The Birthmark
The scientist Alymer in Hawthorne’s “The Birthmark” attempts to sanctify his wife of her impurities through scientific procedures. While this endeavor of human science aims at attaining perfection during the present life, it ultimately comes at the cost of earthly life. In Alymer’s attempt to rid Georgiana’s face of a hideous birthmark, he ends up ultimately killing her. Georgiana’s blemish is so intrinsically tied to who she is as a physical human being that it cannot die unless she dies with it. Using the intellect to harness nature, humans can strive for their own sanctification, but ultimately they are too tied to their imperfections to live without them. As Alymer and Georgiana exemplify, man’s hatred of sin can lead him to destroy his companions by seeking to perfect them according to his own means. By taking the task of sanctification into his own hands, Alymer kills his wife.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Monday, October 27, 2008
Sin and Community in Hawthorne's Stories: Part 2
The Minister's Black Veil
In “The Minister’s Black Veil,” Hawthorne shows us a man who bears an outward sign of hidden sin. Hooper dons a veil that represents the man’s hypocritical concealment of his sin from others. Whereas the revelation of hidden sins is destructive for Goodman Brown, the intentional exposure of man’s hypocrisy serves as a didactic tool for Reverend Hooper. However, even this willful confession of sinfulness cuts him off from relationships. As he says to his fiancé Elizabeth, “This dismal shade must separate me from the world: even you, Elizabeth, can never come behind it!” Elizabeth stays loyal to Mr. Hooper to the end of his life, but it is unclear as to whether they actually marry, and she never again sees his face. Although Hooper hopes for the removal of his veil in eternity, he offers no solution to the problem of hiddenness and isolation for the present life, and his participation in community is forever shrouded by the horrific veil upon his face. Men and women look upon him with dismay and children flee him with fright. While looking hopefully heavenward, Hooper neglects to seek sanctification in the present life. Instead, he continues to bear the sign of hypocrisy upon his face. It seems that Hooper, like Goodman Brown, offers no means of sanctification from sin during the present life, and hence loses his ability for unobstructed community with those around him.
In “The Minister’s Black Veil,” Hawthorne shows us a man who bears an outward sign of hidden sin. Hooper dons a veil that represents the man’s hypocritical concealment of his sin from others. Whereas the revelation of hidden sins is destructive for Goodman Brown, the intentional exposure of man’s hypocrisy serves as a didactic tool for Reverend Hooper. However, even this willful confession of sinfulness cuts him off from relationships. As he says to his fiancé Elizabeth, “This dismal shade must separate me from the world: even you, Elizabeth, can never come behind it!” Elizabeth stays loyal to Mr. Hooper to the end of his life, but it is unclear as to whether they actually marry, and she never again sees his face. Although Hooper hopes for the removal of his veil in eternity, he offers no solution to the problem of hiddenness and isolation for the present life, and his participation in community is forever shrouded by the horrific veil upon his face. Men and women look upon him with dismay and children flee him with fright. While looking hopefully heavenward, Hooper neglects to seek sanctification in the present life. Instead, he continues to bear the sign of hypocrisy upon his face. It seems that Hooper, like Goodman Brown, offers no means of sanctification from sin during the present life, and hence loses his ability for unobstructed community with those around him.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Sin and Community in Hawthorne's Stories: Part 1
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short stories, there is a recurring theme of sin and hypocrisy obstructing human relationships. Again and again, sin destroys the characters’ images of one another and their ability to relate. It seems that Hawthorne’s characters lack an ability to deal properly with sin in community because they lack an adequate concept of sanctification.
In a brief series of posts, I will explore this concept in “Young Goodman Brown,” “The Minister’s Black Veil,” and “The Birthmark,” and then give my own reflections based on Scripture.
