science and mind control to manipulate their victims resulting from their obsession to be or act like God. Neither of his characters felt as if they have sinned or show any remorse for their victims or actions. In the Minister’s Black Veil”, a minister wears a black veil to prove a point to his congregation, but when he realizes the power he has gained from his community through his veil, he decides to never take it off, as a result, he crushes his future bride’s heart along the way (Emmett). In Hawthorne’s story “The Birth Mark”, a scientist is obsessed with his wife’s birth mark and considers it as an imperfection; he believes his wife has. In the story of “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” a scientist is obsessed with science, and as a result he destroys his beloved daughter’s ability to love, and her life. Nathaniel Hawthorn’s story, “The Minister’s Black Veil” the main character “Minister Mr. Hooper” wears a black veil that hangs from his forehead, hiding his face from the world. All that is...
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...boar eats the littlun who has a mulberry-colored birthmark on his face. 5. Piggy’s parents will come find them. 6. The conch provides a symbol for authority that the boys recognize as civilized. 7. The main source of food on the island is food scavenged from the wreckage of the airplane. 8. The boys murder Simon because they think that he is “batty.” 9. Piggy is not afraid of Jack because he knows that SamnEric will protect him. 10. Ralph and Jack initially had a mutual respect for each other that diminished by the end of the book. Match the following descriptions with the choices given (A-E) a. Ralph b. Piggy c. Jack d. Simon e. Roger 11. dies when a rock falls on him 12. the elected leader of the group 13. the most evil character; kills Piggy 14. puts his own lust for hunting ahead of everyone else’s needs 15. sees people for what they really are 16. represents the power-hungry dictator in society 17. represents the mystic philosophers in society 18. represents the good-hearted rule-following leaders in society 19. represents the evil sadist figures in society 20. represents the scholars in a society Multiple Choice 21. The boys are on the island because a. their ship sunk b. they will be safe from the war there c. their plane was shot down d. they were on vacation 22. The boy with the mulberry birthmark who was fearful of the “snake-thing” a...
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...Wyatt Richards Amanda Little Descent Into Savagery William Golding Lord of the Flies In order to demonstrate the fragility of one civilized nature, William Golding uses symbolism in Lord of The Flies, to aid the reader with identifying the boys’ transition from civilized to savage, as result of the boys being liberated from the law and order of their civilized upbringing, once they become stranded in the wild of the tropics. Specifically, to illustrate this idea , multiple (objects/characters) are used to represent the boy’s descent into savagery including the Beast,the Scar and the conch. The conch is a powerful symbol of civilization and unity on the island. Readers can track the boys' descent into savagery from civilized school boys’...
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...'LORD OF THE FLIES' by William Golding “Revision notes can never replace knowing the books thoroughly” J.W.Evans These notes should be used as pointers to the directions that your thoughts might take. They are not meant to replace your reading of the novel, you must still do that yourself.. CHARACTERISATION Never forget that we are talking about a group of boys whose maximum age is twelve. RALPH Does he represent all that is good in people? Tall, fair-skinned, blond hair, very athletic, natural leader although not that good a leader as many of his decisions are questionable, which ones?. He is middle-class, father a naval officer. Elected leader but not forceful enough to maintain position. Eventually he loses support and is reduced to the status of an outcast who must flee for his life. Ralph is an idealist and a dreamer. He needs Piggy to think for him. He finds the Conch but Piggy tells him how to use it. At the end of the book, he is a disillusioned realist who now sees his world and its inhabitants for what they are. JACK MERRIDEW Does he represent the worst in people? He is thin, tall, with red hair, light blue eyes and freckles. Leader of the choir, he becomes the leader of the hunters. Increasingly in conflict with Ralph and more particularly, Piggy, he breaks away, forms his own tribe and splits the group. He manages to get the support to do this by offering the boys the attraction of the hunting life and then by terrorising them. In the...
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...NORTH AMERICAN FICTION BRIEF INTRODUCTION: Before starting our study of American Fiction we must understand what American Literature is in itself and which pieces of writing we can include within this label. It is believed that when a piece is written in North America, more precisely in the USA, it would automatically be given this epithet. But it should be taken into account that this idea is quite broad and doesn’t reflect the real essence of the term. However, there is also another definition that gathers this essence: American Literature is the one that represents the Americanism, the singularity of the USA philosophy and culture. This way, instead of focusing on who the author is, it is focused on the content of the writing. In that which concerns Fiction, the following documents are the ones considered as narrative: Speeches Letters Short Stories Essays Political Documents Sermons Novels Diaries 1 FIRST LITERARY EXPRESSIONS The first documents in which the idea of Americanism is very present are the Sermons. They respond to the strict Protestantism settled in the New Continent after the arrival of the Pilgrim Fathers and Puritans in the Mayflower (1620) and the Arabella (1630). They established a theocratic community whose main and only point of reference was the Bible. That is why the idea of the ‘city upon a hill’ is still very present in American mentality. As we all know...
