Rappaccini's Daughter

Rappaccini's Daughter by Nathaniel Hawthorne is not one of my favorite stories. Unlike Clary I am really annoyed by his language. I always compare it to the language of Jane Austen, who I know wrote at a different time, but I feel like Hawthorne is trying to emulate that way of writing and it is just not as effective. It seems forced, like he was trying to hard to have this interestingly florid language that is highly intellectual. It just seems flat and I don't understand what he is trying to say. I know this makes me have to read slower and try to understand what the meaning of the story is, but it impairs my intake of the content. I feel like I haven't retained any of what Hawthorne was trying to say.

Also, the setting made me a little crazy because I am not sure if it is fairly factual or not. There is one point at the beginning of the story when he mentions Italy as a country....but I don't know if Italy was unified at the time when the story is set. He also mentions that Beatrice is like a tropical sunset, but would Giovanni or Hawthorne have seen a tropical sunset? 

I also question the character of Giovanni. I think he is very ungrateful and full of himself. When he is talking to Baglioni, he acts as if he doesn't respect him at all...but is just listening to him because he can get information out of him. And Baglioni, in turn, seems to be only using Giovanni. After they run into Rappaccini in the street, Hawthorne reveals that Baglioni could be jeaslous that Rappaccini is studying Giovanni...before Baglioni got the chance too. It is almost like he claimed Giovanni because he knew his father. 

I did notice this read that Hawthorne is very attentive in his writing. I have to wonder if that was intentional, to mirror the attentiveness of Rappaccini to his garden and science. It seems like Hawthorne really wants to give the reader hidden clues and meanings constantly. He also has a lot of foreshadowing thrown into the text. He always uses words that could describe a character in the end. Having read this before, I picked up on it more this time. However, my initial reaction to this story was not very positive, and it is the same this read. Unfortunately.