In American literature there are extraordinary findings in simple word use. Two great authors such as Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe have demonstrated what it is like to explore new word choice and go beyond the imagination of some. There short stories like "The Birthmark" and "Ligeia" give a sense of curiosity and leave someone to ponder. Their usage in gothic settings and imagery creates new beginnings of what literature is today. The stories also give a knowledgeable question of whether or not the story was just a dream, or could in fact, some of the events that occurred, become reality. These authors take us through another world by their ever puzzling stories. It will come to show through their literature work of greatness that they are similar with a twist of rareness.
In the short story "The Birthmark" by Hawthorne, a man named Aylmer becomes obsessed with the birthmark of his wife Geogiana that is located on the left side of her cheek in the shape of a hand. He then believes he is more than able to remove it by his scientific abilities. His wife than agrees with her husband and puts all faith into him that he will be able to remove it with few complications. However, Geogiana cannot seem to dismiss the fact that her own husband is appalled by her grotesque birthmark. "You are fit for heaven without tasting death" (Hawthorne 961). Nonetheless, Hawthorne explains in detail the meaning of Geogiana skin and how white her skin is and the color of her red birthmark evens out her beauty. Eventually Aylmer gets a hold of Geogiana and removes the unwanted birthmark of his wife, however, after she looked in the mirror she died instantly. This only comes to show that beauty equals death.
Aylmer wanted something more than just beauty, he wanted Geogiana's life. Hawthorne demonstrates this by the death of Aylmer's wife. Lewis Horne states, "For just as Aylmer's dream, Geogiana's birthmark is rooted in her heart, so in the daytime world "The Birthmark," Aylmer's flaw, indicated by hand, is rooted in his. " And the seat of the spiritual in Hawthorne's work is the heart, that repository of good and evil." This shows that Aylmer's personality showed a define sense of selfishness and Geogiana gave all encouragement towards her husband. She showed an attitude of great morals and Aylmer was set to destroy them. "Most obvious is the suggestion of illusion: everything that Aylmer has created is false and unnatural." "The light is artificial, the figures are shadows, the plant dies at the touch of reality, and the draught of immortality is the draught of death" (Fogle, Richard 123). It is suggested that Hawthorne wanted for readers to understand that everything is imperfect and natural, and if someone tries to create or destroy nothing good will become of it.
As for the short story of Edgar Allan Poe, "Ligeia," there are similarities of what gothic settings can create and destroy. "I cannot, for my soul, remember how, when, or even precisely where, I first became acquainted with the lady Ligeia" (Poe 861). The narrator has a wife by the name of Ligeia she is everything to him, her mind is bright and she has a sense of strangeness about her that the narrator enjoys deeply. He describes her physical features despite he cannot even remember her last name, but what he does know is he is in love. However, Ligeia becomes ill all of the sudden and dies. The narrator soon after, marries again to a woman named Lady Rowena, who seems to be totally opposite of the first wife Ligeia. The narrator soon realizes after a short period of time that his wife does not love him. So mysteriously Rowena becomes ill, during her recovery of her illness she than becomes delusional that the decorations that surround her are in fact alive. Slowly Rowena dies and Ligeia returns as a corpse, she had been haunting her through the bridal chamber where Rowena was kept to stay.
This gave the chance for Ligeia to come back to life only showing she had conquered death. "The very vagueness of the origins and conditions surrounding the narrator's first meeting with Ligeia plunges the reader immediately into an irrational world" (Carlson, Eric 120). Poe describes Ligeia as nothing more than an imaginative woman he made up. However, he describes her as a lovely woman who becomes a corpse and haunts her husband and his wife all for the sake of being together. It seems that Poe was using Ligeia and Rowena to describe two distinct personalities. Rowena's persona was formal and live life according to reality. On the other hand, Ligeia showed great amount of darkness, and abnormalities. Also that Poe was more interested with the touch of what most people would call unreality, this is determined because he brought back Ligeia from the dead. ""Your intent is to tell a tale of the 'mighty will' contending with and finally vanquishing death"" (Cooke Philip 307). Just the thought of a ghost Ligeia entering the body of Rowena shoes extreme gothic attributes. However Poe is best known for his imagery and gothic appearance in his stories.
These two authors give unpleasant but interesting findings in their short stories. As for "The Birthmark" Hawthorne made it clear that Aylmer was nothing more than a man filled with evil intensions which lead him to eventually kill his wife. This story leaves readers to acknowledge any hidden messages and to admire the eventful plots. "My earthly senses are closing over my spirit like leaves around the heart of a rose at sunset" (Hawthorne 961). It seemed that Geogiana knew her husband was eventually going to kill her, but she loved him so much she was willing to do anything for him. In "Ligeia" Poe is at ease presenting the supernatural world to his readers. "Can I never can I never be mistaken these are the full, and the black, and the wild eyes of my lost love, of lady of the Lady Ligeia" (Poe 872). The narrator showed extremely remorseful guilt for having lost his love Ligeia despite she is the one who slowly killed his wife Rowena. These great authors showed a variety of gothic settings and imagery to describe their visions of death between beauty, and good versus evil. According to Monika Elbert, "More than Poe's Ligeia, it is the archetypal image of the creative Muse/goddess who is so seductive in the context of the Gothic". The real determination is was this all use of imagination or simply a dream. Whether it was just a dream or imagination, these stories have an entertaining yet suspenseful mood that make it that much better of a story.
This is a very good paper with lot of interesting ideas. You could have edited it better
Grade: 83
