GIOVANNI’S TYPE OF LOVE
SEEN THROUGH HIS POINT
OF VIEW ON
BEATRICE’S CHARACTER
IN NATHANIEL
HAWTHORNE’S
RAPPACCINI
’S
DAUGHTER
AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS
Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra
in English Letters
By
EDWIN SUGARA
Student Number: 074214069
ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAMME DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS
FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
i
GIOVANNI’S TYPE OF LOVE SEEN THROUGH HIS POINT
OF VIEW ON BEATRICE’S CHARACTER IN NATHANIEL
HAWTHORNE’S RAPPACCINI’S DAUGHTER
AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS
Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra
in English Letters
By
EDWIN SUGARA
Student Number: 074214069
ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAMME DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS
FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
iv
v
For
viii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First of all, I would like to thank Jesus Christ whom I believe always guide
me through the finishing this thesis. I thank Him for all His kindness and
protection to me.
A special thank for my advisor, Elisa Dwi Wardani, S.S., M.Hum. Whose
encouragement, guidance and support from the initial to the final step enabled me
to develop an understanding of the subject. My deepest gratitude also goes to my
co-advisor Maria Ananta Tri Suryandari, S.S., M.Ed. Without their knowledge
and assistance this study would not have been successful.
My greatest appreciation goes to my beloved parents: Miati H for her
unconditional love, prayer, patience, and support; and Ervanus Tanjuk for his
inspiring figure.
Special thanks are given to people who directly or indirectly are involved
in the making of this thesis. Thanks to my best friends: Nurvita Wijayanti,
Hafsyah, Josephine Dewi Utami, Billy Talusakata, Theresia Respati, Riris
Gurning, Rudi Irawan, Andriadi Eko Yuwono, and Meilisa Anggun Hapsari who
always give their best wishes for me. Thanks to my friends from class A: Marita
Anastasia Zelia, Natasha Godeliva, and Silvia Kurnia Dewi who never forget to
give their spirit for me. Last but not least, I would like to thanks to the super
lecturers, the kind librarians and my classmates of 2007 who are always in my
heart.
ix
2. Theory of the Relation between Literature and Psychology ... 12
3. Theory of Love ... 14
1. Beatrice’s Characterization from the Author ... 24
a. Beatrice’s Physical Description ... 24
b. Father-Daughter Relationship ... 25
c. Relationship between Beatrice and the Plants ... 29
B. Beatrice from Giovanni’s Point of View ... 34
C. Giovanni’s Point of View on Beatrice’s Character Reveal His Type of Love toward Her ... 38
x
BIBLIOGRAPHY ... 47
xi ABSTRACT
EDWIN SUGARA. Giovanni’s Type of Love Seen through His Point of View on Beatrice’s Character in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Rappaccini’s Daughter. Yogyakarta: Department of English Letters, Faculty of Letters, Sanata Dharma University, 2013.
This thesis discusses Hawthorne’s short story entitled Rappacinni’s Daughter. This work describes that love is an important thing in a relationship between couple while the type of love the couple have can give an effect to the relationship itself.
There are three problems in the form of questions concerning the topic of the thesis. The first is to see how Beatrice is characterized as seen by the narrator in the short story, second is to see how Beatrice is characterized as seen from
Giovanni’s point of view. And the third find out how Giovanni’s points of view
on Beatrice’s character reveal his type of love toward her.
The method of this study is library research, using a novel entitled
Rappacinni’s Daughter by Nathaniel Hawthorne as the primary source of the analysis. The secondary sources used to find the theories and the references are psychological theories and literature theories. The psychological approach is applied in this study because this approach is used to reveal the problem deals
with human life together with his mind and behavior that focus in Giovanni’s type
of love toward Beatrice.
From the analysis, the writer finds three points of answer. The first point is about how Beatrice is characterized as seen by the narrator. Beatrice is characterized as a beautiful young woman, an obedient daughter who experiences the lack of paternal love. She is lonely and craving for affection. The writer make a comparison about the characterization of Beatrice, the comparison between Beatrice characterization from the author and Beatrice characterization from Giovanni point of view. The second point is about how Beatrice characterized as seen from Giovanni’s point of view, the author through the narrator introduces and sees Beatrice as a complete human, while Giovanni failed to see Beatrice as a complete human being. On the third point, the writer finds that Giovanni’s point
of view on Beatrice’s character reveal his type of love toward Beatrice. Giovanni
xii ABSTRAK
EDWIN SUGARA. Giovanni’s Type of Love Seen through His Point of View on Beatrice’s Character in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Rappaccini’s Daughter. Yogyakarta: Jurusan Sastra Inggris, Fakultas Sastra, Universitas Sanata Dharma, 2013.
Skripsi ini mendiskusikan mengenai sebuah cerita pendek oleh Hawthorne berjudul Rappacinni’s Daughter. Karya ini menggambarkan bahwa cinta adalah sesuatu yang penting di dalam hubungan antara pasangan dimana tipe cinta yang dimiliki oleh pasangan tersebut dapat memberikan dampak kepada hubungan itu sendiri.
Dalam skripsi ini ada tiga masalah dalam bentuk pertanyaan menyangkut tentang topik yang diambil. Pertanyaan pertama untuk menjawab bagaimana Beatrice dikarakterisasikan oleh pengarang di dalam cerita pendek ini. Pertanyaan kedua adalah untuk menjawab bagaimana Beatrice dikarakterisasikan melalui sudut pandang Giovanni. Pertanyaan ketiga adalah untuk mengungkapkan bagaimana sudut pandang Giovanni terhadap Beatrice mengungkapkan tipe cinta yang dimiliki Giovanni terhadap Beatrice.
Metode dalam skripsi ini adalah penelitian pustaka menggunakan cerita pendek berjudul Rappaccini’s Daughter karangan Nathaniel Hawthorne sebagai sumber utama dari analisis. Buku-buku pendukung yang digunakan untuk mencari teori-teori dan referensi-referensi adalah buku teori psikologi dan teori sastra. Pendekatan psikologis digunakan di dalam karya ini karena pendekatan ini digunakan untuk mengungkapkan masalah yang berhubungan dengan pikiran dan tingkah laku manusia yang difokuskan pada masalah tipe cinta yang dimiliki Giovanni terhadap Beatrice.
1 CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A. Background of the Study
People can learn so many lessons from literature. Literature gives new
perspectives about new things, enriches our knowledge, and presents an
entertainment through the beautiful languages. Therefore, Literature is not only
beautiful, but also useful. It helps human to learn something from life through
texts. The biggest purpose of literary works is to give effect on reader’s mind.
