Frankenstein Lecture Notes

Frankenstein Lecture notes

Mary Shelley - Result of the most famous radical literary marriage of the 18th century  Parents – Bohemian lifestyle – not married when pregnant; married for Mary- to legitimize her birth and protect her legal rights  House a haven for free thinkers and romantics of the time  Percy Shelley admired Godwin’s writing – spent much time with Godwin – Godwin began to demand financially on Shelley o Mary Wollstonecraft – feminist . A Vindication of the Rights of Women . Champion of feminist cause o William Godwin – radical philosopher . Believed that the isolated individual would become vicious . Champion of the underprivileged . Poetic Justice – criticism of existing society; advocates a belief in the perfectibility of man through reason  Born in London 1797 – result of the most famous radical literary marriage of the 18th century – Mary’s desire for a loving and supportive family defined her character and structured her fictional idealizations of the nuclear family (DeLacy family)  Father – William Godwin – radical philosopher – believed that the isolated individual would become vicious (Mary expands to state that the viciousness is the product of parental neglect); wrote Political Justice advocating a belief in the perfectibility of man through reason; also believed that the greatest justice done is when he who posses money gives to whomever has the greatest need.  Mother – Mary Wollstonecraft – A Vindication of the Rights of Women – free- thinking, intelligent, open, generous; well-known feminist  Parents marry 5 months before Mary’s birth to give her legitimacy – perhaps because they both recognized who they were and what she might become  1797 – mother dies 11 days after giving birth  absence of strong women in the story reflect the disastrous effect of her mother’s death and no loving women to care for her; governess (Louisa Jones) substitutes but leaves after three years because Godwin banes her love affair – how ironic– only mother she ever knew  1801 – father remarries; Mary Jane Clairmont - sepmother remote; polar opposite of Mary – conservative, devious, manipulative – two half siblings - Charles– one, Jane (Clara-Clare-Claire) followed the Shelley’s to mainland Europe and lived with them – with them on their wedding night – perhaps a model for the creature  refuses to allow Shelley to be educated; Shelley learns to read/educate self through father’s large library; favorite reading spot – mother’s gravestone; favorite pastime – writing stories  Summer of 1812 – sent to live with Baxters in Scotland; model of domestic affection and harmony; rare happiness; close knit family  November 1812 – meets Percy Shelley; supervised visits; he committed to father’s philosophy  June 1814 – Percy and Mary declare love for each other; Godwin forbids the love affair although Percy is financially supporting him; he was bored with his wife and fascinated with the offspring of Wollenstonecroft and Godwin  July, 1814 – Percy attempts suicide in order to prove love; Mary eloped with Percy Shelley, English Romantic poet and Jane Clairmont who eventually changes her name to Claire – became Byron’s lover; Shelley – pregnant; insecure and emotionally dependent on Percy; Percy believer in “free love”  February, 1815 – baby girl born and dies 11 days later – has a dream in March re: dead baby  January, 1816 –birth of son, William (who dies of malaria in 1819)  May, 1816 – with Lord Byron in Switzerland, cold summer, 4 decide to each write a ghost story  October, 1816 – stepsister Fanny Imlay (upon learning that Godwin was not her father – but Gilbert Imlay, an American Revolutionary officer was her father) committed suicide  December, 1816 – Harriet commits suicide; Mary pregnant again; Percy and Mary marry  May, 1817 – finishes Frankenstein; daughter Clara born in September, dies next year  feminist perspective – what happens when a man tries to have a baby without a woman; Shelley’s deepest fear – what if my child is born deformed – could I still love it?  Themes of creation, birth, and death in Frankenstein  1819 – son William dies of maleria– Mary Shelley – 22 years old  1819 – son, Percy, born dies 1889  June 1822, miscarries  July 8, 1822 – Percy drowns while sailing  1831 – revised edition of Frankenstein  1851 – Shelley dies

Mary Wollstonecraft William Godwin Mary Jane Clairmont d. 1797 m. 1797 m. 1801 (5 mos. before M’s birth) 1797-1800 – Louisa Jones Jane (Clara-Clare-Claire) Charles