Young Goodman Brown
In “Young Goodman Brown”, Goodman Brown’s exposure to his community’s depravity causes him to retreat from the community, from his family, and ultimately from his Faith. Having based his Christianity on the perception of others’ righteousness, Goodman Brown’s trust is shattered when he realizes that the people he had looked up to are imperfect (this statement assumes some interpretation, which I’d be happy to defend if requested). During Brown’s chilling and mysterious experience in the woods, he realizes that “Evil is the nature of mankind,” and he quits hoping that virtue “were not all a dream.” All that Brown now sees in people is depravity, and he lives the rest of his life avoiding them “as if to avoid an anathema,” seeing no hope for their redemption. He is hopeless even to his death, and “they carved no hopeful verse upon his tomb-stone.” Goodman Brown’s problem is that he sees only sin and has no concept of sanctification – his realization of sinfulness is the end of his faith, rather than a motivation to seek purification. Because of his inability to see the process of sanctification that fallen man is in, Goodman Brown is unable to live with the imperfections of those around him, and he withdraws from community.
In a brief series of posts, I will explore this concept in “Young Goodman Brown,” “The Minister’s Black Veil,” and “The Birthmark,” and then give my own reflections based on Scripture.
Young Goodman Brown
In “Young Goodman Brown”, Goodman Brown’s exposure to his community’s depravity causes him to retreat from the community, from his family, and ultimately from his Faith. Having based his Christianity on the perception of others’ righteousness, Goodman Brown’s trust is shattered when he realizes that the people he had looked up to are imperfect (this statement assumes some interpretation, which I’d be happy to defend if requested). During Brown’s chilling and mysterious experience in the woods, he realizes that “Evil is the nature of mankind,” and he quits hoping that virtue “were not all a dream.” All that Brown now sees in people is depravity, and he lives the rest of his life avoiding them “as if to avoid an anathema,” seeing no hope for their redemption. He is hopeless even to his death, and “they carved no hopeful verse upon his tomb-stone.” Goodman Brown’s problem is that he sees only sin and has no concept of sanctification – his realization of sinfulness is the end of his faith, rather than a motivation to seek purification. Because of his inability to see the process of sanctification that fallen man is in, Goodman Brown is unable to live with the imperfections of those around him, and he withdraws from community.
Monday, April 21, 2008
Mr. Darcy isn't Perfect
I've frequently heard guys lament that young women are too insistent upon holding them up to an unattainable "Mr. Darcy standard." I wonder, however, why Mr. Darcy should be considered such a formidable foe to the young men that must bear comparison with him: as I was thinking while editing a friend's Pride and Prejudice essay this week, Mr. Darcy isn't perfect. He's quite imperfect, in fact, as even the title of the book attests: who daydreams about a man characterized by things like prejudice and pride?
I think that his very imperfection, however, is ultimately a reason for Mr. Darcy's appeal, as well as Austen's insight as an author. Mr. Darcy is anything but charming at first - he is aloof and scornful, and his people skills are certainly lacking. As his first proposal manifests, his communication skills are a complete wreck. He is even susceptible to serious character flaws such as the propensity to hold grudges, as he himself confesses (his "good opinion once lost is lost forever."). But Darcy's strength lies in the fact that, as Lizzy realizes, "He improves upon closer acquaintance." As it turns out, Mr. Darcy is a good man beneath all of his seemingly-glaring flaws; it just takes a lot of work to realize the depth of his virtue. Austen has created Darcy as an authentic human character, with flaws and strengths all mixed in together. As in any real human relationship, it takes really getting to know Darcy for Lizzy to appreciate his true qualities. Genuinely getting to know someone is a difficult process, as favorable and unfavorable layers of a person's character are revealed, but it is necessary to true relationships, and as Pride and Prejudice depicts, it can be truly rewarding.
If a young man fears that he'll never live up to Mr. Darcy's apparently perfect example, he should consider that, were a girl to meet a real life Mr. Darcy, there would be occasions when she would think even him an utter failure according to the idealized "Mr. Darcy standard." When it comes to human character, perfection isn't requisite to goodness.
