Frankenstein

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Isolation You may deem me Romantic, dear sister, but I bitterly feel the want of a friend - WaltonSolitude was my only consolation - Victor

I saw and heard of none like me - Creature

I was shut out from intercourse with them - Creature

My vices are the children of a forced solitude - Creature

No one was near me who soothed me with the gentle voice of love - Victor

Glory The inestimatable benefit which I shall confer on all mankind - Walton

No father could claim the gratitude of his child so completely as I should deserve theirs - Victor

Perhaps, if my first introduction to humanity had been made by a young soldier, burning for glory and slaughter, I should have been imbued with different sensations - Creature

Do not return to your families with the stigma of disgrace marked on your brows - Victor to Walton's men

Power Life and death appeared to me ideal bounds, which I should first break through, and pour a torrent of life into our dark world. - Victor

I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished the beauty of the dream vanished - Victor

So powerful, so virtuous and magnificent yet so viscous and base? - Creature on humans

I am fearless and therefore powerful - Creature

Sacrifice If I succeed many months, perhaps years will pass before you and I meet - Walton to his sister regarding his voyage

The love of another will destroy the cause of my crimes - Creature

To save them I resolved to dedicate myself to my most abhorred task - Victor on creating the female creature

Who encountered death for honour - Victor to Walton's men

Passion Nothing contributes so much as to tranquilliser the mind as a steady purpose - Walton

I was attacked by my fatal passion - Victor

I devote myself either in life or in death to his destruction - Victor

Mine is assigned to me by Heaven - Victor on purpose

The completion of my demoniacal design became an insatiable passion - Creature

Responsibility If your wish is to become really a man of science, and not merely a petty experimentalist, I should advice you to apply to every branch - M. Waldman

The mere presence of the idea was irresistible proof of the fact - Victor on the creature being William's murderer.

For the first time, I felt what the duties of a creator towards his creature are - Victor

It's was the fiend within me, not I - Creature regarding placing trinket on Justine

I was guiltless - Victor

Destiny Vs. Free Will Destiny was too potent, and her immutable laws had decreed by utter and terrible destruction - Victor

Forced to spend days and night in vaults and charnel houses - Victor on his first creation

Superior beings who would be arbiters or my future destiny - Creature on the De Laceys

I did not reflect that a voluntary act of mine could avert it - Victor on his loved one's deaths

Revenge Come, Victor not brooding thoughts of vengeance against the assassin, but with feelings of peace and gentleness, that will heal instead of festering - Alphonse

Avenge the deaths of William and Justine - Victor

At such moments, vengeance that burned within me died in my heart - Victor on dreaming his loved ones alive

From that moment I declared everlasting war against the species - Creature

Revenge kept me alive - Victor

Family Nurture No human being could have passed a happier childhood than myself - Victor

Instantly expressed a degree of ecstatic joy, of which I could hardly have believed it capable - Creature on Felix receiving Safie

I am malicious because I am miserable - Creature on his lack of parent

How the life and cares of the mother were wrapped up in her precious charge - Creature on discovering what families do

Suffering The tortures of the accused did not equal mine - Victor

Your sufferings shall satisfy my everlasting hatred - Creature

The agony of my feelings allowed me no respite - Creature

So much does suffering blunt even the coarsest sensations of men - Victor on the Scottish peasants

Your abhorrence cannot equal that which I regard myself - Creature

Passive women Looked upon Elizabeth as mine - Victor

One word from you Victor is necessary to calm our apprehensions - Elizabeth

A thousand conflicting emotions rendered her mute as she bade me a tearful, silent farewell - Victor on leaving Elizabeth for England

Tore to pieces the thing - Victor on destroying the female creature

Appearances He must have been a noble creature in his better days, being now in wreck so amiable and attractive - Walton

One hand was stretched out, seemingly to detain me - Victor

How was I terrified when I viewed myself in a transparent pool - Creature

I am blind, and cannot judge your countenance but there is something in your words that persuades me you are sincere - De Lacey

Master / Slave You are my creator but I am your master - obey! - Creature

I too can create devolution, my enemy is not invulnerable - Creature

I was the slave of my creature - Victor

I was the slave, not the master of an impulse - Creature on his murders

I will be even mild and docile to my natural lord and king - Creature on asking for female

Childish Imagination I read and studied the wild fancies of these writers - Victor

My imagination was too much exalted by my first success to permit me to doubt - Victor on his creating skills

With the joy a child feels when he embarks on a little boat - Walton on his voyage

His wild and enthusiastic imagination was chastened by the sensibility of his heart - Victor on Clerval

Sublime Nature I never beheld anything so destroyed - Victor on the power of lightning

The blue lake and snow clad mountains, they never change - Elizabeth

The icy wall of the glacier overhung me - Victor

Magnificent scenes afforded me the greatest consolation - Victor

I dared to be happy - Creature after feeling the sensations of nature

Dangerous Knowledge A selfish pursuit had cramped and narrowed me - Victor

One mans life or death but were a small price to pay for the acquirement of the knowledge - Walton