Literature is a portrait of human’s life because it reflects some aspects of
human life, such as moral, society, psychology and many more. Literary works
become a media to communicate human’s thought, feeling, and idea about
something based on their life experience or imagination. Some people could not
share their feeling or their thought directly so they use media as tool. People often
use three kinds of media, such as poetry, drama, and novel to share what they
have in their mind. Wellek and Warren in Theory of Literature (1956: 96) state that Literature looks like a real life portrait. It is an illustration of human lives
because the literary works presents the reality of human situations, problems,
feelings, love and relationship.
Rappaccini’s Daughter is one of the examples that reflect some aspect in human life, such as feelings, love and relationship. Love becomes the most
interesting story for all people. So many literary works tell about love. The story
even paintings. One of the most dramatic love stories is Nathaniel Hawthorne’s
short story entitled “Rappaccini’s Daughter”. The story tells about a dramatic love relationship between two main characters. The writer thinks that the story
will be interesting to be analyzed.
The experience of love is unique for every person, and one might use that
feeling to measure the success of a relationship. Hazan and Shaver in Romantic Love Conceptualized as an Attachment Process (1978: 511) state that love is fuelled by a mixture of sexual attraction and the security of the developing
attachment, and excitement due to exploration of human being. The sexual
attraction wanes, lead to the conflict and withdrawal. Lovers can find themselves
securely attached and caring deeply about each other or experiencing some forms
of distress, boredom, loneliness or hostility and yearning for a more satisfying
relationship. "I love you" with a feeling is essential. The ability to express those
words in a nonsexual context to men, women and children is a good indicator of
emotional health. To be able to love men, women and children is part of being
healthy adults. Love is a passionate spiritual-emotional-sexual attachment
between a man and a woman that reflects a high regard for the value of each
other’s person. It is a way not only to feel the extraordinary joy but also to
experience self-discovery.
Love might be the conceptualized as an attachment-formation process.
Hazan and Shaver in Romantic Love Conceptualized as an Attachment Process
(1978: 520) state that love is the attachment system in human undergoes
parents are relinquished, and the individual is able to integrate new objects, new
attachment figures.” The attachment system is just one among a number of
interrelated behavioral system which include exploration, care giving, sexual
mating and affiliation.
No one knows what the real meaning of love is. Everyone has his/her own
meaning depending on his/her point of view. Love brings spirit for everyone.
Besides positive motivation, love also can give negative motivation. Sometimes
someone who falls in love will act illogically. He/she will do anything to make
his/her partner happy, even though it is beyond imagination. Happiness, sadness,
worries, and jealousy are parts of love. Love is all you need, and you will not
know, across the crowded world or even on a first date, that the person is
absolutely the one.
Love can be used as the object of psychological analysis. “Psychology is a
science that studies living being’s behavior and mental processes” (Herrnstein as
quoted by Crider, 1983:4). This is in line with what Jung states as quoted by
Koesnosoebroto (1988) that it is absolute that psychology can be applied in
analyzing literary work, since human’s psyche has potential power of all
knowledge and arts. Thereby, literature and psychology are really inseparable.
Psychology explains the underlying reason for character’s behavior elaborates
between conflict and psychological condition and evaluates their behavior and
motive in doing something.
People cannot deny that the existence of love can really change their heart
somebody’s life maybe tied to a love relationship. Love might drive people crazy.
Some people even put their lives to and end by committing suicide because of
love while some others want to live a thousand years because they meet the right
persons to love or who love them. Love is the motor to move one’s machine; body
and mind.
Nobody needs to be convinced that the love relationships are important to
our lives, and nobody needs to be told that they are intriguing. There are many
love relationship in this world such as relationship between parents and their
children, a man and a woman, people and God, men with their pets or plants, one
friend and the other, and also there are many type of love, Fromm in his popular
book entitled The Art Of Loving (1963:39) categorizes love into several types. The types of love are brotherly love, motherly love, erotic love, self-love, and love of
God.
The way one sees someone that he or she loves also gives an effect to the
way he or she loves his or her lover. People have many different points of view in
someone that he or she loves. For example, if he or she only sees his lover as an
object then forever he only sees his lover only as an object.
In this study, love relationship refers to the love between a poisonous girl
named Beatrice and a medical student named Giovanni. The writer is interested to
study the topic because it is an unusual story in which the two characters; Beatrice
and Giovanni are in love but can not be united because in the end Beatrice died.
Beatrice loves Giovanni very much, but there is something different in Giovanni’s
Beatrice as a dangerous human. He seems only to see Beatrice as a beautiful girl
and loves her because of her physical appearance. Once again for those reasons
above, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Rappaccini’s Daughter was a good example to explore more about types of love. Therefore, this novel is a good choice to help
explore that topic.
B. Problem Formulation
The writer presents some problems as shown in the following questions:
1. How is Beatrice characterized as seen by the narrator?
2. How is Beatrice characterized as seen from Giovanni’s point of view?
3. How does Giovanni’s point of view on Beatrice’s character reveal his type
of love toward her?
C. Objectives of the Study
In the objectives of the study, the writer focus on three objectives since the
problem formulation divided into two. The first objective is to see how Beatrice is
characterized in the short story, the second objective is to see how Beatrice is
characterized from Giovanni’s point of view and the third objective is meant to
find out how Giovanni’s point of view of Beatrice reveal Giovanni’s type of love
D. Definition of Terms
There is one term that needed to define in order to get clear explanation to
avoid misunderstanding
1. Love: Based on The Art of Loving, love is an activity, not a passive effect; it is “standing in”, not a “falling for”. In the most general way,
the active character of love can be described by stating that love is
primarily giving, not receiving (Fromm, 1963:18).
2. Character: According to A Handbook to Literature is defined as a brief descriptive sketch of personage who typifies some definite quality. The
person is described not as an individualized personality but as an
example of some vice oe virtue type, such as a busybody, a glutton, a
7
comments and criticism are taken from many sources in books and journals.