I think that his very imperfection, however, is ultimately a reason for Mr. Darcy's appeal, as well as Austen's insight as an author. Mr. Darcy is anything but charming at first - he is aloof and scornful, and his people skills are certainly lacking. As his first proposal manifests, his communication skills are a complete wreck. He is even susceptible to serious character flaws such as the propensity to hold grudges, as he himself confesses (his "good opinion once lost is lost forever."). But Darcy's strength lies in the fact that, as Lizzy realizes, "He improves upon closer acquaintance." As it turns out, Mr. Darcy is a good man beneath all of his seemingly-glaring flaws; it just takes a lot of work to realize the depth of his virtue. Austen has created Darcy as an authentic human character, with flaws and strengths all mixed in together. As in any real human relationship, it takes really getting to know Darcy for Lizzy to appreciate his true qualities. Genuinely getting to know someone is a difficult process, as favorable and unfavorable layers of a person's character are revealed, but it is necessary to true relationships, and as Pride and Prejudice depicts, it can be truly rewarding.
If a young man fears that he'll never live up to Mr. Darcy's apparently perfect example, he should consider that, were a girl to meet a real life Mr. Darcy, there would be occasions when she would think even him an utter failure according to the idealized "Mr. Darcy standard." When it comes to human character, perfection isn't requisite to goodness.
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Mirror of Nature: Shakespeare's Theatrical Project in Hamlet
Often today, we learn Shakespeare as literature rather than theater. This has certainly been the case in my own education. We forget, however, that during Shakespeare's career, his contemporary, Ben Johnson, was censured for presuming to publish his 'playes' as 'workes' of literature. Shakespeare was a professional playwright, and his venue was the theater, not the press (although his plays were eventually published). A look at the theatrical world of Shakespeare's day enables us to appreciate his work on more levels that we can if we only read his plays as literature. Additionally, it opens our eyes to a better understanding of Shakespeare's artistic project on the whole.
Shakespeare is a very self-conscious playwright, as it turns out. His works are full metatheatrical and theatrically self-aware moments, and Hamlet is a prime example. Certain lines of the play can only be fully appreciated in light of their original theatrical context. The theater business of Elizabethan and Jacobean London consisted of theater companies which would perform frequently for regular audiences. Like the movie industry today, the public was typically more familiar with the actors than with particular plays. Plays were made popular by the actors who stared in them, such as Richard Burbage and Edward Alleyn, who popularized Hamlet and Tamberlain, respectively (Burbage and Alleyn were lead actors of the rival theater companies, Lord Chamberlain’s Men and Admiral’s Men, who held a duopoly in the London theater business).
In Hamlet, Shakespeare capitalizes on his audience’s familiarity with the cast to make a metatheatrical joke that is actually extremely relevant to the play’s plot. It is found in Act three, Scene two:
HAMLET: [TO POLONIUS] MY LORD, YOU PLAYED ONCE I’TH’ UNIVERSITY, YOU SAY?
POLONIUS: THAT I DID, MY LORD, AND WAS ACCOUNTED A GOOD ACTOR.
HAMLET: AND WHAT DID YOU ENACT?
POLONIUS: I DID ENACT JULIUS CAESAR. I WAS KILLED I’TH’ CAPITOL. BRUTUS KILLED ME.
While this comment might seem irrelevant to the modern reader, Shakespeare’s audience would have recognized that John Hemmings, who acted the part of Polonius, had also acted the part of Julius Caesar in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, which would have been performed not long before Hamlet (G.R. Hibbard suggests that the two plays were in the company’s repertory at the same time: 1599-1601). Additionally, Richard Burbage, who played Hamlet, had also played the Brutus who killed Caesar, played by Hemmings. In a subtle way, Polonius/Hemmings is foretelling his own death at the hands of Hamlet/Brutus/Burbage. Through theatrically self-conscious references such as these, Shakespeare is reminding his audience that they are sitting in a theater, watching actors. This awareness gets right to the heart of Shakespeare’s project in Hamlet (one of the projects, at least; Hamlet addresses multiple big topics).
In Hamlet, Shakespeare is exploring the nature of acting and theater, and how theater functions as a form of art, representation, expression, and communication. It features a play within a play, and a whole speech instructing players how to act. The whole play is rife with the language of action, performance, speech, authenticity, disguise and perception. In his own actions, Hamlet puts on a deceptive performance of madness, and on stage, he presents a revealing representation of his uncle's sin. Hamlet exhorts his players to act authentically on stage:
SUIT THE ACTION TO THE WORD, THE WORD TO THE ACTION, WITH THIS SPECIAL OBSERVANCE, THAT YOU NOT O'ERSTEP NOT THE MODESTY OF NATURE. FOR ANYTHING SO OVERDONE IS FROM THE PURPOSE OF PLAYING, WHOSE END, BOTH AT THE FIRST AND NOW, WAS AND IS TO HOLD AS T'WERE, A MIRROR UP TO NATURE...
