Irony In Rappaccini's Daughter By Nathaniel Hawthorne

In many of Nathaniel Hawthorne's short stories, he creates characters with either a malicious or evil feature to relay to the reader a more allegorical meaning. In the story " Rapaccinni's Daughter" he uses Beatrice as a carrier of a deadly poison. Beatrice's relationship with Giovanni is the main plot of the story. To Giovanni, she is the woman who represents death and enslaves him but in reality she is not deliberately harmful to him. She becomes a focus of Giovannis fantasies, fears, and desires, and is credited or punished by him for various evil intentions which in fact stem from his own mind. As Giovanni admires her from afar, meets her, and has a final confrontation with her, we see that he is the one with the poisonous heart.

Giovanni,
the would-be lover, alternates between obsession with Beatrice, which he considers love, and abhorrence of her as shown when he says he felt "a wild offspring of love and horror that had each parent in it, and burned like one and shivered like the other". (655) Giovanni is infatuated with Beatrice from the first moment he sees her in the garden below her window. Yet he senses something dangerous about her, especially because of her resemblance and immunity to the purple-flowered plant her father so carefully avoids. But his association of Beatrice with the plant is only partially correct. Although both are beautiful and dangerous, Beatrice has human qualities that are more than Giovanni's fantasies. She is often described as rich and deep, both indicating that she also has an abundance of character and does not represent only the physical beauty that Giovanni sees in her. He is drawn to her beauty and her sexuality and she becomes a fantasy so strong that he does not want to see the danger in her, he wants to believe he can 'fix" her to be his "ideal woman".

Upon Giovanni's first meeting with Beatrice she warns him almost immediately by saying "Believe nothing of me save what you see with your own eyes"(658).
Since all that Giovanni has seen has only confused him, he responds with "Bid me believe nothing, save what comes from your own lips" (658). Her reply goes straight to the heart of the story: I do so bid you, Signor!" "Forget whatever you may have fancied in regard to me. If true to the outward senses, still it may be false in its essence. But the words of Beatrice Rappaccini lips are true from the depths of the heart outward. Those you may believe!"(658) At this Giovanni "seemed to gaze into her transparent soul, and felt no more doubt or fear". (658) He finds that the woman that he idealized with "hues of terror" turns out to be "so human". (658) After this meeting Beatrice forgets her purple blossoms for the first time. Beatrice recognizes on a conscious level that she really does like human company, after many years of depravation of it. From this day forward she befriends Giovanni, and enjoys his company. Its apparent that Beatrice is concerned for the welfare of Giovanni and has no evil intentions when he reaches for one of the purple flowers and she tells him "Touch it not!" "Not for thy life! It is fatal!"(659) But he soon forgets her concern for his
safety.

Giovanni continues to meet Beatrice and it appears that they are in love. Yet there is a distance between them; their love has no sexual dimension, "no seal of lips, no clasp of hands, nor any slightest caress, such as love claims and hallows."(660) Giovanni wants this physical intimacy, yet when he seeks it, Beatrice gives him "such a look of desolate separation"(660) that he gives up his attempts. Beatrice avoids contact because she fears contaminating him, but Giovanni has "horrible suspicions that rose, monster-like, out of the caverns of his heart, and stared him in the face; his love grew thin and faint as the morning mist." It becomes clear that he has never really shed his distrust of Beatrice. He proves this when he decides to test her by observing whether her breath wilts a bouquet he plans to give her. He is aware at this time that Beatrice may be an unwilling participant in her father's experiment and is given and antidote that is supposed to cure Beatrice's poisonous nature, but he still blames Beatrice. But just before Giovanni leaves to test Beatrice he vainly looks in the mirror, which displays "a certain shallowness of feeling and insecurity in character". (663) This contrasts with the message of depth conveyed in Beatrice throughout the story. But just as Giovanni feels that he has escaped being poisoned he discovers that the flowers have withered in his own hand. With this knowledge he accuses Beatrice: "Yes, poisonous thing...Thou hast done it! Thou hast blasted me! Thou hast filled my veins with poison! Thou hast made me as hateful, as ugly, as loathsome and deadly a creature as thyself....let us join our lips in one kiss of unutterable hatred and so die!"(665) But Giovanni is the one with the ulterior motives and he offers her the antidote in an attempt to make her into his "ideal woman", to make his fantasy a reality. Again, showing herself to be of better character than him, Beatrice drinks the antidote first so he can observe if it is harmful to her. She is willing to sacrifice for him, but he is willing to sacrifice nothing for her. His "love" requires that she conform to his ego and his fantasies. Beatrice observes this and points out" Oh was there not, from the first, more poison in your nature than in mine?" The poison in his "moral system" turned out to be far more deadly than the poison that ran through her physically. The offer of his "help" for his own selfish intentions leads to the death of Beatrice.

Giovanni shows that his intentions rather than Beatrice's are the more dangerous of the two from their first meeting to their last confrontation. Giovanni projected all of his fears and insecurities into Beatrice and made her punishable for deeds she never intended to commit. The focus on the relationship between Giovanni and Beatrice is a major part of the story of "Rappaccini's Daughter"; with Beatrice being a carrier of a deadly poison. "Rappaccini's Daughter" is a wonderful example of Hawthorne's ability to show the evil that resides in his characters through symbolic representation.

Works Sighted:

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. "Rappuccini's Daughter." The Norton Anthology of American Literature. New York, London, 2003. 647-667