The Birthmark Feminist Analysis

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short stories pose numerous questions about science, the opposition between scientists and Nature, and the roles of women in relation to science and scientists, most notably in “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” “The Birthmark,” and “The Artist of the Beautiful.” In these stories, one might argue that the women—Beatrice, Georgiana, and Annie, respectively—act as foils, disrupting the scientific progress of the male scientist—Giacomo Rappaccini, Aylmer, and Owen Warland, respectively. However, another way of looking at these stories and the women within them is to see these women not merely as foils but as Muses, from whom the scientists take inspiration in their efforts to control of overcome Nature. Similar to the Muses of Greek and Roman mythology, these three women fuel scientific fires, but instead of being praised and valued by scientists, these women are often abused by scientists in various and misogynistic ways. By closely examining these three short stories and the relationships between the Muses and the

scientists, I will explore how these Muses are either used or abused by scientists, so that these scientists can pursue their goals of controlling or conquering Nature.
In “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” the Muse-scientist relationship between Beatrice and her father, Giacomo, is layered with complexity. Even though Beatrice is the daughter of Giacomo, she still inspires his main scientific endeavor. This places her in the realm of the Muses, for Muses inspire scientists, writers, and artists alike. From her mysterious and shadowy inception, Beatrice has been tied to Giacomo’s experiments. Of her and the plant’s creation, Beatrice tells Giovanni: “[A]t the hour when I first drew breath, this plant sprang from the soil, the offspring of his science, of his intellect, while I was but his earthly child” (Hawthorne 250). As explained here, Giacomo created the most notable, and perhaps the most poisonous, plant in the garden from the inspiration he drew from his daughter from the moment she came into the world, though readers are not told how she was born. To add more mystery to Beatrice’s inception and Giacomo’s experiment, it is not mentioned if Giacomo has a wife or partner who gave birth to Beatrice. Readers are left wondering if Beatrice was created by Giacomo, like the poisonous plants in his inverse-Eden.
The garden in which Giacomo keeps Beatrice is much like the Eden of Genesis before Eve partakes of the forbidden fruit and makes the world Fallen.

Giacomo’s garden, like Eden, has lush greenery, has borders which keep separate the inside and outside worlds, and has its own version of Adam and Eve, who are, as Oliver Evans argues, Beatrice and Giovanni, respectively (186). Despite similarities to the original, perfect Eden, what makes Giacomo’s garden an inverse-Eden is that it is Fallen, and its Fallen state is revealed through the poisonous nature of Beatrice and the plants within. Giacomo’s garden is also like an inverse-Eden because Beatrice is Adam—for she was created by Giacomo, who appears to be playing the role of God—and Giovanni is Eve, whom Giacomo (God) finds so his Beatrice can have a mate. This gender-reversal of “Adam” and “Eve,” in addition to the poisonous plants make Giacomo’s garden like, but also not exactly like,

Eden.
In Giacomo’s garden, both the plants and Beatrice are Fallen because they are poisonous; however, as Giacomo claims, it is this poison that makes Beatrice, his Muse, stronger than the Fallen world outside the garden walls. Giacomo even believes Beatrice’s poisoned nature is a gift, a point to which Beatrice vehemently disagrees. Near the end of the story, Beatrice asks of Giacomo why he would curse her with such “miserable doom” (Hawthorne 253). And Giacomo responds: “‘What mean you, foolish girl? Dost thou deem it misery to be endowed with marvellous gifts against which no power nor strength could avail an enemy? … Wouldst thou, then, have preferred the condition of a weak woman … ?’” (253). These passages show that, in the mind of Giacomo at least, Giacomo views his Muse as perfect, even if she is poisonous and Fallen. His retort to her question also reveals his view of his Muse, that she is his possession, or more like a subject in his life-long experiment, whatever this experiment may be, for it is not specified. But Giacomo could very well be aiming to undo the Fall by “fixing” the source of the Fall: woman.
Because Beatrice is the source of Giacomo’s inspiration and likely the main reason why he continues with his experiment of creating a reverse-Eden and amending the Fall, and because Giacomo clearly would do anything for the sake of science, Giacomo keeps his Muse close to him in the poisonous garden, like she is his prisoner or confined lab specimen. Here, in this garden, or “testing place,” Giacomo can “raise his daughter in accordance with a scientific experiment” (Abramson 28). On the one hand, this garden is a safe space for Beatrice, a place where she is among similar, poisonous beings, but, on the other hand, this garden is a prison, where Giacomo keeps his Muse so she will always be close by, supplying inspiration to Giacomo for his scientific endeavors whenever he requires inspiration.
While Beatrice has the companionship of the purple plant, which she and Giacomo consider to be her “sister” (Hawthorne 233, 236, 250, 253), she is also in a prison-like, solitary place, as Giovanni observes one day from his window: “All beneath his eye was a solitude” (236). Also, “the garden was a solitude” (236), and, near the end of this short story, Giovanni, after pouring forth his anger at Beatrice for poisoning him, cries out: “‘Accursed one!’ cried he, with venomous scorn and anger. ‘And, finding thy solitude [emphasis mine] wearisome, thou hast severed me likewise from all the warmth of life” (251). Therefore, despite the companionship of similar, poisonous beings, Beatrice is in solitude, all for the sake of Giacomo’s scientific experiment, and he just watches all this at a safe distance, away from the poisonous lives he has created, gaining inspiration from his confined Muse and watching his experiment unfold before his eyes.
While examining Giacomo’s “infernal experiments” (240), many readers will be left questioning Giacomo’s motives, for the professor, Pietro Baglioni, who himself has motives and prejudices toward Giacomo that are questionable, claims that Giacomo’s “‘patients are interesting to him only as subjects for some new experiment [and that he] would sacrifice human life, his own among the rest, or whatever else was dearest him, for the sake’” of increasing knowledge (234). So, while readers may never fully know or understand Giacomo’s motives and his intentions for his Muse, what is clear is that he appears to value science over any and all life, including his own and no doubt his daughter’s life. And it is also clear that he has kept his Muse in his garden, where he is conducting what appears to be a reverse-Fall experiment, which ultimately leads to her death.
Much mystery surrounds the character of Giacomo and his personality, or personalities. Evans proposes that Giacomo “has two identities: the true one (as Adam) and the false one which he creates for himself (as God)” (187). As God, he selects a mate (Giovanni) for his creation (Beatrice), but, as Adam, Beatrice is, in a way created, sprung from his ribs, for there is no mention of her mother or how Beatrice was born. Yet, Giacomo could also be Satan, attempting to counter God’s Fallen Eden by making it inverse, attempting to make life no longer Fallen through poison. However, due to the multi-layered ambiguities of the story and its characters, readers cannot reach clear conclusions about character motivations.
When Beatrice dies, one has to wonder if Giacomo planned her death. Throughout the story, it is implied that, like God, he orchestrated every aspect of her life, even mysteriously drawing in the young, handsome Giovanni to be his Muse’s mate, and/or to be a part of his experiment. Evans claims that when Giovanni meets Beatrice and is poisoned by her, he becomes “one of Rappaccini’s creations like [Beatrice]” (193). So, if Giovanni becomes part of Giacomo’s experiment, and when Giovanni gives Beatrice the antidote, is he still in control of himself or his actions, or are his life and actions now controlled by Giacomo? There may be not answer to this question, but it is a question that should be asked, for much about the story is ambiguous, particularly in regards to Giacomo.