The power of this mirror to nature is manifest in the king’s (Claudius’) response to the play that catches his conscience by representing his guilt before his eyes, just as Hamlet had planned.
Later in the play, there is a discussion of action apart from the stage, when two grave-diggers wonder what incurs guilt in human action. "An act hath three branches," the grave-digger says, "it is to act, to do, and to perform." Each of these branches has a different level of authenticity, and hence a different degree of guilt. Shakespeare is getting his audience to question what is authentic action and what is performance, both on stage and off.
At a time when theater held a peculiar position in society, being on the one hand patronized by monarchs, and on the other, censured as a source of riot and indecency, Shakespeare is forcing theater-goers to consider the nature of theatricality and the way that theater communicates as an art form. This consideration of artistic form fits in with the broader thematic content of Hamlet, which wrestles with questions of speech, presentation, human action and guilt, and man’s ability to access and understand reality.
Sources of Historical Information:
Foaks, R.A. “Shakespeare’s Elizabethan Stages.” In Shakespeare: An Illustrated Stage History, Edited by Jonathan Bate and Russell Jackson. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Gurr, Andrew. The Shakespeare Company: 1594-1642. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
Hibbard’s Introduction to Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Edited by G.R. Hibbard. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987.
Leggatt, Alexander. “The Companies and Actors.” In The Revels History of Drama in English. Edited by Cliford Leeck and T. W. Craik. Volume III: 1576-1613. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1975.
Thomson, Peter. Shakespeare’s Professional Career. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
Shakespeare is a very self-conscious playwright, as it turns out. His works are full metatheatrical and theatrically self-aware moments, and Hamlet is a prime example. Certain lines of the play can only be fully appreciated in light of their original theatrical context. The theater business of Elizabethan and Jacobean London consisted of theater companies which would perform frequently for regular audiences. Like the movie industry today, the public was typically more familiar with the actors than with particular plays. Plays were made popular by the actors who stared in them, such as Richard Burbage and Edward Alleyn, who popularized Hamlet and Tamberlain, respectively (Burbage and Alleyn were lead actors of the rival theater companies, Lord Chamberlain’s Men and Admiral’s Men, who held a duopoly in the London theater business).
In Hamlet, Shakespeare capitalizes on his audience’s familiarity with the cast to make a metatheatrical joke that is actually extremely relevant to the play’s plot. It is found in Act three, Scene two:
HAMLET: [TO POLONIUS] MY LORD, YOU PLAYED ONCE I’TH’ UNIVERSITY, YOU SAY?
POLONIUS: THAT I DID, MY LORD, AND WAS ACCOUNTED A GOOD ACTOR.
HAMLET: AND WHAT DID YOU ENACT?
POLONIUS: I DID ENACT JULIUS CAESAR. I WAS KILLED I’TH’ CAPITOL. BRUTUS KILLED ME.
While this comment might seem irrelevant to the modern reader, Shakespeare’s audience would have recognized that John Hemmings, who acted the part of Polonius, had also acted the part of Julius Caesar in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, which would have been performed not long before Hamlet (G.R. Hibbard suggests that the two plays were in the company’s repertory at the same time: 1599-1601). Additionally, Richard Burbage, who played Hamlet, had also played the Brutus who killed Caesar, played by Hemmings. In a subtle way, Polonius/Hemmings is foretelling his own death at the hands of Hamlet/Brutus/Burbage. Through theatrically self-conscious references such as these, Shakespeare is reminding his audience that they are sitting in a theater, watching actors. This awareness gets right to the heart of Shakespeare’s project in Hamlet (one of the projects, at least; Hamlet addresses multiple big topics).