Fanny (Imlay) Mary (Shelley) Percy Shelley Harriet d. 1816 b. 1797 m. 1812 d. 1822 d. 1816 (suicide) d. 1851 (suicide) William (malaria) Girl b. 1816 d. 1819 d. 1815/11 days Percy Clara b. 1819 d. 1889 b. 1817 d. 1818 miscarriage 1822 Romanticism – movement which began in Germany – Goethe; desire to affect the reader in manner which he would not encounter in everyday lie  American authors – Melville, Emerson, Thoreau, Longfellow, Poe  English – Wordsworth, Coleridge (Ancient Mariner), Percy Shelley, and Byron  Key elements: o Intuition and emotion – rejection of the rational and intellectual in favor of the intuitive and the emotional; emotions create the arts o Subject matter – emphasized the strange, unusual and unexpected o Primacy of feeling o Importance of nature – seeking solace in nature o Opposite nature of love o Belief in man’s basic goodness o Reaction to the Enlightenment o Championed progressive causes o Key words – Imagination and intensity o Characterization and verisimilitude . Not interested in creating believable characters o Setting and time – obscure and unknown place/foreign country . Romantic settings – Swiss Alps . Unknown places – goal – to create a world that was entirely different from the known world of the reader . Different/unique world so reader would concentrate on the themes and ideas – not on the boring/mundane world

Gothic novel – movement away from classical order and toward imagination and feeling – development that ran parallel to the romantic period  Grotesque, mysterious  Remote settings which evoke fear  Eerie atmosphere  Reliance on fantastic and supernatural  Overcoming the limits of mortality

Title:  The Modern Prometheus – Greek mythological figure who was responsible for taking fire from gods and alienating humans and gods; humans given an advantage over animals b/c humans could make weapons and tools. Prometheus chained to a rock and an eagle came every night and ate his liver which during the day grew back.  Application – Frankenstein defies the gods by creating life and becomes a god; he is punished by his creation Settings:  North Pole via Archangel; glacial location – suitable background for a man coldly detached from society  Geneva, Switzerland (Plainplais in Geneva – where William is killed; Chamounix – village and valley where Frankenstein seeks refuge; Belrive – Frankenstein has house; Montanvert – encounters the creature)  Ingolstadt, Germany (university; hills where creature observes the De Lacey family)  Perth, Scotland (after meeting Henry in Strasbough, desending the Rhine River to Rotterdam and then to London; finally to island to begin new creation; after destroying the female creature, Frankenstein goes Ireland)  Geneva to Lake Como where they get married; to Rhine, Black Sea, wilds of Tartary and Russia and finally to North Pole again.

Climax:  The murder of Elizabeth on the wedding night; the creature succeeds in obliterating F’s social world

Tragedy: the creature is driven by mankind to be evil

Frankenstein’s fatal flaw: his failure and inability to give love to his creature

Conflict:  Is human nature innately good or evil?  Creature – believes he was innately good  Frankenstein – innately bad

Point of view:  1st person by three narrators – Walton, Frankenstein, and creature

Mood: somber/cold

Characters: Apart from the protagonist and antagonist, the characters are weakly drawn

 Victor Frankenstein – young scientist; loves natural sciences as a young boy; studies in the university; double of Robert; protagonist; passion for knowledge; prepared to go to any length to achieve his goal; overreaches; ignorant of the consequences of his actions; doesn’t seem to change; reader alternately feels hope and despair for him – long for Victor to save himself but realize his ruin is inevitable b/c of his character which leads to his downfall – his destiny seems unalterable (narration from the beginning lets reader know F’s destruction has occurred); identified with Percy Shelley who penned his first volume of poems under the name of Victor, had a sister named Elizabeth, had read the same books/education, and evidenced indifference for his children (abandoned first wife/children for Mary); moral error – failure to love  Elizabeth Lavenza Frankenstein – adopted sister of Frankenstein

 Henry Clerval – friend of F; his protector; savior – comes at the necessary time to help out F; positive image of Percy

 Creature – result of F ambition; antagonist; no name which shows the alienation and anonymity that oppresses him – he has no place in the human chain; ironic – must be referred to as monster, creature or demon but is, at the beginning, more humane than many of the other characters; sensitive; circumstances force him to use his dormant aggression; embodiment of the consequences of our actions; becomes a creator also – of desolation when he can’t have love; the scientist’s deviant self; becomes inseparable with F in their mutual hatred and common misery; only two people do not immediately interpret the creature as evil – DeLacey – who is blind and Walton – because he has listened to his story

 William Frankenstein – younger brother of F; first victim – name of Shelley’s father; stepbrother who replaced her in her father’s affection, and own son (shared blue eyes and curls)

 Ernest Frankenstein – younger brother of F; wants to join the military – only member who survives

 Alphonse Frankenstein – Frankenstein’s father

 Caroline Frankenstein – Frankenstein’s mother; husband is her benefactor and spouse; dies while tending Elizabeth through an illness which illustrates the value placed on self-sacrifice which Frankenstein doesn’t seem to grasp

 DeLacey – old blind man who is an exile from France; this family represents Shelley’s concept of the idea family

