Rappaccini's Daughter

“Rappaccini’s Daughter” is considered one of Hawthorne’s best and most complex stories. It has been interpreted in many ways, from a retelling of the story of Adam and Eve to an allegorical interpretation of the conflict between science and faith.

The first paragraph gives a literary allusion to the best-known Italian writer, Dante Alighieri, and his famous poem The Divine Comedy (1320). In the poem, the narrator travels through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise, a symbolic journey representing a soul’s ascent to God. The traveler is guided through Hell and Purgatory by the Roman poet Virgil, representing reason. In Paradise, his guide is Beatrice, an embodiment of the ideal woman and divine wisdom. In the first stage of the journey, the narrator witnesses the tortured souls of sinful people, separated into different circles of Hell depending on their crimes. The reference to The Divine Comedy suggests that Giovanni will also undergo a type of journey or test that could result in his salvation. Beatrice Rappaccini, then, is presented as his potential guide.

The problem of inhabiting the imperfect, corruptible physical world is reflected in Beatrice’s character. In Dante’s work, both the narrator and his beloved are entirely in the spiritual realm. In Hawthorne’s story, Giovanni and Beatrice inhabit the mortal world, and, consequently, are touched by sin.

This conflict between spirit and flesh is represented by the broken fountain in the middle of the garden. The pure water coming out of the fountain symbolizes the spirit. In the Christian tradition, entrance into the community of believers happens through baptism with water. The fountain, then, is the vehicle through which spirit enters the world. It can be read as the physical vessel that holds the soul. The shattered fountain signifies a broken or corrupted world. Despite the physical imperfection of the fountain, the water, or spirit, is still pure and nourishes the garden. This duality is particularly visible in Beatrice: she is beautiful and pure but deadly and doomed.

The physical corruption inherent in the human condition is shown to be the result of both personal shortcomings and the transgression of others. Giovanni and Baglioni are too preoccupied with the “natural” and “ordinary,” to be able to appreciate both Rappaccini’s accomplishment and Beatrice’s purity. In fact, their attempts to bring the young woman back into the social world lead to her death, potentially a murder orchestrated by Baglioni.

Rappaccini achieved something extraordinary, though at a high cost. While endowing his daughter with special powers, he condemned her to a lonely existence. What is more, both his experiments with cross-pollination and Beatrice’s poisonous nature are viewed as unnatural and evil by society. Both Baglioni and Giovanni believe the young woman to be doomed because of her special powers. These perceptions of Rappaccini’s experiments echo the debates between science and religion prevalent in Western cultures since the onset of the Renaissance. Artists and scientists such as Michelangelo, Paracelsus, and Vesalius sought to understand the human body and improve health. Their efforts were often opposed by those who regarded experimentation as suspicious and unnatural. Scientists, especially in the medical field, were often accused of playing God.

Such a reading would be in line with the timeline of the story. The text occasionally alludes to historical events and people, suggesting it takes place sometime after the mid-16th century. For example, the Padua botanical garden was founded in 1545. The antidote vessel was made by Benvenuto Cellini, a famous 16th-century Florentine goldsmith and sculptor. Finally, Baglioni references the Borgias, an infamous dynasty that rose to power in the 15th and 16th centuries.

Towards the end of the 16th century, a debate about the role of religion in education and medicine gave rise to two main schools of thought: Paracelsism, which believed chemistry could be used as a cure, such as giving antimony as a purgative, and Galenism, which relied exclusively on the authority of such historic figures as Aristotle and Galen. Gradually, by the 17th century, chemical medicine became widely accepted throughout Europe and the New World.