Rappaccini's Daughter Ambiguity

As the poet Adam Smith once said, “On the road from the City of Skepticism, I had to pass through the Valley of Ambiguity.” This leads into the ideaology that Nathaniel Hawthorne carries throughout the story “Rappaccinni’s Daughter.” Within the story, Hawthorne leaves many elements of plot, character, and verbal discourse ambiguous to the reader. This narrative technique allows for the story to have various interpretations as each individual sees it. Throughout “The Discourse of Romance: Truth and Fantasy in Hawthorne’s Point of View” by Allene Cooper and “Gardens and Edens: Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Rappaccini’s Daughter” and Bernard Malmud’s “The Lady of the Lake” by Edward A. Abramson, the ambiguous nature or Hawthorne’s writing is highlighted

One example is that of the cryptic nature of the character Baglioni. Baglioni is an enemy of Rappaccinni’s but a “friend” to Giovanni. At the conclusion of the story, Beatrice dies due to the antidote that Baglioni has produced in order to save her. He exclaims in a “tone of triumph mixed with horror” (Abramson). This points the reader into a multitude of directions in which the character Baglioni can be interpreted. His reaction alludes to the reader that Baglioni may have intended to kill Beatrice and that it was not an antidote at all, or that he didn’t intend for her to die but it worked out in his favor in the end, or that he was victorious over his rival Rappaccinni and proved Giovanni wrong too. The ambiguity within Baglioni’s character grants the reader the ability to decipher whether or not he is evil all along, or what his character truly entails. Another aspect of the story that contains vagueness is that of the Garden of Eden and Rappaccinni’s garden. The Garden of Eden created by God is supposed to be ideal in every way, however, Rappaccinni’s garden is poisonous, and Beatrice doesn’t want to stay in the garden. Furthermore, this goes against the ideals of the Garden of Eden and represents the opposite as Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden and condemned to the outside world, and Beatrice and Giovanni were condemned from the world and forced to live within the garden (Abramson). Consequently, the reader is left with the question, “Is Rappaccinni’s garden the modern day Garden of Eden? Or is it the exact opposite?” Overall, Abramson highlighted how Hawthorne frequents the utilization of uncertainty within his writings and especially “Rappacinni’s Daughter” in order to create a unique openness to interpretation of characters and