 Robert Walton – sea-captain/explorer who wants to find a passage way through the North Pole to the Pacific Ocean; passion for knowledge; prepared to go to any length to achieve his goal; extension of F; passionate about voyages and discoveries; childhood similar to F – both loved books and passionate about their goals; tend not to learn from their mistakes; willing to sacrifice human life for discovery – illustrative of epic hero; desires glory and conquest and immortality; hubris (belief that he can be equal to a god) and invincible; chosen by destiny to complete this journey

 Agatha DeLacey – sweet girl

 Felix DeLacey – marries Safie after he helps her deceitful Moslem father escape from France

 Safie – loves Felix; is a Christian; breaks free from father

 Justine Moritz – adopted child of Caroline; tried and found guilty of murder of William

 Margaret Walton Saville – sister of Robert who gets his letters; same initials as the author Theme concepts:  playing God; creation belongs in the hands of God not man  science as Savior  prophetic statement against the pride that accompanies technological and scientific knowledge  science as a replacement for spirituality  the problem is not with science but with the character of those who wield it; ie. atomic power – can be used for either good or evil – rests upon the assumption that we have at our disposal the critical sensibility to know which is which  science as the panacea for all evil, regardless of the evil it brings with it  creation or birthing of new life minus woman  ambition and the emotional cost it exacts – not criticizing ambition but the misapplication of it  judgment based on externals; inability of society to accept those who are different, regardless of their inner beauty  virtue of friendship  lack of love between parent and child/creator and creature  overreaching –the superman who breaks through normal human limitations to defy the rules of society and infringe upon the realm of God; F – compares himself to Satan – like Satan, though regretting the result of his effort is not ashamed of having made the effort in the first place  inevitability of atoning for one’s sins and the kind of suffering that atonement entails – one must always pay for one’s cruelty and pay w/the one thing that one holds most dear (first seen in Justine’s history)  what are the checks and balances of “creating” in isolation, w/o a moral motivation or a community of support?  dangerous knowledge – pursuit of knowledge without regard for consequences  sublime nature – a source of unrestrained emotional experience for the individual initially offers the character the possibility of spiritual renewal  seemingly godless universe where science and technology have gone awry  the darkness of man in a fallen sate, separated from God and seeking communion and understanding  the power to inspire love for the untouchable; teaches us how fallen we are and how we must love one another, despite all our sins and crimes in order to live through the world and maintain the humanity which the monster could not only not find in himself, but which he smothered in those around him with their fear and violence  isolation – Victor’s – a moral isolation chosen by him b/c of his obsession; creatures b/c of his hideousness

Style/Form:  Epistolary – story written in the form of letters, or letters with journals  Frame story  Gothic novel – grotesque, mysterious and remote settings which evoke fear; eerie atmosphere; reliance on fantastic and supernatural (often overrides inconsistencies within the details of the plot); overcoming the limits of mortality; a movement away from classical order and toward imagination and feeling, a development that ran parallel to the romantic period  Romantic work  precursor of science fiction – 1) must be based on valid scientific research, 2) gives a persuasive prediction of what science might achieve in the future, and 3) offers a humanistic critique of the benefits and dangers of this scientific research  argument against the romanticism her idealistic husband

Structural analysis:  Letters from Robert to Margaret (probably added later at Percy’s insistence)  Frankenstein tells his version of the story (1 – 10)  The creature tells his story (11 – 16)  Frankenstein continues his story (17 – 24)  Letters from Robert to Margaret

Allusions:  Coleridge’s “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” – Robert promises not to kill any albatross – inferring that doing so would have grave consequences; like the ancient mariner, Robert begins as an inexperienced sailor but ends up a wiser man; the lonely wanderer would appeal to the lonely creature; F –has a deadly weight handing round his neck – he desires to create – not relate to others  Milton’s Paradise Lost – a touchstone for the creature to try to understand his identity; he compares himself to both Adam and Satan – both human and demonic; creature is between to realms; creature confused as to whether he is Adam – destined ultimately for eternal grace, or Satan – doomed to eternal darkness; theme of creation; the reproaches made by the creature also echo those made by Satan in PL  Biblical – theme of the outcast and the story of creaion; creature is bitter and dejected after being turned away from civilization; Adam caused his own fate – creature didn’t have the choice

