“The Birthmark,” Nathaniel Hawthorne
“‘The Birthmark’ has been described as an ‘indictment
of modern science,’ but the text and modern life both acknowledge the
extraordinary achievements of science. Science is not unequivocally evil; it
is, however, dangerous in isolation from human society's other influences,
including sexuality, work of all kinds, and familial relations. It is dangerous
in the speed with which it progresses, an incredible pace far outrunning the
cumbersome gait of social and moral change. And it is dangerous when the study
of minute details becomes a system of belief, as it is for Aylmer. He says to
Georgiana that her birthmark can be removed because it is a 'trifle' compared to this or that achievement of 'deep science,' just as in
this century we say that the removal of all pollution or the obsolescence of
nuclear weapons is, if not a trifle, at least a possibility, because 'we
put a man on the moon.' But as Aylmer once knew, creation, let alone
resurrection, is not the business of isolated science. These tasks require
considerable human cooperation.”
- -- Barbara Eckstein, “Hawthorne's
'The Birthmark': Science and Romance as Belief,” Studies in Short Fiction, Fall 1989, Vol. 29
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