The strange system of human society was explained to me - Creature

I learned from your papers that you were my father - Creature

doppelgänger

Nearly in the light of my own vampire, my own spirit let loose from the grave - Victor on the creature

Have you drank also of the intoxicating draft? - Victor on Walton

My form is a filthy type of yours - Creature

In Clerval I saw the image of my former self - Victor

Critics ''doomed to perpetual life on earth for the ultimate crime against God'' - David Punter

''to portray Frankenstein as a feminist novel: Natures revenge is absolute; he who violates her secret hiding places must be punished'' - Anne Mellor

''Mary Shelley doubted the legitimacy of her own literary voice, a doubt that determined her decision to speak through three male narrators'' - Anne Mellor

''anxiety of authorship'' - Anne Mellor

''Beware; I am fearless, and therefore powerful,'' - Mary Shelley

''The Creature - has become a metaphor for our own cultural crisis'' - George Levine

Assessment oBJECTIVES AO1 - key terms / understanding / fluency / include argument

AO2 - quotes / analysis of form, structure and language

AO3 - different interpretations - marxist and feminist

AO4 - context

Shellys Life Timeline 1797 - Mother died 11 days after birth - mother was a feminist and left her feminist books after death

1814 - Mary ran away with Shelley. Returned to England. Father disowned her

1815 - Gave birth to Clara who died 11 days after birth. Had William

1817 - Finished Frankenstein. Had daughter

1818 - Frankenstein first edition published anonymously. Daughter died

1819 - William died. Gave birth to Percy

1822 - Shelley drowned. Had a miscarriage

1831 - Frankenstein revised edition published crediting Mary Shelley as author

1851 - Died of a brain tumour

The aUTHOR Mary Shelley was the daughter of a philosopher and a radical feminist. Being an atheist with a Catholic background she was also an anarchist who who believed we could live peacefully without laws. It seems Shelley’s life was engulfed in and surrounded by misery. Shelley’s mother died shortly after her birth in she was an illegitimate child. Her husband’s ex wife drowned herself and he died later during his marriage with Shelley by drowning. Unfortunately she also lost her daughter before she even had the chance to name her, she had dreams of bringing the child back to life.As for the creation of Frankenstein, Lord Byron challenged Shelley to write a ghost story in the wet summer of 1876. After being inspired by a discussion from her husband and Byron about the nature of horror, life and galvanism (alongside a dream she had resembling the awakening of the creature) Frankenstein was born.

‘Supremely frightful would be the effect of any human endeavour to mock the stupendous mechanism of the creator of the world.’ Shelley was also inspired by the recent scientific discoveries of the time such as the galvanisation process.

hISTORICAL content Female writers were given little respect so Mary Shelley did not put her name to Frankenstein for 13 years. In the 18th and 19th centuries some writers were lingering on the topic of bringing the dead back to life. Scientific discoveries were being made such as that of how the circulation of blood flows and the nervous system. Frankenstein was also written during a period when Christianity was widely believed and accepted before Darwinian theories had been established. This made it all the more shocking that even in literary fiction someone was trying to take on the role of God.

In the midst of the industrial revolution the development of new technology threatened the livelihoods of many labourers. This was a period of change and uncertainty.

Literary Content There were many shared characteristics of the ‘Romantic movement’ such as:

Value placed on feelings and emotion

Value placed on the individual

Connecting nature to the individual and the use of pathetic fallacy

The rebellion against traditional literary and political institutions.

A plot involving a quest for transcendence or escape from the melancholythrough greater knowledge or another spectacular means

A sense of innovation and spontaneity

Fresh possibilities and new beginnings.

The modern prometheus Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is also known as The Modern Prometheus. Prometheus is a mythic titan who stole the power of fire from Zeus and gave it to the humans, leaving him to be punished eternally by Zeus. Much like one could argue that Frankenstein has stolen the power of life from God for man and is being punished in kind.

the narrative structure This has been compared to a Russian, because it is fundamentally a story being told inside a story being told inside a story.

Retrospective narrative

The setting There are many different settings such as:

The wastes of the Arctic

Switzerland

London

The Orkneys

The audience would have been mostly unfamiliar with these locations giving Shelley free reign to write them how she wished. This gave her the opportunity to use the elements to make them particularly frightening. Also unfamiliarity can be quite frightening to many because it’s hard to navigate through the unknown.

The supernatural The central premise of the plot of Frankenstein is bringing the dead back to life. This would have been particularly terrifying to Shelley’s 19th Century audience, especially with the large presence of Christianity still among the public. The 19thCentury was a time of progress in science and knowledge although the majority of the public still held on to traditional beliefs. Using a combination of the myth of Prometheus and the concept of Galvanisation Shelley was able to create an overwhelming presence of the supernatural.