Symbols (objects, characters, figures, or colors used to represent abstract ideas or concepts):  fire – creature sets fire to the cottage – unleashing the fire w/in - fire of malignancy; dangerous weapon – spreads quickly and is uncontrollable; creature in a combustible state; good and bad  light – symbolizes knowledge, discovery, and enlightenment; illuminates, clarifies; it is essential for seeing and seeing is the way to knowledge; it can also blind; warm and ignite a dangerous flame  marriage – inclusion in society  blasted tree – split down the middle, severed from its roots and unable to register sensations – what Frankenstein has become as opposed to a whole tree – a living organism that branches and spreads itself widely Key words/influences:  Frankenstein means literally the stone of the Franks – castle erected for the Baron Von Frankenstein in Germany  Darwin – biologist – grandfather of Darwin; considered the finest doctor of his time in England; produced many inventions; influential in literary circles  galvanism – the re-animating of a corpse from electricity; Luigi Galvani – argued that electricity was the life force and conducted experiments with electricity through dead animals; nephew performed electric experiment on body of recently hanged criminal (dead only one hour at 30 degrees F – body twitched, muscles moved  Romanticism - primacy of feeling, importance of nature – seeking solace in nature; the individual and his quest, the supernatural and the exotic, solitude; importance of friendships – Victor and Robert, Victor and Henry; opposite nature of love – Elizabeth and Victor; fascination with death; plight of innocent with an system of injustice; belief in man’s basic goodness; reaction to Enlightenment; inspired by the revolutions in American and France; championed progressive causes; intensity and imagination – key words  Paracelsus, Agrippa, and Albertus Magnus – natural scientists who were not well regarded; alchemists – who wanted to produce gold from metals  doppleganger – mirror image of self; Creature and creator are different sides of the same human personality – F – represents the feelings and creature – the intellect – they are the antithesis of each other; device used in Gothic literature; F becomes the monster he created – each driven by revenge and remorse; F – is the mind and emotions turned in upon themselves, and his creature is the mind and emotions turned imaginatively outwards, seeking a greater humanization through a confrontation of other selves; Walton and F – both sin against the moral and social order; both begin pursuit with benevolent intentions (which become misguided pride – a selfish pursuit aimed at self-glory because it evades the fulfillment of higher duties toward the social community , the brotherhood of man which forms the highest good), each discovers his error in assuming that knowledge is a higher good than love or sympathy;  foil – someone whose traits or actions contrast with, and thereby highlight those of another character – Walton to Victor – Walton is either not obsessive enough to risk almost certain death or not courageous enough to allow his passion to drive him  Shelley’s dream 12 days after first baby’s death (2/1815) – Dream that my little baby came to lie again – that it had only been cold and that we rubbed it before the fire and it lived?  noble savage/primitivism– creature – tests the world with its natural impulses and unsophisticated reasoning and responds to it with a mixture of bewilderment and dismay; embodiment of a dream; acts with a nostalgic frame of reference in that he combine both intellect and sensibility the supposed reconciliation of innocence; a belief in man’s natural goodness, and in the inevitable corruptions of civilization – ideas which were continued in the Romantic movement Motifs (recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes):  passive women – seen in all female characters; esp. seen in Frankenstein’s destruction of the female creature – he ensures her passivity  abortion  deaths – they proceed in terms of increasingly important relationship for Victor – child, peer, closest male peer, closer female peer, finally father – the ultimate bond – die in alphabetical order – William-Justine-Henry-Elizabeth-Alphonse

Rejected child:  Mary watched Baxter family as creature watched DeLacy family  Shelley identified with the rejected child  Creature and author lack a mother and have distant fathers  Creature realizes that he will be alone forever; this pain evokes the anger and desire for revenge that abandonment and isolation can produce

Romanticism critique:  Shelley questions Romantics desire to transform mortals into godlike creatures; perfect mankind, and locate the divine in the human  commitment to Romantic utopian meant a rejection of present resp.

Feminist interpretation;  what happens when a man tries to have a baby without a woman  Shelley’s deepest fear – what if my child is born deformed – could I still love it?  F total failure as a parent; labored 9 months to give birth to his creation; F’s inability/willingness to accept resp. for creation contrasted with fathers in his family and DeLacey family.  If Frankenstein succeeded, then no need for the female in reproduction; eliminate the biological need for women; human could survive with males alone; ties into the devaluation of women during this time.  All the women associated with F die  Why Frankenstein kills the woman creature – fears that the woman he constructed might be independent – refuse to obey laws she doesn’t make; she would have the ability to reproduce  Shelley not upset with his attempt to usurp the power of the gods but in his attempt to usurp the power of women as he seeks to combine the role of both parents in one – to eliminate the need for woman in the creative act  sense of guilt on Shelley’s part and a reproach against her husband for his disregard of the emotional and physical needs of a pregnant woman – Percy sought other women for comfort throughout their marriage

* - notes taken from NLCs, Critical Survey of Long Fiction, DBLB, and various web sites