Nothing in this world is perfect. Our flaws are what make us the beautiful and unique people that we are. They give us our personality, and allow us to stand out from the crowd. Without them, our world would be boring. Perfection is a standard that no one could ever live up to, and the more “perfect” someone may be, the less of a personality they may have. “The Birthmark’’, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is a story about a young, beautiful woman with a minor flaw that leads to the destruction of her life. “…in the center of Georgiana’s left cheek there was a singular mark, deeply interwoven, as it were, with the texture and substance of her face” (Hawthorne, 278), Hawthorne writes about the woman’s crimson, hand-shaped birthmark. This simple flaw leads to her husband’s and her own deadly obsession with perfection. In reading “The Birthmark”, and the two commentaries: Judith Fetterley’s, “!
             ;A Feminist Reading of ‘The Birthmark’”, which explains how this story is about physical perfection, obsession, sexism, and acceptance; and James Quinn and Ross Baldessarini’s, “A Psychological Reading of ‘The Birthmark’”, a psychologists’ view of the story as being about obsessive-compulsive behavior and sexuality, I have decided that I agree with Fetterley’s interpretation. Fetterley and I agree that “The Birthmark” displays the ideas of sexism and power, idealism, and obsession. 2
             “One cannot imagine this story in reverse-that is, a woman’s discovering an obsessive need to perfect her husband and deciding to perform experiments on him-nor can one imagine the story being about a man’s conceiving such an obsession for another
             man” (Fetterley, 313), Fetterley writes about this story. Most women aren’t as concerned with physical appearance as most men. ...