Margaret Hallissy in Hawthorne's Venomous Beatrice: Studies in Short Fiction explains how poisons in general and venomous women in particular have long been the embodiment of fear for moral evil and physical destruction. She
stated that:
Venomous women have been equated with sexual excess and are believed to threaten men both physically and morally. She explores the paradoxes and ambiguities which surround female sexuality. Beatrice represents the homeopathic strand of this tradition, defined by Sir Thomas Browne, which makes her both a sexual seductress and a spiritual savior (1982:234). It is this strand in which one poisonous creature is not only unable to infect another, but also serve as an antidote. As a paradox, Beatrice can touch poison yet not die. She can also operate in a world of sexuality yet remain uncorrupted. In "Rappaccini's Daughter," Beatrice is a life force who reconciles both physical and spiritual natures. Giovanni responds to her only as a physical being and fails to understand her as a real person rather than just a symbol of evil. The fall into sexuality is the Fortunate Fall for it unites flesh and spirit and allows man to move beyond his initial physical attraction for the female and come to understand her as a total being. Beatrice, representative of all females, is therefore to be considered both the problem and the solution to man's salvation. (1982:231).
In Rappaccini's Children, William Shurr describes the tale as “a savage
stereotype of the classic American religion”--Calvinism (1981:4). He states that:
control of Satan and redemption is only a quasi-successful operation involving a few "elect." The tree of life has turned into a poisonous plant of death. Rappaccini is compared to a Calvinist deity who gives his creatures no choice but preordains the poison which will infect their bodies. Beatrice is a child of the devil and her specific evil for Giovanni is her sexual attraction. In this corrupted garden, sexual love does not lead to love and consummation but rather to the death of a seductive woman. (1981:4)
Most of Hawthorne‟s short stories present humans‟ psychological
problems. Spiller (1961:78) states the opinion in the The Style of American Literature that the central theme of most his stories is not sin theological problem, but rather than the psychological effect of the conviction of sin on the lives of the
early colonists. Like Poe, he was an explorer of the dark recesses of the human
soul, and he used his art to reveal, rather than to resolve the dilemma of human
destiny.
Hawthorne‟s Rappaccini’s Daughter is one of his short stories which also
present humans‟ psychological problem which is presented in the main character;
Beatrice cannot lead her life as other people lead it because of her father‟s
treatment toward her. Beatrice has been victimized by the father to achieve his
own ambition to be a man of science. Brenzo in Trancendental Symbolist
criticizes toward the short story and also puts the same insight about the matter. In
his critics he states:
The statement shows that Rappaccini‟s treatment toward Beatrice has trapped her
into the psychological problems because her father does not let her to lead her life
normally.
Some criticisms draw attention to the Giovanni and Beatrice‟s relationship
as the mixture between feeling of love and hate in Giovanni. Elder states
The dark view would send Giovanni out of the influence of the unintelligible power; the bright view would encourage him to see Beatrice in daylight may give him a chance to appreciate her true spiritual self. But enjoying the mixture of love and horror was sure to create an infernal
blaze. This truth is closely related to Hawthorne‟s analysis of the relation
between Giovanni and Beatrice just before his harsh words to her near the conclusions of the story. (1969:96)
This statement intends to explain that there is also a psychological conflict that is
experienced by Giovanni when he has a close relationship with Beatrice, such a
war of love and honor in the Giovanni‟s inner life.
In this thesis, the writer wants to explore how Giovanni‟s points of view of
Beatrice reveal his type of love toward her by employing psychological approach
in this study. The study focuses on how Beatrice characterized by the author,
Beatrice in Giovanni‟s point of view, and Giovanni relationship with Beatrice.
B. Review of Related Theories
Since this analysis starts with the intrinsic elements of the literary work, it
is appropriate to put the literary theories in the first part.
B.1. Theory of Characterization
To find out how the characters are characterized in the story, we need to
Handbook to Literature, Characterization is the way in which the author reveals
or creates or the characters in his/her work, making them „alive‟ for the reader
(1986: 81). Also in his book Holman and Harmon (1986:81) stated that there are
three fundamental methods of characterization in fiction. First, the explicit
presentation by the author, second, the character‟s own representation from within
a character of the impact of certain events towards the character‟s inner self, also
without any interference from the author.
Baldick suggests that characterization is the presentation of persons in
narrative or dramatic works that may include direct way like the description or
commentary and distribution of qualities. Indirect or dramatic way is also
combines to invite readers to decide qualities from the fact of the characters‟
action, speech, or physical appearance so the readers are free to interpret their
characterization (1991:34).
Meanwhile M.J. Murphy (1972:161-173) in Understanding Unseen An Introduction to English Poetry and the English Novel for Overseas Students
explaines that there are nine ways of how the author makes his character
understandable for the reader. Sometimes the steps are not all used by the authors
to show their characters‟ characteristics, however some of them must exist. Those
nine ways are:
a. Personal description
The author can describe a person‟s appearance and clothes in details so that the
appearance. Whether he is handsome, tall, thin, like parts of the body of the
character and the clothes she or he wears.
b. Character as seen by another
Instead of describing a character directly the author can describe a character
through the opinions, attitudes, view, and comment of other characters in the
novel. The readers will catch a reflected image of the characters the author
means.
c. Speech
The author can explain a character trough the way she or he speaks and the
language she or he uses in a conversation with another, whenever she or he put
forward on opinion, so readers will get an insight into the characteristics.
d. Past life
By allowing the reader learns something about person‟s life the author can give
us a clue to events that have helped to shape a person‟s character. This can be
done by direct comment by the author, through the person‟s thoughts, through
his conversation or through the medium of another person.
e. Conversation of others
The author can also give clues to a person‟s character through the conversations
of other people and the things they say about him. From this readers will learn
that what other say about a character may reveal what kind of character she or
f. Reactions
The author can describe the characteristic by allowing us to know how that
person reacts to various situations and events. The reaction may give a clue to
what characteristic a character has.
g. Direct comment
The author can describe or comment on a person‟s character directly through the
narration (especially in third-person narrator).
h. Thoughts
The author can give us direct knowledge of what we cannot do in real life. He
can tell us what different people are thinking from the omniscient narrator.
i. Mannerism
The author can describe a person‟s mannerism, habits of idiosyncrasies that may
also tell us something about his character.
B.2. Theory of the Relation between Psychology and Literature
Literature and Psychology are two different subjects that can influence
each other. Psychology can be a good tool to understand literature well.
Characters represent as human representation in the literature and it can be
analyzed through psychology. As psychology is a body of knowledge which
studies human psyche, the most related element of literature to psychology is its
or human-like characters. Referring to Barnet‟s explanation about character in
moral qualities; it is obvious that characters are observable through psychology, in
term that they consist of unique mental qualities (Barnet, 1988: 71).
