Nathanial Hawthorne

MAJOR CHARACTERS
BEFORE EXPERIMENT

Was a merchant; get rich quick schemes
Now a mere beggar

Was a wild party guy – girls & drinking
Now suffers physical ailments

Was a crooked politician
Now obscure

Was a beautiful woman & a flirt
Now a recluse (scandals)

Was a doctor/magician; engaged to be married
Now eccentric and lonely

A story or poem in which characters, settings, and events stand for abstract ideas or moral qualities
Allegorical characters are often onedimensional, since they are meant to represent only a particular aspect of human nature
Allegories also contain a moral

MAJOR CHARACTERS
DURNING EXPERIMENT

Represents greed Starts thinking about money and schemes to get rich

Sings a drinking song; starts eyeing the widow
Represents lust and gluttony

Gives a political speech while muttering and whispering
Represents hypocrisy

Starts flirting Represents vanity

Represents pride Still trying his experiments on patients

SYMBOLS

Was from his fiancé Sylvia, given to him 50 + years ago
Symbolic of his devotion and undying love for her
During the experiment it blooms & soon wilts
Represents that youth is fleeting

Shows the characters in their old state, not in their youth
Symbolic of the truth – the mirror reflects that they have not changed in terms of their vices even though they’ve been given a second chance

Symbol for life, renewal, and cleansing
Water makes them youthful again & washes away the sins of their past
However, the characters make the same mistakes again (unchanged)

“The skeleton in the closet”
Dr. Heidegger has past sins he tries to conceal (the patients’ ghosts in the mirror)

GOTHIC ELEMENTS

Dr. Heidegger’s study
– Cobwebs, antiques, skeleton, mirror with ghosts

Dr.’s patients’ spirits dwell in the mirror
Open magic book
Dr. Heidegger’s fiances steps out of the mirror
Hippocrates yells, “Forbear”
Flower blooms
Characters turn young again
Fountain of Youth

Dr. Heidegger’s fiancé, Sylvia Ward, died
55 years ago after taking one of his prescriptions

Foreshadowing/Omens
Hippocrates yells, “Forbear”
Mirror reflects them as old
Dr. Heidegger just watches
Patients’ ghosts in the mirror

Highly charged emotional states
Dr.’s guilt and grief over “killing” his fiance
The men fighting over the widow
Their desire for more water

Damsel in distress
The men fighting over Widow
Wycherly

Archetype
Based on the plot of the Fountain of
Youth
Why elderly people flock to Florida
(Malone)

Theme/Moral
Human nature is innately prone to flaw and sin
– Dr. Heidegger’s hypothesis – if given a second chance, humans will commit the same sins/mistakes
• Declares he would never drink from the water b/c he has “had much trouble in growing old.”
• Ironic because he hasn’t changed either – still using others for his experiments

Theme/Moral
Our sins cannot be erased, but we can correct our behavior
– Water is a symbol of renewal and cleansing
– However, the water in the story doesn’t was away their sins
– Hawthorne’s message could be that we get second chances and should learn from our mistakes