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...Irvine Welsh Trainspotting IRVINE WELSH works, rests and raves in Edinburgh. He has had a variety of occupations too numerous and too tedious to recount. Trainspotting was his first novel and he has also published a collection of short stories, a novella entitled The Acid House and a second novel, Marabou Stork Nightmares. IRVINE WELSH TRAINSPOTTING Minerva Thanks to the following: Lesley Bryce, David Crystal, Margaret Fulton–Cook, janice Galloway, Dave Harrold, Duncan McLean, Kenny McMillan, Sandy Macnair, David Millar, Robin Robertson, Julie Smith, Angela Sullivan, Dave Todd, Hamish Whyte, Kevin Williamson. Versions of the following stories have appeared in other publications: 'The First Day Of The Edinburgh Festival' in Scream If You Want To Go Faster: New Writing Scotland 9 (ASLS), 'Traditional Sunday Breakfast'in DOG (Dec, 1991), 'It Goes Without Saying' in West Coast Magazine No. 11, 'Trainspotting at Leith Central Station' in A Parcel of Rogues (Clocktower Press), 'Grieving and Mourning In Port Sunshine' in Rebel Inc No. 1 and 'Her Man, The Elusive Mr Hunt' and 'Winter In West Granton' in Past Tense (Clocktower Press). The second part of 'Memories of Matty' also appeared in the aforementioned Clocktower Press publication as 'After The Burning'. Contents KICKING – – * THE SKAG BOYS, JEAN–CLAUDE VAN DAMME AND MOTHER SUPERIOR; JUNK DILEMMAS NO. 63; THE FIRST DAY OF THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL; IN OVERDRIVE; GROWING UP IN PUBLIC; VICTORY ON NEW YEAR'S DAY; IT GOES WITHOUT...
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...62118 0/nm 1/n1 2/nm 3/nm 4/nm 5/nm 6/nm 7/nm 8/nm 9/nm 1990s 0th/pt 1st/p 1th/tc 2nd/p 2th/tc 3rd/p 3th/tc 4th/pt 5th/pt 6th/pt 7th/pt 8th/pt 9th/pt 0s/pt a A AA AAA Aachen/M aardvark/SM Aaren/M Aarhus/M Aarika/M Aaron/M AB aback abacus/SM abaft Abagael/M Abagail/M abalone/SM abandoner/M abandon/LGDRS abandonment/SM abase/LGDSR abasement/S abaser/M abashed/UY abashment/MS abash/SDLG abate/DSRLG abated/U abatement/MS abater/M abattoir/SM Abba/M Abbe/M abbé/S abbess/SM Abbey/M abbey/MS Abbie/M Abbi/M Abbot/M abbot/MS Abbott/M abbr abbrev abbreviated/UA abbreviates/A abbreviate/XDSNG abbreviating/A abbreviation/M Abbye/M Abby/M ABC/M Abdel/M abdicate/NGDSX abdication/M abdomen/SM abdominal/YS abduct/DGS abduction/SM abductor/SM Abdul/M ab/DY abeam Abelard/M Abel/M Abelson/M Abe/M Aberdeen/M Abernathy/M aberrant/YS aberrational aberration/SM abet/S abetted abetting abettor/SM Abeu/M abeyance/MS abeyant Abey/M abhorred abhorrence/MS abhorrent/Y abhorrer/M abhorring abhor/S abidance/MS abide/JGSR abider/M abiding/Y Abidjan/M Abie/M Abigael/M Abigail/M Abigale/M Abilene/M ability/IMES abjection/MS abjectness/SM abject/SGPDY abjuration/SM abjuratory abjurer/M abjure/ZGSRD ablate/VGNSDX ablation/M ablative/SY ablaze abler/E ables/E ablest able/U abloom ablution/MS Ab/M ABM/S abnegate/NGSDX abnegation/M Abner/M abnormality/SM abnormal/SY aboard ...
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