Through literature, a writer overflows all his obsessions. He reveals his
psychological tension that suppresses him when he sees that people just often
trample on the truth-values. It is apparent that many authors realize the functions
of literature dealing with some psychological processes. Although it is not the
main purpose, they use literature indirectly as a medium to express and relieve
their emotion. Wellek and Warren in their book Theory of Literature confirm that: We may be able to find out the valuable of human character by the way that one cognitive value in the dramas or novels would seem to be
psychological. “The novelist or dramatist can teach you more about human nature than the psychologist” is a familiar kind of assertion (1956:25).
Furthermore, Bornstein in his book Psychology and its Allied Discipline Humanities volume I states that literature is best at describing the human condition in dramatic form, while psychology has the strength to investigate
human‟s character or behavior in systematic ways. The statement means that
literature depicts human condition in dramatic way while psychology studies
human characteristics systematically. Both subjects have one common purpose
that is to depict human condition (Bornstein, 1984: 144).
According to Wellek and Warren, Psychology and literature have a very
close relation in which some literary works talk about psychological cases. They
say that people can learn theory of psychology that may be revealed in works of
literature by analyzing the works. Furthermore, the important part is the
application of the psychological laws within works of literature (Wellek, 1956:
B.3. Theory of Love
Somebody who is falling in love with a special person feels something
different in his or her life. He or she feels that “a new color” comes into his or her
life. It may occur because he or she has found out a special person who is able to
fulfill his or her needs of love. Powell (1983:194) states that love is a special type
of relationship with another person. It is characterized by a feeling of warm
affection and desire for attachment. It can be including caring within family,
friendship, idealistic love, and romantic love. Fromm in his popular book entitled
The Art Of Loving (1963:18) remarks that “Love is the active concern for the life
and the growth of that which we love. Where this active concern is lacking, there
is no love.” The statements of love above remind us that love is a thing that we
need along our lives for growing and surviving in the world. Fromm also states
that the major activity of loving somebody is the activity of “giving”. About this
matter, Fromm states
Love is an activity, not a passive effect; it is “standing in”, not a “falling for”. In the most general way, the active character of love can be described
by stating that love is primarily giving, not receiving. (1963:18)
Therefore “giving” here does not mean “giving up” something, being deprived of,
or sacrificing. Fromm intends to explain that giving is the highest expression of
potency (1963:19).
Fromm categorizes love into several types. The types of love are brotherly
love, motherly love, erotic love, self-love, and love of God.
a. Brotherly love is the most fundamental kind of love that underlies all types of
by its very lack of exclusiveness. In this kind of love there is the experience of
union with all men, of human solidarity, of human atonement. The live is based
on the experience that we all are one.
b. Motherly love is unconditional affirmation of the child‟s life and his or her
needs (1963:41). There are two aspects in the affirmation of the child‟s life.
Firstly, the care and responsibility are absolutely necessary for the preservation
of the child‟s life and his/her growth. Secondly, the attitude which instills in the
child a love for living and which gives him or her the feeling of good to be
alive, good to be a little boy or girl , and good to be on this earth. The love
requires unselfishness, the ability to give everything and to want nothing but the
happiness of the loved one.
c. Erotic love (1963:44) is the craving for complete fusion, for union with one
other person. “It is by its very nature exclusive and not universal.” (Fromm
1963: 44). Erotic love can inspire the wish for sexual attraction or union. From
implied erotic love as a physical love or individual attraction and it is only act of
will to love someone, he stated that:
Both view then, that of erotic love as completely individual attraction, unique between two specific persons, as well as the other view that erotic love is nothing but an act of will.” (1963: 48).
Fromm thinks that erotic love or he implies as physical love is often greatly
misunderstood. People often make the mistake of thinking that, because they are
attracted to another person physically and they feel a strong feeling, they also
feel love for that person. If the relation is only physical, however, it never
feeling – it is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise. If love is only a
feeling, there will be no basis for the promotion to love each other forever.”
(Fromm 1963: 47). In fact, if the relationship is only physical or erotic love, it
can make people even farther apart than before. It can actually make them
dislike, or even hate each other since it emphasizes their basic aloneness
“Sexual attraction creates for the moment, the illusion of union, yet without love
this “union” leaves strangers as far apart as they were before-sometimes it
makes them ashamed of each other, or even makes them hate each other,
because when the illusion has gone they feel their estrangement even more
markedly than before.” (Fromm 1963: 46).
From also mention if people are in erotic love, they want a sexual contact for
intimacy “For them intimacy is established primarily through sexual contact.”
(Fromm 1963:45).
d. Self – love (1963:48) has several considerations because it still in widespread
conceptions. According to Western thought, self-love as “I love myself and I do
not love others” is the same of selfishness Freud as quoted by Fromm states that
self-love is the same as narcissism, the turning of the libido toward oneself.
Biblical idea that “Love thy neighbor as thyself” implies that respect for one‟s
own integrity and uniqueness, love for and understanding for another individual.
The love for my own self is inseparably connected with the love for any other
being. General premises state that we ourselves are the “object” of our feelings
and attitude, the attitude toward others and toward ourselves. Eckhart‟s opinion
yourself, you love everybody else as you do yourself. As long as you love
another person less than you love yourself, you will not really succeed in loving
yourself, but if you love all alike including yourself, you will love them as one
person and that person is both God and man…”
e. Love of God (1963:53) is also based on our need to love lies in the experience
of separateness and the resulting need to overcome the anxiety of separateness
by the experience of the union. The love springs from the need to overcome
separateness and to achieve union. The understanding about love of God cannot
be separated from the history of human development, that God is the creator of
human beings. Thus, there is a primary bond between human beings and God.
The need to hold the bond will rescue human beings from the anxiety of
separateness.
C. Theoretical Framework
The major concern of this study is to find out how Giovanni‟s point of
view of Beatrice reveals his type of love toward Beatrice. There are some theories
are used to help the writer to answer the three problem formulation. First, the
theories of characterization are used to analyze the main characters in the story.
After the first problem formulation has been done, the writer focuses in the second
problem formulation. Since the second problem is concerning about Beatrice
characterized from Giovanni‟s point of view, the theories of characterization are
characterization and theory of love are combined to find out how Giovanni‟s
19 CHAPTER III
METHODOLOGY
A. Object of the Study
Rappaccini’s Daughter is a short story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne in
1844, which presents about the scientifically aspects of research and how far two
persons can love each other despite physical barriers. It was published in the
collection Mosses from an Old Manse, an anthology short story by Nathaniel
Hawthorne in 1844 in New York, United States. The publisher is Boston and New
York Houghton Mifflin Company. Then many of his short stories collected in
Hawthorne’s Short Story, published in 1955, the publisher is New York Vintage Books. The setting of Rappaccini’s Daughter was in Padua, the southern region of
Italy. It was about a beautiful girl, a daughter of Dr. Giacommo Rappacinni. Dr.