In Hamlet, Shakespeare is exploring the nature of acting and theater, and how theater functions as a form of art, representation, expression, and communication. It features a play within a play, and a whole speech instructing players how to act. The whole play is rife with the language of action, performance, speech, authenticity, disguise and perception. In his own actions, Hamlet puts on a deceptive performance of madness, and on stage, he presents a revealing representation of his uncle's sin. Hamlet exhorts his players to act authentically on stage:
SUIT THE ACTION TO THE WORD, THE WORD TO THE ACTION, WITH THIS SPECIAL OBSERVANCE, THAT YOU NOT O'ERSTEP NOT THE MODESTY OF NATURE. FOR ANYTHING SO OVERDONE IS FROM THE PURPOSE OF PLAYING, WHOSE END, BOTH AT THE FIRST AND NOW, WAS AND IS TO HOLD AS T'WERE, A MIRROR UP TO NATURE...
The power of this mirror to nature is manifest in the king’s (Claudius’) response to the play that catches his conscience by representing his guilt before his eyes, just as Hamlet had planned.
Later in the play, there is a discussion of action apart from the stage, when two grave-diggers wonder what incurs guilt in human action. "An act hath three branches," the grave-digger says, "it is to act, to do, and to perform." Each of these branches has a different level of authenticity, and hence a different degree of guilt. Shakespeare is getting his audience to question what is authentic action and what is performance, both on stage and off.
At a time when theater held a peculiar position in society, being on the one hand patronized by monarchs, and on the other, censured as a source of riot and indecency, Shakespeare is forcing theater-goers to consider the nature of theatricality and the way that theater communicates as an art form. This consideration of artistic form fits in with the broader thematic content of Hamlet, which wrestles with questions of speech, presentation, human action and guilt, and man’s ability to access and understand reality.
Sources of Historical Information:
Foaks, R.A. “Shakespeare’s Elizabethan Stages.” In Shakespeare: An Illustrated Stage History, Edited by Jonathan Bate and Russell Jackson. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Gurr, Andrew. The Shakespeare Company: 1594-1642. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
Hibbard’s Introduction to Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Edited by G.R. Hibbard. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987.
Leggatt, Alexander. “The Companies and Actors.” In The Revels History of Drama in English. Edited by Cliford Leeck and T. W. Craik. Volume III: 1576-1613. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1975.
Thomson, Peter. Shakespeare’s Professional Career. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
Sunday, April 6, 2008
The Home Stretch
As I was cramming like mad for my final essay on the educational philosophies of Rousseau and Aristotle, I stumbled across a quote most appropriate to my last week in Oxford:
"Learning is not a matter of amusement.
It is attended by effort and pain."
-Aristotle, Politics, VIII.4.4
Undoubtedly there will be effort and pain as I work over the next three days to research for and write my last 4,000 word essay of the term. (to save my academic reputation, I have to say that I did begin researching a number of weeks ago, but there is still a ton yet to do...)
The effort and pain is paying off, however, as I reflect on how much I've learned and grown over this term. I have had an amazing experience in Oxford, and as much as I look forward to having this last essay behind me, I am going to miss this beautiful old city of spires. For now, I am just trying to soak up every last minute of reading in the Bodelian, walking through my favorite park, and sharing wonderful fellowship with my housemates (which today, came in the form of a snowball fight!).
"Learning is not a matter of amusement.
It is attended by effort and pain."
-Aristotle, Politics, VIII.4.4
Undoubtedly there will be effort and pain as I work over the next three days to research for and write my last 4,000 word essay of the term. (to save my academic reputation, I have to say that I did begin researching a number of weeks ago, but there is still a ton yet to do...)
The effort and pain is paying off, however, as I reflect on how much I've learned and grown over this term. I have had an amazing experience in Oxford, and as much as I look forward to having this last essay behind me, I am going to miss this beautiful old city of spires. For now, I am just trying to soak up every last minute of reading in the Bodelian, walking through my favorite park, and sharing wonderful fellowship with my housemates (which today, came in the form of a snowball fight!).
History and Literature: Past and Present
This term I attended a historiography lecture series titled, "History and Literature." Conveniently, my tutorials in Shakespeare and Historiography perfectly converge under this category. This post is a reflection on the interplay of these two disciplines.
