Research paper continued + Olympics!

I was very busy this weekend, but -- I have to admit that I wasn't busy with my paper...

I was busy watching the Olympic Games!

Maybe I shouldn't use the past tense, because I am still watching the Olympic Games at this very moment (a lot of swimming competitions today).

The Olympics is such an irresistible temptation to me, and watching various competitions is certainly more entertaining and exciting than reading the book.

So I am going to share a bit on my research paper today.

On my first draft, I wrote about how Zenobia and Fuller are similar, and Zenobia's death in Blithedale is merely a portrayal of Margaret Fuller's death in reality but not a "devastating satire" of Fuller. I began with Hawthorne and Fuller's relationship, because in order to prove that Hawthonre is not expressing his hatred towards Fuller in Blithedale, I need to establish that their friendship was intimate, and was misundertood to be negative by many past critics. I devoted a lot of time on the background in my first draft, which is too much, so I need to cut down the background and expand the similarities between Fuller and Zenobia, as well as their drownings in my final draft.

So far, I found several similarities between Fuller and Zenobia's deaths.
1. Fuller drowned in a shipwreck; Zenobia drowned in a river.
2. Fuller refused help from others to save herself (which she could have survived if she accepted help); Zenobia committed suicide.
3. Fuller refused help because she wished to die with her husband and baby. She would rather die with the ones she loves than to live without them;
Zenobia commited suicide because she would rather die than to live alone without the man she loves.
4. Fuller prayed with other passengers before she died; Zenobia was found dead "in the attitude of prayer"
5. They both had ambition to achieve women's rights, but both died before they could push or witness women's movement. So, they both left their feminist works undone.
6. still searching.....

I am trying to prove that the reason Hawthorne kills Zenobia in the novel is not because he hates Fuller or feminism, but because he is portraying Fuller's life and fate (of course, not 100% similar to the reality).

I also want to show that Hawthorne might be expressing his sadness of Fuller's sudden death through Zenobia's death. For many readers, Zenobia's death is sudden, surprising, pitiful, and perhaps, heartbreaking. Perhaps Hawthorne had the same feelings when he found out that Fuller died in a shipwreck, given that Fuller was one of Hawthorne's closest friends in his lifetime.

The latter may be harder to prove, but my goal is to prove the first claim. I will put more analyses on Fuller and Zenobia's drownings.