Giacommo Rappacinni was a medical professor who dedicated his life for his
medical experiment. Beatrice, a beautiful girl was educated by her father to
continue his experiment. She grew up in the middle of medicine garden without
any friends. The plants in the garden were her friends and even sisters. She was a
lonely girl because her father never permitted her to go out. Beatrice was like an
object of experiment for her father’s science. As a result, she was being poisoned by her father’s medical plant. It happened until she was a teenage girl.
Giovanni Guasconti, a medical student of the Padua University became
her first friend. He attracted to Beatrice since at the first time he saw the girl.
happy life beside Giovanni. She wanted to be free from the poison, and be a
normal girl like the others. The attention that she accepted from Giovanni
replaced her father’s love and fulfilled the loneliness in her life. All she had done
were just for Giovanni. She wanted to make her dream came true by drinking a
kind of antidote with a new hope that she would recover from the poison.
Unfortunately, it killed her. She passed away on the feet of Giovanni and her
father in the medical garden.
B. Approach
Since the concern of this study is analyzing about Giovanni’s type of love
toward Beatrice, the psychological approach is needed to answer the problem
formulation. This analysis deals with character, and type of love. Therefore,
psychological approach is appropriate since character is one of the subjects of
psychology. According to Lewis Leary (1976: 57) in his book American Literature: A Study and Research Guide, psychological approach is an approach that applies of modern psychology to characters or situation within literary work
or to the person who wrote the work. In connection with this approach,
Rohrberger and Woods (1971:13) state that psychological approach is focused on
psychological interpretation for entrancing the understanding and appreciation of
Literature.
Psychological approach is appropriate in analyzing this topic because
some psychology theories such as theory of love were used to help the writer in
C. Method of the study
In doing this analysis, the writer used the library research method. There
are two kinds of data used in the study. First, the short story written by Nathaniel
Hawthorne Rappaccini’s Daugther was used as primary data. Second, some books
such as Abram’s A glossary of Literary Terms, was used as secondary data. Some critical reviews and theories obtained from Internet sites were also used. There
were four steps in analyzing this topic.
Firstly, the short story Rappaccini’s Daughter written by Nathaniel Hawthorne was read to set the idea of the novel. Afterward, the novel once again
was reread to get better understanding and to decide the topic of the analysis.
After decidingthe topic, the writer tried to find some critics and comments on
Rappaccini’s Daugther.. These comments and criticism were used as further information to analyze the novel.
For the next step, the writer formulated three question related to the topic.
These three questions were important as the basic problem that needed to be
solved. The first question dealt with the major character in the novel. The second
question dealt with the major character in the novel seen by other character. And
the last dealt with type of love seen through someone point on view of other
character.
After the problem formulation was formulated, it was important to decide
the most appropriate approach of the study that is psychology approach.
Afterward, the writer focused to seek some theories related to these three
formulations. In this step this novel was analyzed based on some theories and
references that related to the analysis. Theories of characterization were used to
analyze the first problem and the second problem. Theories of characterization
and theory of love were combined to find out the answer for the third problem.
The fourth step was drawing the conclusion related to the analysis. After
making an analysis, the conclusion should be made as the last part. In this step the
23 CHAPTER IV
ANALYSIS
In this analysis, the writer will divide the study into three parts to answer
the question formulated in the problem formulation. The first part is to analyze the
characterization of the main character; Beatrice. The second part is to analyze the
characterization of Beatrice from Giovanni‘s point of view. And the last part is to
analyze how Giovanni‘s points of view of Beatrice reveal his type of love toward
her.
A. The Characterization of Beatrice
Beatrice is one of the major characters in the story. The other character is
Giovanni. They are defined as major characters because their presence has
important role to build the plot of the story. Most events of the story present both
characters. Beatrice is the focus of the analysis so that the exploration on the
characteristic of Beatrice is needed in the analysis. In this chapter the writer wants
to make a comparison about the characterization of Beatrice, the comparison
between Beatrice characterization from the author and Beatrice characterization
from Giovanni point of view, the writer make a comparison because there is
different way how the author and Giovanni sees Beatrice. The author introduced
and sees Beatrice as a normal human except the fact that she is poisonous person
different with Giovanni, Giovanni loves Beatrice but he failed to see Beatrice as a
human being, sometimes he scared about Beatrice because Beatrice is a poisonous
answered based on Beatrice characterization and how Giovanni sees Beatrice, to
answer problem number three, the writer also use theory of love by Fromm.
A.1. Beatrice’s Characterization from the Author
A.1.a. Beatrice’s Physical Description
Through the narrator, the author describes Beatrice as a beautiful girl and
she is the daughter of Professor Giacomo Rappaccini, a doctor in Padua. Beatrice
was born as a beautiful girl. Physically, she is defined as a beautiful young girl.
The author describes her voice ―as rich as tropical sunset‖ (p.183). Beatrice‘s
physical appearance is also good. Her good-looking appearance is described as the
sunshine day that gives beauty and brightness within her environment:
Soon there emerged from under sculptures portal the figure of a young girl. Arrayed with as much of taste as the almost splendid of the flowers, beautiful as the day, and with a bloom so deep and vivid that one shade more would have been too much. (p.183)
Knowing her appearance for the first time, people may think that Beatrice
is a lucky girl since she got a beautiful face and physically good. Seemingly, all
her needs can be fulfilled. Thus, people can see that Beatrice possesses the things
that other people may not have: good looking appearance, beauty, health and
energy. ―She looked redundant with life, health and energy; all of which attributes
were bound down and compressed, as it were, and girdled tensely, in their
luxuriance, by her virgin zone.‖ (p.183). This quotation also describes that most of
Beatrice‘s physical needs are fulfilled well. The author also wants to show
Beatrice lives with her old father and along her life she has grown to be a
beautiful daughter. Rappaccini is a single parent. He is a professor in the
University of Padua. He is a man who likes doing experiments.
Beatrice never knows her mother. Her mother is not explains in the story,
Rappacinni is the only person who takes care of his daughter and whom she
knows. Beatrice also does not have either brothers or sisters. Considering that fact,
it can be seen in the family Beatrice never has conversations with other people
except her father.
