Baltimore Book Festival

Baltimore is a beautiful city that leaves visitors with an understanding of why it has been dubbed “Charm City.” This past Saturday I attended the 22^nd Annual Baltimore Book Festival in the Inner Harbor. As an avid reader, I was excited to see what books the festival had to offer. When I arrived, I was pleasantly surprised to see that not only was there a plethora of books, but many other festivities and vendors. The Inner Harbor was transformed into a book lover’s paradise with live book readings, vintage classics, musical performances, interactive games, and delicious food. The atmosphere was jovial and friendly. People had no qualms with striking up conversation with random strangers. I found myself in conversation with one man and I learned that he had never been to Baltimore and he was in town for the Comic-Con Convention. As I was telling him all about my favorite spots in Baltimore he interrupted me and said, “Yeah, it would be a really beautiful city if it weren’t for all those homeless folk littering the streets.” I did not have the chance to rebuttal as I was quickly pulled away towards a vendor by my roommate. That stranger’s sentiment stuck with me for the rest of the day and I could not stop thinking about how wrong I felt he was. 

As I was reading the assigned works for this blog post, I found myself connecting each story or poem to the homeless population in Baltimore. “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne speaks about a so-called “imperfection” upon a beautiful woman. I could not help but relate Aylmer’s perspective to that of the man from the Book Festival. Aylmer was obsessed with the birthmark on his wife, Georgiana’s face and strived to remove it. He was open with her regarding his disgust which in return, made his beautiful wife self-conscious and insecure. No one wishes to be homeless. One of the basic human needs is shelter. In order to be homeless, people go through many hardships and have to lose everything. People tend to treat the homeless as less than human. Society forgets that people who are homeless have needs and strive for basic human rights just like everyone else. Aylmer eventually starts to define his wife by her imperfection which, then causes resentment and repulsion. Georgiana, who has been called beautiful by men her whole life, begins to despise herself and begs Aylmer to remove her birthmark. This intense longing for perfection leads to Georgiana’s demise as Aylmer’s method of removing her birthmark kills her. If we keep on marginalizing the homeless population and diminishing their humanity, then eventually society will cause their demise. 

“The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman has been one of my favorite pieces of writing for a few years. The narrator of “The Yellow Wallpaper” suffers from post-partum depression and her husband, a physician, prescribes her bedrest and lack of activity to cure her. Locked in a room with little to occupy her mind, the narrator becomes transfixed with the wallpaper in the room and quickly loses touch with reality. Ironically, the “cure” her husband prescribes, ends up making her condition much worse. Much of the homeless population suffers from mental illness and their conditions have worsened due to lack of professional care. In today’s world there is still a stigma that surrounds mental health especially when in regards to the homeless. People tend to place blame on those who are homeless and judge them for where they have ended up in life. Mental illnesses can be very difficult to diagnose and treat and can easily be made worse. In “The Yellow Wallpaper,” John unintentionally makes his wife’s condition worse by not allowing her freedom to explore the beautiful property and the freedom to exercise her body and mind. The isolation that society forces upon the homeless population can be debilitating and can worsen their illnesses. Homeless people can lose their sense of reality and get stuck inside their own heads just like the narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper.” If only people like the man from the Book Festival knew this, there would be much less of a divide between society and the homeless population. 

Loneliness can be the most isolating and depressing feeling in the world. William Wordsworth’s poem, “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud,” talks about how both nature and the human mind are powerful forces. Nature can cause people to feel comforted and content. The human mind is a big factor in this. The narrator in “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” could allow the loneliness to consume him, but instead, he lets his imagination wander and feels less lonely because of the natural beauty around him. No one ever discusses how lonely homelessness must be. Living in constant isolation and seclusion can be enough to drive a person to madness. Amongst the beauty in our city, there is the undeniable reality of homelessness. Society needs to remember the humanity of those who are living on the streets in constant danger. Instead of kicking people down and berating them for their position in life, we need to come to their aid and help them gain their footing. Putting up a barrier would do no good and would cause the situation to escalate. Our city needs to come together to unite all citizens in Baltimore.