Frankenstein, Dracula and Science Fiction
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View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Research Commons Kutztown University Journal of Dracula Studies Volume 5 Article 1 2003 "A Race of Devils": Frankenstein, Dracula and Science Fiction Robert James Frost Birmingham University, England Follow this and additional works at: https://research.library.kutztown.edu/dracula-studies Part of the English Language and Literature Commons, Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, and the Film and Media Studies Commons Recommended Citation Frost, Robert James (2003) ""A Race of Devils": Frankenstein, Dracula and Science Fiction," Journal of Dracula Studies: Vol. 5 , Article 1. Available at: https://research.library.kutztown.edu/dracula-studies/vol5/iss1/1 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Research Commons at Kutztown University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of Dracula Studies by an authorized editor of Research Commons at Kutztown University. For more information, please contact [email protected],. "A Race of Devils": Frankenstein, Dracula and Science Fiction Cover Page Footnote Dr Robert James Frost studied at the Shakespeare Institute, Birmingham University, England. Since 1986 he has worked as a Lecturer in a London College where he has taught modules on Frankenstein and Dracula. This article is available in Journal of Dracula Studies: https://research.library.kutztown.edu/dracula-studies/vol5/ iss1/1 JOURNAL OF DRACULA STUDIES “A Race of Devils”: Frankenstein, Dracula, and Science Fiction R J Frost [Dr Robert James Frost studied at the Shakespeare Institute, Birmingham University, England. Since 1986 he has worked as a Lecturer in a London College where he has taught modules on Frankenstein and Dracula.] Victor Frankenstein has hidden himself away on one of the remote Orkney Islands, off the northeast coast of Scotland, where he is on the verge of creating a second monster – a She-creature. He has been working on the project for some time since he made his promise to the Creature to make him a mate, but now he is having second thoughts: Even if they were to leave Europe, and inhabit the new world, yet one of the first results of those sympathies for which the daemon thirsted would be children, and a race of devils would be propagated upon the earth, who might make the very existence of the species of man a condition precarious and full of terror. (160) An interesting idea for a Science Fiction sequel perhaps. But Mary Shelley’s novel takes a different direction when Victor destroys the unfinished She-creature and prepares himself instead to face the Creature’s wrath. Many of the motifs in Frankenstein (1818) resonate not only in Dracula, the most significant monster novel of the late nineteenth century, but also in the fin-de-siècle classic SF tale, H G Wells’s The War of The Worlds (1898). But first we need to examine how Mary Shelley deals with scientific ideas in Frankenstein and establishes the general outline that helps shape the later texts. In terms of genre, Frankenstein is generally considered a Gothic Horror novel. Indeed, it clearly owes much to the Gothic literary tradition of the eighteenth century dating back to Walpole’s Castle of Otranto (1764). But to pigeon-hole Shelley’s novel in this way is to understate how it anticipates Science Fiction. In Trillion Year Spree, Brian Aldiss argues the case for Mary Shelley as the first writer of SF. Now whether we agree that Shelley was the first, and not Swift for instance, is irrelevant here. Later SF writers such as Wells clearly exploited the model of Frankenstein, including the horror elements, in their own work. In essence Frankenstein’s claim to be SF rests on the way it represents the character of Victor Frankenstein as “The Modern Prometheus.” The Greek myth of the fire-thief and the terrible retribution of the gods certainly would have resonated with Shelley’s classically educated readers. But significantly, Victor is not a god; he is a scientist, a new type of protagonist in literature. Moreover the retribution Victor faces in the novel is not directed by the gods; it is the Creature who takes revenge on his creator. And what is the Creature but the symbol of scientific technology out of control and wreaking havoc? Thus we have the essential formula for subsequent writers of dystopian SF: a brilliant scientist invokes the powers of science, but fails to control the forces he has unleashed with dire consequences for himself and mankind, what Aldiss describes neatly as “Hubris clobbered by nemesis” (30). Victor is “the Modern Prometheus,” not because he breaks the laws of the gods and suffers divine retribution (a pious misreading of the novel which does not stand up to close scrutiny) but because he is presumptuous enough to think he can wield the god- like forces of science to conquer death and produce a new utopia. Of course the results lead to a tragic denouement with both the Creature and Victor facing destruction. 