A.1.b. Father-daughter Relationship
Through the narrator, the author also depicts Beatrice as an obedient
daughter to show the reader that Beatrice is like other children; she likes to help
her father and respect his father. Beatrice is an obedient daughter for Rappaccini.
She always obeys her father‘s command and helps him whenever he needs her
assistance. She will serve him gladly (p.183). She also respects him and his
experiments. She often joins her father in the garden when he is taking care of the
plants. She helps him gathering the flowers and takes care of them well. She is
really an obedient daughter who never protests her father‘s will.
Beatrice, surely will serve her father gladly whenever Rappaccini needs
her assistance. Beatrice will do Rappacinni‘s request without rejection. The fact is
supported by the quotation below,
I fear, this plant must be consigned to your sole charge.‖ ―and gladly will I
undertake it‖, cried again the rich tones of the young lady,…(p.183)
The narrator also describes Beatrice‘s feeling to show that Beatrice is like
other human who has a feeling although she is a poisonous person. There are
many quotations that show Beatrice‘s feeling toward her condition, her father and
her love, Giovanni.
Beatrice also experiences the lack of paternal love, she expresses her
opinion that her father‘s love for science is bigger than his love for her as a
daughter, and brought miserable condition to her ―There was an awful doom,‖ she
continued, ―the effect of my father‘s fatal love of science, which estranged me
from all society of my kind.‖ (p. 206). Dr. Rappaccini, a researcher of the
medicinal properties of plants, he plays as God with the life of his daughter.
Beatrice never gets the real love from her father. Her father has never played his
role as the real father to Beatrice. He dedicates his life for his experiment in
science. He loves his experiment more than anything in the world, including
Beatrice. It can be seen in the quotation:
―I know little of the Signora Beatrice save that Rappaccini is said
instructed her deeply in science, and that, young and beautiful as fame
reports her, she is already qualified to fill a professor‘s chair.‖ (p.186)
From the quotation above, we can see that Beatrice is educated to continue
her father‘s experiment. Since she is a child, her father has decided that Beatrice
will be the one that could continue his experiment. Beatrice is born with all the
perfections as a girl. She is beautiful, charming and so clever. Her father realizes
that Beatrice is so brilliant. He does not want anyone to exploit Beatrice‘s
Beatrice does not have the right to express her feeling. Her father never wants to
know what actually she wants to do; he does not want to know her dreams in her
life. Her father also never talks to Beatrice, except about his medicinal plants in
the garden. Dr. Rappacini just needs Beatrice when his medicinal plants need her
nurse. It is proved in the quotation:
―I know not how this dearly this physician may love his art; but surely there is one object more dear to him. He has a daughter.‖
―But as for Rappacini, it is said of him and I, who know the man well, can answer for its truth; that he cares infinitely more for science than for mankind. His patients are interesting to him only as subject for some new experiment. He would sacrifice human life, his own among the rest, or whatever else was dearest to him, for the sake of adding so much as a
grain of mustard seed to the great heap of his accumulated knowledge.‖ (p.
185)
From the quotation above, it can be seen that her father loves science more
than he loves her daughter. Another point that could be inferred from the
quotation is that the narrator sees Beatrice as a human by addressing Beatrice as a
subject for Rappacinni‘s experiment. By addressing Beatrice as a victim of her
father‘s experiment, the narrator wants to show that Beatrice has been victimized
despite the fact that she is Dr. Rappacinni‘s only daughter. This narrator‘s view of
Beatrice‘s dehumanization, when later is compared to Giovanni‘s view on
Beatrice will serve as proof for the narrator‘s more human perspective on Beatrice.
From its omniscient position, the narrator explicitly reveals Beatrice not simply as
a physical being, but as a complete human being and woman, capable of feeling
misery and of being reduced to nothing more than a scientific device.
As the narrator sees her as a victim, it is shows that the narrator sees
such an inhuman treatment, and made as an object of experiment. In other words,
the narrator believes that Beatrice should be treated more affectionately as a
human because she is a human being.
A father usually will do anything for his daughter‘s happiness.
Unfortunately, it does not happen in the relationship between Beatrice and her
father. Her father just spends all his life for science. While he works with the
plants, Dr. Rappacini let Beatrice alone in the garden, without any friends.
Beatrice does not have any friends to play with. As a father, he never does his
responsibilities to serve Beatrice. There is no communication that usually happens
in the life of a father and his daughter.
The poor Beatrice is subject to her father‘s experiment. It can be seen in
the quotation:
―He is a man fearfully acquainted with the secrets of nature, replied
Beatrice and at the hour when I drew breath this plant sprang from the soil, the offspring of his science of his intellect while I was but his earthy
child.‖ (p. 206)
The quotation above reveals how that Dr. Rappacini‘s love to his
experiment is so big. From the quotation above the writer of the thesis sees that,
the narrator grasps the senses of Beatrice‘s trying to question about her existence.
The narrator shows Beatrice as a human, she is told to be thinking about her
existence as if she is ―created‖ by Dr. Rappacinni. The narrator uses the words
―earthy child‖ to make a contrast on how Dr. Rappacinni loves his science and
sees Beatrice just as a child, a human child. Earthy in Oxford Advanced Learner’s
it is more about physic than mind. Beatrice knows she‘s been treated as an earthy
child.
A.1.c. Relationship between Beatrice and the Plants
Dr. Rappacini has educated Beatrice to love plants since she was a child,
and it makes her love the plants with all of her affection. It happens until she
becomes a teenager. Beatrice‘s habits in serving and nursing the plants, for a
moment replace her father‘s love. Beatrice needs something that can fulfill her
loneliness. She wants someone to love her as her father loves his children
commonly. He sacrifices his daughter to create his experiment of science.
Everyday, Dr. Rappaccini asks Beatrice to do some tasks in the garden. Beatrice
has some duties to nurse and serve the plants in the garden. Beatrice will serve
everything that is needed by the plants. As a result, Beatrice is even more exposed
to being poisonous herself by the poison that sprang from the plants. The poison is
so dangerous for the other human and the other living creature. The poison makes
the other living creature dead. It is the result from his father‘s experiment in
science.