Victor fRANKENSTEIN On many occasions Frankenstein heavily conforms to Gothic protagonist conventions:

He is talented in science and blindly passionate about it

We can assume that he is attractive as he gets the girl of his dreams with ease and tends to solely judge most based on their appearance

Victor also happens to be incredibly egocentric and solitary, he will only tend to focus on his own pain

He cannot escape his past events

As a modern reader it is sometimes incredibly hard to see him as the victim as this is something that he had brought upon himself, but 19th Century audiences tended to enjoy the extreme emotional levels which would have probably heightened their sense of entertainment.

elizabeth and Justine Both of these characters of victims of the monster (and Frankenstein), each so incredibly caring and compassionate, yet they were the ones to die. They are not necessarily stereotypical damsels in distress but they most certainly hold Gothic characteristics.However, a key difference between them is how Justine accepts and faces her death bravely and somehow still tries to comfort those around her. Elizabeth never get such a chance. On the other hand she is a woman who speaks her mind, she confronts Victor offering to relieve him from any obligation of marrying her because she believes it’s causing him distress. This just reflects how selfless each of these women are.

They are each idealised images of women; beautiful, sensitive and working only for the good of others.

Justine = ironic as receives no "justice"

the monster / the creature He did not ask to be created and yet he suffers hatred constantly, there is absolutely no possible escape from his isolation. Yet you may argue how could we possibly feel sympathy for something that’s artificial, that’s made of a collection of dead body parts and goes against all laws of creation.After his ‘birth’ he is innocent and child-like in nature. All he wishes for are friends, from what we gather he only becomes evil due to the way he is treated by others. Mankind attacks him, if he is not man then why should he not fight back?

You may say that he is a ‘noble savage’. He has been corrupted by the influence of society.

Marxist interpretation A Marxist Critic may perceive the privileged Elite Victor Frankenstein as the Capitalist Bourgeoisie who exploit the labor of the Proletarians, and his Monster as the working class, the Proletarians, who exist because of the Capitalist Bourgeoisie. Victor Frankenstein represents the Capitalist Bourgeoisie because of his privileged youth. Much like how the Bourgeoisie brought forth the Industrial Revolution through innovations and technology, so has Frankenstein in a sense that he made the Monster through science which makes a connection between Frankenstein and the Bourgeoisie. The Monster symbolises the Proletarians because he is assembled of different parts which makes a connection to the assembly line. Instead of being in one piece, the Monster is artificially created. The Monster’s eventual revolt against his creator, Victor Frankenstein, also represents the eventual revolt of the Proletarians against the Bourgeoisie as predicted by Karl Marx himself. In addition, Frankenstein’s surprise at the sight of the Monster being awakened suggests the Alienation of the worker and his product. The everlasting conflict on the quality of life between Frankenstein and his Monster also shows a parallel to that between the Bourgeoisie and the Proletarians. Lastly, the calming effect rural scenes have on Victor Frankenstein implies that only nature can heal a soul damaged by the negative effects of technology and urbanity.

feminist interpretation

She sees the novel as one that traces out the dangerous consequences of attempting to either possess or dismiss the "female.”

Critiquing male attitudes towards female sexuality

Shelley’s engagement with Paradise Lost is indicative of the way in which her “anxieties about femaleness” are as much about literature as they are about physical female sexuality

Shelley’s biography provides all of the material that makes up the Gothic power of the novel; she details the way in which life forces (love-making, pregnancies, births, and marriages) and death forces (stillborns, miscarriages, suicides, and sexual betrayal) are entwined in Mary Shelley’s lived experience as a woman.

Justine's death = the ultimate crime against women

Paradise Lost Victor Frankenstein, playing God, resembles Satan from Milton's Paradise Lost, in which Satan is an archangel punished for his vanity, arrogance, and thirst for forbidden knowledge. Like him, Victor attempts to take over God's role as creator and master of the universe. This achievement, Victor imagines, will be a superior one, and the exuberant and admirable beings that he creates will worship and honor him like a most deserving father.

The Romantics, especially Blake, Byron, and Percy Shelley, interpreted Milton's account of the biblical story of Genesis as a celebration of Satan — the rebellious hero who defies the power of God. They regarded Satan not as the embodiment of evil, but as a victim of the tyrannical power of the establishment.

Like Milton's Satan, Victor Frankenstein is a rebellious character who has faith in his own creative powers and has the courage to aspire higher than his limited human condition allows. However, Mary Shelley does not present Victor's acts as positive or admirable. Victor's intellectual curiosity and ambition does not contribute to any scientific advancement or social progress. Instead, he destroys a family and, symbolically, populates the world with monstrous fantasies.

qUOTES ON ELIZABETH

Looked upon Elizabeth as mine

heaven-sent

bearing a celestial stamp in all her features

cherub

shed radiance

till death she was to be mine only

fairer than a garden rose among dark-leaved brambles