Mark-Me-Not

Michelangelo's Creation of Adam and the Cueva de las Manos in Argentina

The hand-shaped blemish at the center of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s ‘The Birthmark’ (and his character Georgiana’s cheek) call forth the threat of physical violence, sexual promiscuity and the artistic signature of both man and nature. These themes are explored within the story and will be detailed in this essay.

Aylmer may well function as a doppelganger for Victor Frankenstein: both men dabble in occult arts outside the margins of science and suffer the fatal consequences of endeavoring to sublimate nature. It is reasonable to consider the hand-shaped birthmark with relation to Adam, fashioned out of dust and Prometheus, who molded man from clay. Both instances invoke the act of manual labor; the hand as artistic tool. Georgina brings forth these comparisons when declaring that “In [Aylmer’s] grasp the veriest clod of earth assumed a soul.”

Other phenomena signal the hand as signature: Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam, emphasizing the hand of God’s role in mankind’s creation, recently discovered cave paintings proffering hand-stencils as signatures and the already-established validity of fingerprints as identifiers. Nature left its signature on Georgiana’s cheek. Aylmer wished to impose his own by removing it.

The hand mark on Georgiana’s cheek suggests the physical violence of a slap. It symbolizes Aylmer’s abusive control over his wife’s appearance and self-esteem. It thus references the mark of Cain, struck by God as punishment for Abel’s murder. The mark, paradoxically, imbues Cain with God’s protection against death. Like Cain’s, Georgiana’s mark protects her from death, which she succumbs to through its removal.

The birthmark also connotes sexual promiscuity. The hand as sensory organ is integral to the sensual connectivity between people. Georgiana’s mark suggests she’s been touched; its redness evocative of broken-virginity. Indeed, she indicates that previous paramours were familiar with and fond of her mark, a detail that may not have sat well with Aylmer.

Georgiana’s birthmark references violence, promiscuity and possessive signatures. Through these motifs Hawthorne explores age-old Biblical and mythical ideas.

•This assignment was inspired by Kate's post on Hands and Hawthorne, and the ideas brought forth in our subsequent discussion.