Beatrice does not have friends to talk to. She only has the shrub in her
father‘s botanical garden to be her friend or her sister. Thus, as a human she often
feels lonely. She then will speak to the flowers to break up her solitude. There is a
mutual relationship between Beatrice and the flowers. The flowers do not only
supply their perfume for her, but also becomes her friend because she doesn‘t
splendor, it shall be Beatrice‘s task to nurse and serve thee; and thou shalt reward
her with thy kiss and perfumed breath, which to her is as the breath of life.‖
(p.183). Beatrice treats the flower tenderly. Her treatment toward them shows that
actually Beatrice is a tender woman. ―Then, with all the tenderness in her manner
that was so strikingly expressed in her words, she busied herself with such
attentions as the plant seemed to require.‖ (p.183). She likes kissing the flower
and inhaling the perfume. She treats them well because she needs them, she needs
their poison.
Approaching the shrubs, she threw open her arms, as with passionate ardor, and drew its branches into a intimate embrace – so intimate that her features were hidden in its leafy bosom and her glistening ringlets all
intermingled with the flowers.‖ (p.188)
Friendship is one kind of the relationship among human beings. Friendship is very
useful activity to make our lives more interesting and meaningful. As a human, if
we have no friends or someone to talk we can feel lonely. That is the consequence
being a human. We are not individual but social beings so we need to make
friends, we need to socialize with others and it also happens with Beatrice.
Beatrice does not have friends to talk to and it makes her feel lonely. She even
made a flower as her friend. The narrator finds it proper to position Beatrice as a
complete human with all of the human aspects that she has, she can feel lonely
and needs a friend.
Because she does not have friends, Beatrice also grows to be a shy person.
She feels ashamed when she once has a chance to meet other people. For example,
Beatrice is expressively ashamed after receiving a bouquet from Giovanni, ―…
stepped aside from her maidenly reserve to respond to a stranger‘s greeting,…‖
(p.189). She does not have any experience to face other people.
Another basic human aspect that the narrator reveals in Beatrice is
Beatrice‘s craving for affection. One of human needs is love and feeling of
belonging that can be fulfilled by having relationship with other people. To show
the reader about Beatrice‘s feeling as a human when she falls in love and have a
relationship with other, the narrator introduced another character named Giovanni.
Giovanni Guasconti is a young man from the southern region of Italy; he came to
Padua to continue his study at the University of Padua ―A young man, named
Giovanni Guasconti, came, very long ago, from the more southern region of Italy,
to purse his studies at the University of Padua.‖ (p. 179) a young man named
Giovanni is the first person that Beatrice knows beside her father. Other
Beatrice‘s characteristics appear when she meets him. The way Beatrice responds
to Giovanni‘s attendance shows her friendly and warm character. She receives his
attendance well, although, she feels a little bit ashamed toward him (p.195).
However she can overcome the feeling and she knows how to greet politely to the
stranger. Beatrice is happy for having an opportunity to know him and to have
relationship with him. In her relationship with Giovanni, Beatrice shows her
dependence on Giovanni. Thus, Beatrice does not want to be left by Giovanni for
a long time.
In her relationship with Giovanni, she also shows her heroic character.
Beatrice expresses her attention to Giovanni by preventing him to touch the
―He made a step toward the shrubs with extended hand, but Beatrice
darted forward, uttering a shriek that went through his heart like a dagger. She caught his hand and drew it back with the whole force of her slender figure. (p.197)
After Giovanni comes, everything has changed. The attentions that
Giovanni brings make her happy:
―The tinge of passion that had colored Beatrice‘s manner vanished; she
became gay, and appeared to derive a pure delight from her communion with the youth not unlike what maiden of a lonely island might have felt
conversing with a voyager from the civilized world.‖ (p. 196)
From the description above we can see that the Giovanni‘s attention makes
her very happy. The sadness and loneliness that always accompany her has
disappeared. After Giovanni comes, Beatrice becomes the happiest person in the
world. The love that she feels to Giovanni throws away all of the sadness and
loneliness in her life. For the first time in her life, Beatrice falls in love. From the
quotation above, the author also want to shows the reader that Beatrice is capable
of feeling good, she is like other human, capable of feeling love. All of the
happiness that she dreams in her life is found in Giovanni. Beatrice does not only
find a friend but also love in her life for the first time in her life. It can be seen in
the quotation:
―Her spirit gushed out before him like a fresh rill that was just catching its
first glimpse of the sunlight and wondering at the reflections of earth and sky which were flung into its bosom. There came thoughts too, from a deep source, and fantasies of a gemlike brilliancy, as if diamonds and
rubies sparkled upward among the bubbles of the fountain.‖ (p.197)
From many quotations above, we can see Beatrice is just like other girls in
her youth, except the fact that she is a poisonous girl. Beatrice acted like other
human, she can fell sad, lonely and fall in love:
―She was human; her nature was endowed with all gentle and feminine
qualities; she was worshipped; she was capable, surely, on her part of the height and heroism of love. Whatever had looked ugly was now beautiful; or; if incapable of such a change, it stole away and hid itself among those shapeless half ideas which throng the dim region beyond the daylight of
our perfect consciousness.‖ (p. 198)
This quotation above also showed as if the author understands the
complexity of a girl falling in love, the narrator want to show Beatrice‘s feeling as
a human when she fall in love.
As a human Beatrice also can express her feeling that she loves Giovanni
very much. She just wants to be with him although she is a ―poisonous person‖
and she doesn‘t want to hurt Giovanni with her poison:
I dreamed only to love thee and be with thee a little time, and so let the pass away, leaving but thine imagine in mine heart: for Giovanni, believe
it, though my body be nourished with poison, my spirit is God‘s creature, and craves love as its daily food. (p. 208)
This quote showed Beatrice as human, as a God‘s creature, she also need a love,
she also want to be loved by other.
The implication of the various quotations above is that the narrator of the
story always positions Beatrice as a complete woman. She is always described as
a woman who, like human in general, is capable of knowing that she has been
treated merely like an object of experiment, she is capable of feeling lonely, and
of fall in love. By showing Beatrice‘s human characteristic, the author brings alert
Drawing from the contrast of the narrator‘s perspectives and Giovanni‘s
perspectives on Beatrice will lead to the idea about Giovanni‘s type of love for
Beatrice.
B. Beatrice from Giovanni’s Point of View
From the beginning of the story, Giovanni only sees Beatrice‘s physical
appearance; he is attracted to Beatrice because of a Beatrice‘s youthful and
beautiful face. Giovanni sees Beatrice for the first time in the garden and he is
always thinking about Beatrice‘s beautiful face:
Giovanni, closing the lattice, went on to his couch and dreamed a rich flower and beautiful girl. Flower and maiden were different, and yet the same, and fraught with some strange peril in either shape. (p. 184)
From quote above, Giovanni already characterized Beatrice as beautiful girl and
this is make Giovanni attracted to her because Beatrice‘s physical appearance.
