Donatello the Faun:Constructing a Dark Other inThe Marble Faun

Abstract

Hawthorne’sFaunstands as a racially and culturally hybrid figure.The Marble Faunis compared to an Italian artist with the image of Faun, which is equivalentto Pan God in pagan culture.Hawthorne encodes American construct of race.On one hand, he representsthewhiteimperialist, who shows cognizance ofthe power ofthegod of his kind.Atthesame time, however,thehalf-goat status of the faunmakesthecreature half Other.The faun is the Other,its dark desires predominant, striving to overcome and choke out and emerge as the Other. This thesis explores why the novelist compares Donatello with the image of Pan and why he represents him as a pack of sins, comparable in some ways to post-lapsarian Adam.