Short Stories Paper #2

Kelsey Larin  

Professor K. Mignano-Brady

Literature

April 22, 2017

When there is a good support system or strong foundation of outlook on one’s life, there is a positive and an overall good view on the different aspects of life. In the short stories “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne and “White Woman of Color” by Julia Alvarez, it is visible that the failure of providing the support system and that strong foundation one should have, and often needs, results in negative views and outcomes. Things such as societal influences or people who make others believe what may or may not be true, has a large affect on future outcome of the lives of others.

            In Hawthorne’s short story, Alymer is solely focused on his research and experiments until he fell in love with Georgiana. According to him, she is perfect in every way possible except for the very unique birthmark on her face. He obsessed over this imperfection of hers, and he let her know how he felt about it. He basically tells her that her face is almost perfect, “you come so nearly perfect from the hand of Nature, that this slightest possible defect, which we hesitate whether to term a defect or a beauty, shocks me, as being the visible mark of earthly imperfection” (Hawthorne 219). Flaw played a major role in the two characters as well, which lead to many failures. Alymer is centered on his projects and trying to be perfect in everything, he even succeeded in influencing his wife as well. His ambitions to control nature itself leads to wanting to control more than nature, which reveals his selfishness that affects Georgiana greatly. As he finished perfecting her she says “you have rejected the best the earth could offer. Alymer, dearest Alymer, I am dying!” (Hawthorne 231). He in his flaws, allowed him to fail in recognizing the human heart and spirit; more specifically he failed his wife.

            Georgiana did not think much of her birthmark before she met and married Alymer. She tells him that the birthmark, “has been so often called a charm, that I was simple enough to imagine it might be so” (Hawthorne 219). Alymer never made her feel secure or proud of her unique beauty; that is how he also failed his wife. He wanted to her to be perfect, and because she adored him so much she became to think the same way about perfection. There is no encouragement towards her self worth or boost to her confidence. Instead he diminished whatever love she had for herself, and allowed her to think negatively about the birthmark she had. All that he did and said to her resulted in her wanting to do whatever it took to have no imperfections his Alymer’s eyes. She is willing to risk everything because she admired and adored her husband very much. It is also seen that he failed to stop her from going through with the procedure knowing it could kill her; the danger of it all is clear and his wife proclaimed, “Remove it, remove it, whatever be the cost, or we shall both go mad” (Hawthorne 229).  In a way, Georgiana knew she would end up failing Alymer if she did not go through with the removal of her birthmark. She would always have in mind that her own husband could not see passed the mark on her cheek, and Alymer would always see his wife through the birthmark.

            It is evident in "The Birthmark" and "White Woman of Color" that the person failing the other person or people were those whom were close to them. In “White Woman of Color” Alvarez experienced different expectations externally and internally. Her family had much to do with how their ethnicity played a big role in their lives. More from Alvarez’s mother, she tried and succeeded in “slowly bleaching the color out of her children” (Alvarez 184). Instead of the mother encouraging and telling her children that their natural hair and skin tone was beautiful and unique, she allowed them to be aware that it was not good compared to white people. The eldest sister is “considered the least pretty” (Alvarez 186) because her skin is darker and her hair is coarse unlike the other sisters. In a way, their mother failed to plant confidence in their lives, and self love for the way they are. It was made to be normal for there to be a sister better or not as good as the other, which gave Alvarez the opportunity to acknowledge she is not the favorite daughter. As she grew up, this created a type of isolation for Alvarez in her new environment in New York. She recognized that the majority of Hispanics lived and stayed in one area near the city. She was almost relieved that they were not like all Dominicans in New York, “We were lucky we were white Dominicans or we would have had a much harder time of it in this country” (Alvarez 187).

            The main characters in both short stories lacked an out view of themselves that is positive. In some ways, they were let down in a less obvious way by some one very close to them and someone they looked up to.  This quote by Zaim Ricochet pertains to the discussion of failure and also about the person itself: “We were fools in charge of ourselves destines to crash into out own destiny, and it is all for the sake of how others saw us. When we should’ve been more worried about how we saw ourselves, because that is what we ultimately projected. All we knew is that we didn’t want to become failures.” The end of this quote connects to how Georgiana did not want let down Alymer, by not being the perfect wife. She thought it would make him happy to have her birthmark removed, and that it would make her happy as well. If she had worried less about what he thought of her, she could have learned to come to love the way she is and not have to sacrifice. In “White Women of Color” Alvarez lived a life where all they did think about is how others saw them because they we Latinos with different skin tone and hair. Her and her sisters lived up to expectations of their mother in order not to be how Dominicans were typically seen. They acted, dressed and portrayed themselves a certain way to not fail their family, but in reality their family failed them.

                                                                    Works Cited

Alvarez, Julia. “White Women of Color.” Reprinted in Half and Half: Writers on

            Growing up Biracial and Bicultural. New York: Pantheon Books, 1998).

Booth, Alison, and Kelly J. Mays. The Norton Introduction to Literature. W.W. Norton

            & Company, Inc., 2011.