On their second meeting, Giovanni still sees Beatrice‘s physical
appearance rather than observe Beatrice‘s character. Unlike the narrator who sees
Beatrice as a complete human, Giovanni has only seen one side of her, as seen in
the following quotation:
On again beholding Beatrice, the young man was even startled to perceive how much her beauty exceeded his recollection of it; so brilliant, so vivid, was it character, that she glowed amid the sunlight, and as Giovanni whispered to himself, positively illuminated the more shadowy intervals of the garden path. (p. 187)
When Giovanni waits for Beatrice in the garden, he also sees a lizard dies
he doubted Beatrice as an ordinary beautiful young girl or something horrible (p.
188):
But Giovanni, out of the shadow of his window, bent forward and shrank
back, and murmured and trembled. ―Am I awake? Have I my sense?‖ said he to himself. ―What is this being? Beautiful shall I call her, or inexpressibly terrible?‖ (p.188)
Giovanni‘s utterance on Beatrice ―what is this being?‖ shows that for him
Beatrice is not yet a human. Being here means a thing or a creature. From the
quotation above the writer of this thesis thinks that Giovanni only sees Beatrice as
an object because he compares Beatrice with the two concepts that remain on
physical condition of Beatrice; beautiful or terrible. He reduces Beatrice‘s
existence as a human by thinking that Beatrice is either a beautiful creature or a
terrible creature, two opposite roles which both remains only on the physical
realm of Beatrice.
Giovanni also sees the bouquet of flowers that he gives to Beatrice
suddenly wither in Beatrice‘s gasp, and again he is scared and fails to see Beatrice
as a human being (p.189):
For many days after the incident the young man avoided the window that
looked into Dr. Rappaccini‘s garden, as if something ugly and monstrous
would have blasted his eyesight and he been betrayed into glance. He felt conscious of having put himself, to a certain extent, within the influence of an unintelligible power by the communication which he had opened with Beatrice. (p. 190)
The quotation above shows how Giovanni thinks and feels about Beatrice when
he sees Beatrice as poisonous person for the first time. He even avoids seeing the
garden where Beatrice stays for several days because he was afraid something
Although Giovanni is scared of Beatrice, he is also curious about her; he
wants to meet Beatrice very much and talks with her for a long time. He is
possessed by the beauty of Beatrice. Also as a medical student he maybe curious
with the poison in Beatrice body and want to know it to solve the riddle about
himself as a human ―Day after day his pulses had throbbed with feverish blood at
the improbable idea of an interview with Beatrice, and of standing with her, face
to face, in this very garden, basking in the Oriental sunshine of her beauty,
snatching from her full gaze the mystery which he deemed the riddle of his own
existence‖ (p. 194)
The first interview is continued with other interviews. They, then often
have meetings and the meetings become such routine activities for Giovanni and
Beatrice:
After the first interview, a second was in the inevitable course of what we call fate. A third; a fourth; and a meeting with Beatrice in the garden was
no longer an incident in Giovanni‘s daily life. (p. 199)
The same condition happens to Beatrice, ―Nor was it otherwise with the daughter
of Rappacinni.‖ (p. 199)
Giovanni decides to see Beatrice every time they have a time to meet, he
makes friend with Beatrice then he also attracted to Beatrice. Giovanni is obsess
with Beatrice but also feel something horror when he thinking of Beatrice, still he
feels a thrill because Beatrice‘s beauty, this quotation shows Giovanni feeling
about Beatrice:
love an horror that had each parent in it, and burned like one and shivered like the other. (p. 190)
This quotation shows how the rich beauty of Beatrice still attracted Giovanni and
it was madness to him, he confused with his feeling toward Beatrice. He was
unable to define what his feeling is. Yet, as the narrator reveals, it was essentially
not love for Giovanni.
Because he always meets Beatrice in the garden a place where the poison
flowers also planted in the garden, there is something strange with Giovanni, the
poison in Beatrice‘s body also infect him, and this makes his breath contain a
poison that can kill a spider. He is very angry and upset with Beatrice; he even
says Beatrice is a cursed one because he thinks Beatrice has infected him:
―Accursed one!‖ cried he, with venomous scorn and anger. ―and, finding
thy solitude wearisome, thou hast severed me into thy region of
unspeakable horror!‖ (p. 206)
Giovanni even calls Beatrice as a poisonous thing, a thing or a creature
that contains poisons not a human because he was mad at Beatrice and blame her
for the poison in his breath. He thinks Beatrice has infected him with the poison in
her body, make him like her also ―Yes, poisonous thing!‖ repeated Giovanni,
beside himself with passion. ―Thou hast done it! Thou hast blasted me! Thou hast
filled me with poison! Thou hast made me as hateful, as ugly, as loathsome and
deadly creature as thyself –a world‘s wonder of hideous monstrosity!‖ (p. 207)
The poison in Giovanni‘s body actually is not because of the poison in
Beatrice‘s body but the poison in the flowers in the garden, Beatrice has explained
it to him but he is still angry. If one falls in love, He or she must accept his or her
what happened with him and Beatrice, he is only attracted to Beatrice because she
is beautiful, because of her physical beauty. Giovanni responds to her only as a
physical being and fails to understand her as a real person.
C. Giovanni’s Point of View on Beatrice’s Character Reveal His Type of
Love toward Her
Giovanni is infatuated with Beatrice from the moment he first sees her
in the garden below his window. He characterized Beatrice as a beautiful and
dangerous young girl, especially because of her resemblance and immunity to
the purple-flowered plant which her father carefully avoids. "Flower and
maiden were different and yet the same, and fraught with some strange peril in
either shape" (p.184). In Giovanni‘s eyes Beatrice is beautiful and dangerous
and this is make Giovanni physically attracted to Beatrice, this is revealing his
type of love which Fromm considered as erotic love or physical love.
Since Giovanni's imagination is provoked by his very first
observance of Beatrice and her surroundings, it is difficult for him to focus
on the reality of who and what she is. In the following passage, notice
how his thoughts quickly move away from the actuality of Beatrice to
metaphors created by his mind "Here am I, my father! What would you?"
cried a rich and youthful voice from the window of the opposite house; a
voice as rich as a tropical sunset, and which made Giovanni, though he
knew not why, think of deep hues of purple or crimson, and of perfumes