1 JOURNAL OF DRACULA STUDIES Let us turn now to a closer examination of Victor’s character as a scientist. Victor approaches science rather indirectly by way of alchemy and black magic. His intellectual curiosity is aroused by reading the works of Paracelsus, Cornelius Agrippa and Albertus Magnus. His father tells him these works are “sad trash” (38) but such is the influence of Victor’s liberal education, he is free to choose his own interests. He carries on reading these works in secret and, at the same time, becomes intrigued by Nature and its hidden laws. His fascination with the unknown is described in sexually charged language: “The most learned philosopher … had partially unveiled the face of Nature, but her immortal lineaments were still a wonder and a mystery” (39). Had Victor not been living during the Eighteenth Century Enlightenment he would have run the risk of serious charges for reading these banned books. The practice of witchcraft was punishable by hanging and burning at the stake. Two points emerge out of this. First of all, he is unable to share his interests with anyone; his studies take a direction of esoteric and secret inquiry. Secondly, the pursuit of knowledge is, in some ways, characterized by taboos and prohibitions. When Victor witnesses an electrical storm and sees an oak blasted by lightning, his interests take a new direction towards empirical observation. He starts to investigate the subjects of electricity and galvanism. All this eclipses Agrippa and the others. At this point Shelley seems to be emphasizing the importance of inspiration as well as reading and mental discipline. Victor could become a crank sorcerer or a serious scientist. But is the dichotomy really that clear-cut? In its way the sudden flash of “dazzling light” (40) which reduces the oak to a blasted stump is just as dangerous and ominous as the path of forbidden sorcery. The disturbing aspect to the lightning is that, far from being wielded by the hand of a vengeful Jupiter, it is a completely arbitrary manifestation of enormous destructive potential. Victor goes to the University of Ingolstadt to study Natural Philosophy, a catch-all term for the newly emerging branches of science including Physics, Biology and Chemistry. But on meeting his charismatic tutor, Waldman, the alchemists and sorcerers once again become the topic of conversation. Victor has at last discovered somebody sympathetic towards his esoteric interests. Waldman has no faith in the transmutation of base metals into gold nor the elixir of life per se; yet he respects those who did this as the early fathers of the modern techniques. He sounds what is a familiarly contemporary note of scientific caution when it comes to making claims about what science is capable of; however, as he warms to his theme he seems to get carried away with the “ardour” that fires Walton, Victor and Clerval elsewhere in the book. Waldman’s panegyric about “real” scientists depicts them as deus ex machina: “They ascend into the heavens: they have discovered how the blood circulates, and the nature of the air we breathe” (47). Victor now begins to attend lectures and embark on an arduous and methodical course of private research which leads, by slow degrees, to the discovery of the spark of life. He acquires an attic laboratory segregated from the rest of the house by stairs and a gallery, and locks himself away from human contact. He calls it “a cell” and he is, in some ways, imprisoned in it (53). His gregarious human instincts and love of Nature are stifled. The requirement for privacy is underlined by the very practical and prudent criterion that much of this research involves grave robbing and the desecration and mutilation of corpses. His need to work outside the law and suppress natural instinctive fears shows that science, to most people at that time, still was a black art. Working against the current of popular prejudice and ignorance, Victor can still identify with science as a heroic individual enterprise casting himself in the role of Prometheus pouring “a torrent of light into our dark world” (52). But it is in fact Victor who is forced to work in the dead of night by the light of a candle. This obsessive work takes a physical toll on him and, as his conception of the Creature magnifies in his mind to a giant of eight foot stature, his body shrinks and dwindles as if he is suffering from a wasting illness (55). While he embraces science, Victor never completely escapes from the supernatural. On the surface he shows the signs of belonging to a materialistic creed of science.