Rappaccini's Daughter

The main female protagonist is described as a “young girl, arrayed with as much richness of taste as the most 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. She looked redundant with life, health, and energy” (Paragraph 14). She is Dr. Rappaccini’s daughter and has been raised by him as if a part of his poisonous garden. There is no information about her mother, suggesting that Beatrice might have been conceived entirely for Rappaccini’s experiment.

Even though the narration follows Giovanni, Beatrice is the best-developed character in the story. She is aware of her condition, forced on her by her father. But rather than becoming bitter owing to her social isolation, Beatrice remains selfless and trusting. Her love for Giovanni can be explained by her sheltered upbringing and her father’s encouragement of the romance. While it is unclear what it is she finds appealing in Giovanni, her feelings seem to be genuine. She is deeply upset on learning her condition has been passed onto him and is willing to sacrifice her life to test the antidote. Ultimately, Beatrice becomes the victim of the three male protagonists. Her father forces her to become poisonous; Giovanni is incapable of accepting her difference; and Baglioni is willing to use her as a pawn in his competition with Rappaccini.

Rappaccini is described as “a tall, emaciated, sallow, and sickly looking man, dressed in a scholar’s garb of black. He was beyond the middle term of life, with gray hair, a thin gray beard, and a face singularly marked with intellect and cultivation, but which could never, even in his more youthful days, have expressed much warmth of heart” (Paragraph 8). This is one of the few direct descriptions he is given. The rest of the information comes from third parties, Baglioni and the landlady, who have their own agendas.

Rappaccini is an ambiguous figure. He is purportedly dedicated to science, even at the price of human suffering. He has brought up his daughter as if she is another one of his experiments. His behavior towards Giovanni is also unethical. The old man knows what will happen if Beatrice spends time with her beloved, but instead of informing the young man, so that he can choose his fate, Rappaccini remains a silent observer.

He is not portrayed entirely negatively, however. While Beatrice is the embodiment of his scientific experiments and the pinnacle of his achievements, he also frames his daughter’s abilities as “marvelous gifts” that protect against the “mightiest” enemy (Paragraph 133). Without her poisonous touch and breath, Beatrice would be “a weak woman, exposed to all evil, and capable of none” (Paragraph 133). These words could potentially shed light on Beatrice’s mother’s fate. Such sentiment seems out of character for a man devoid of emotions. It is possible that his wife suffered some tragic fate, sparking his obsession with endowing his daughter with deadly powers.

Within the context of Medieval and Renaissance Italy, alluded to through Dante’s Divine Comedy, Rappaccini is not an unequivocally evil person. Without observation and experimentation, modern medicine would not have developed. His attempts to derive potent cures from poisonous plants are described as evil by his rival, but that could be an expression of a wider debate taking place at the time between those in favor of developing the field of medicine and those who regarded illness as part of a divine plan that should not be meddled with.