Professor Balglioni In Rappaccini's Daughter

In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Rappaccini’s Daughter, it appears that Dr. Rappaccini is the main antagonist of the story. He is responsible for hiding his daughter, Beatrice, from the outside world, and he exposes her to poisons so that she will kill anyone who might come in contact with her. However, there is another character, Professor Baglioni, who exceeds the doctor in his level of antagonism. His motives are selfish and cruel, and he ends up victimizing the innocent daughter of Rappaccini.
In the beginning of the story, Baglioni begins to create drama between Giovanni, his pupil and the anti-hero of the tale, and Dr. Rappaccini. Baglioni explains to the young man that Rappaccini’s “patients are interesting to him only as subjects for some new experiment” (Hawthorne4), and Giovanni, as a medical student, is outraged by this. Giovanni becomes determined to rescue his beloved Beatrice from the horrendous life that her father has cursed her with, and he does it all because of Baglioni. Later on, Baglioni confronts Giovanni and claims that the doctor has made the young man into one of his victims of experimentation. This makes Giovanni even more frustrated and determined to beat this seemingly horrid man.

If Baglioni had not given Giovanni the antidote, then Beatrice would not have passed, but it is possible that he might have given it to the young student as a rouse to get revenge on Rappaccini. This would explain why he was not sympathetic. After Beatrice’s death, Baglioni watches from a distance and shouts: “’Rappaccini! Rappaccini! And is this the upshot of your experiment?’” (Hawthorne20). Although Baglioni may have hated Rappaccini, losing a daughter or any other immediate family member is very difficult to deal with, and his response was not