I just returned from a very delightful tutorial on Shakespeare's Henry IV and Henry V. My tutor and I discussed what Shakespeare is like as a historian, and as it turns out, he no historian at all. Not by typical historiographical standards, at any rate. He is not necessarily interested in the accuracy of chronology or facts: although drawing from the Chronicles of Holinshed (one of the best sources on English history available in Shakespeare’s day), many of Shakespeare's details don't line up with Holinshed's historical data. Hotspur Percy and Prince Henry were actually thirty years apart, for instance, not the peers that Shakespeare presents them as. Shakespeare makes them peers, however, to make a more poignant comparison between the two characters.
It may be contended that Shakespeare wasn't really all that interested in conveying the past. What he found fascinating and important, however, were the themes of kingship, war, the nature of the state, and human character and responsibility. He looked to history to understand metahistorical ideas - principles that are true and pertinent across the span of all time, not only an isolated historical era. He granted himself a good deal of literary license in adjusting the historical details to convey his metahistorical ideas as poignantly as possible.
The license we allow to Shakespeare would never be granted to a historian, who is bound to a rigid standard of accuracy. We need historians to be accurate if we are to value truth in our understanding of the past. However, we also have need of those who are able to interpret the past, distill out the metahistorical principles, and present them to us in a palpable and compelling way. It may be, as in the case of Shakespeare, that the narrative best demonstrating those principles must sometimes compromise the accuracy of historical detail. Such compromise is not acceptable for the historian, but that is why we have literature. We need both Shakespeare and Gibbon, Homer and Thucydides, to help us understand the reality of how the world works. Historians can give us facts, and even interpretations of them, but it is up to the author or the playwright to present a didactic and winsome historical tale.
Of course I must give the caveat that the historian is not always cold and dry - he, too, can "literaturize" his work. And sometimes a writer of literature may stray so far from historical accuracy that the content of his work may be considered all his own invention. This is where the distinction between the two disciplines – between fact and creative imagination – begin to blur, and it is particularly important in these instances to look carefully at history and literature side-by-side to discern the truest and most edifying meaning we can.
I just returned from a very delightful tutorial on Shakespeare's Henry IV and Henry V. My tutor and I discussed what Shakespeare is like as a historian, and as it turns out, he no historian at all. Not by typical historiographical standards, at any rate. He is not necessarily interested in the accuracy of chronology or facts: although drawing from the Chronicles of Holinshed (one of the best sources on English history available in Shakespeare’s day), many of Shakespeare's details don't line up with Holinshed's historical data. Hotspur Percy and Prince Henry were actually thirty years apart, for instance, not the peers that Shakespeare presents them as. Shakespeare makes them peers, however, to make a more poignant comparison between the two characters.
It may be contended that Shakespeare wasn't really all that interested in conveying the past. What he found fascinating and important, however, were the themes of kingship, war, the nature of the state, and human character and responsibility. He looked to history to understand metahistorical ideas - principles that are true and pertinent across the span of all time, not only an isolated historical era. He granted himself a good deal of literary license in adjusting the historical details to convey his metahistorical ideas as poignantly as possible.
The license we allow to Shakespeare would never be granted to a historian, who is bound to a rigid standard of accuracy. We need historians to be accurate if we are to value truth in our understanding of the past. However, we also have need of those who are able to interpret the past, distill out the metahistorical principles, and present them to us in a palpable and compelling way. It may be, as in the case of Shakespeare, that the narrative best demonstrating those principles must sometimes compromise the accuracy of historical detail. Such compromise is not acceptable for the historian, but that is why we have literature. We need both Shakespeare and Gibbon, Homer and Thucydides, to help us understand the reality of how the world works. Historians can give us facts, and even interpretations of them, but it is up to the author or the playwright to present a didactic and winsome historical tale.
Of course I must give the caveat that the historian is not always cold and dry - he, too, can "literaturize" his work. And sometimes a writer of literature may stray so far from historical accuracy that the content of his work may be considered all his own invention. This is where the distinction between the two disciplines – between fact and creative imagination – begin to blur, and it is particularly important in these instances to look carefully at history and literature side-by-side to discern the truest and most edifying meaning we can.
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