Analysis Of Mary Shelley 's ' Frankenstein '

Quote: He stated “I was seized by remorse and the sense of guilt, which hurried me away to a hell of intense tortures such as no language can describe…..I shunned the face of man; all sound of joy or complacency was torture to me; solitude was my only consolation–deep, dark, deathlike solitude.”(Page 88).

John Locke is one of the most influential Enlightenment thinkers and is famously known for asserting that all humans have natural rights. He also believed that humans are born with clean slates, and that the environment humans grow in, especially at a young age, has massive influences on aspects of their personalities, ideals, and motivations. Shelley was most definitely influenced by this claim when writing Frankenstein. As the reader, we can see the monster that Victor Frankenstein creates grow up alone, without guidance, and be formed by the experiences it is put through while trying to survive. Its emotions and beliefs throughout the book were merely a result of its experiences as it encounters the harsh reality of the world. Mary

Frankenstein thinks that everything is alright now, but Elizabeth has a premonition that the monster will return, and she warns her fiancé that she fears some harm is going to befall him. At the same time, during the entire village’s celebration, the father of the dead girl carries her lifeless body though the streets for all to see. The shock crowd stops its celebration, stunned and outraged over the death of Maria, and they demand justice from The Burgomaster (mayor) and local police. By nightfall, the angry mob has organized into torch carrying search parties to find the murderer. Frankenstein is determined to destroy the creature, and leads one of several groups looking for the monster, up the mountainous terrain.

Man changes all the time. His emotions, state in life, body figure and even peace of mind can change in a matter of moments. In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, one of the themes expressed repeatedly is the mutability of the state of man. Victor Frankenstein emotions and states of life change many times in this novel. Mary Shelley uses Victor Frankenstein to show the audience that the only thing that does not change is the fact that human beings are always changing. Some of these changes come by impulse other changes may come by changes in the surrounding environment.

Our society has a very acute perception of what is and what is not normal, predicated through our upbringing and life experiences. For instance, people are viewed as weird or foreign if they have a disability. Frankenstein by Mary Shelly is about a creature that is created by Victor Frankenstein. The creature wants to understand why he was made, what his purpose in life is and why he isn’t accepted by society; in order to fulfill these needs the creature try’s to connect with his creator Frankenstein. However, Frankenstein does not want to have any personal contact with the creature. Understandably, the creature wants to connect with Frankenstein because the creature sees Frankenstein as normal and wants to be like Victor. On the same front, Frankenstein does not want to connect with the creature because he views the creature as abnormal. As a result, the creature threatens Frankenstein and ends up killing most of Frankenstein’s family and friends to purposely hurt Frankenstein. Mary Shelly shows that despite someone’s power and knowledge, acceptance in society is not guaranteed.

Another illustration of the need of equality can be seen in the Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein in which the protagonist, Victor Frankenstein, spends his time in college reviving a corpse. Throughout the novel, the Monster is judged and is awfully mistreated based on his looks. For example, when the Monster tries to attain food by entering a hut, “the children [shriek]…[as] some [villagers] attack [him]” (Shelley 74). Due to the Monster’s appearances, the whole village immediately believes he was evil, which provokes them to attack. This is unfair treatment because the Monster was not even looking for a fight. Hence, this mistreatment validates that there is a need for equality regardless of one’s appearances. Nevertheless the monster

In the novel Frankenstein by Marry Shelley, it is apparent that a lack of knowledge along with an abundance of knowledge can lead to the destruction of relationships that are ideal for a happy life. The theme of corruption through knowledge is a recurring literary device throughout the novel. This corruption compels the reader to question whether or not it is beneficial to have the vast amount of knowledge that Victor has.

As written in Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, knowledge can be seen as dangerous power. This pursuit of wanting to know more can be seen throughout the story including Victor Frankenstein’s view of science and trying to create a human being. Also, his creature’s need to know more about the world around him and his thirst for a companion. This knowledge learned from their personal experiences can then be helpful in guiding Robert Walton with his path of danger as well. All of these factors play a part in discovering why knowledge when misused can be a dangerous tool.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein begins with a series of letters Captain Robert Walton has written to his sister Margaret Saville. The letters express Walton’s aspirations for his upcoming voyage to the North Pole. Throughout four messages, Walton describes his frustrations and triumphs leading to his impending journey. His most heart wrenching grievance is his inability to find companionship. In each letter, Walton is progressively farther along in his journey, and, in the fourth and final letter, Walton and his men have been trapped in ice for several days when they encounter a stranger stranded at sea. The men welcome the stranger aboard the ship, and Walton personally sees to the man’s recovery. As the two men spend time together, Walton

The definition of success often varies from person to person. To Victor Frankenstein, his version of success entails to earning widespread recognition and praise from achieving something that no one else prior has accomplished; the act of bestowing life into an inanimate object. Mary Shelley’s classic story of Frankenstein commendably demonstrates the idea that, in trying to rise above others, those who dream of glory can easily turn a blind eye to the consequences. This is seen in Frankenstein’s obsession with completing his initial goal, his unpreparedness in dealing with the monster, and in his inability to take responsibility for the consequences afterwards.

“Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos; the materials must, in the first place, be afforded: it can give form to dark, shapeless substances, but cannot bring into being the substance itself.”(Mary Shelley)

In the book Frankenstein by Mary Shelley her most evolved character is the creature because of his upbringing and having to learn on his own with no guidance. The creature evolved through his baby stage with no father figure from Victor Frankenstein. To his adolescence stage with the Delacey family who did not accept him. This ultimately led to his destructive stage where he was tired of being alone and being an outcast. The creature wanted to be accepted into society but because of the outer form of his being and the reactions from others caused him to become the monster Victor claimed him to be.

There are many critical analyses to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Two of these analyses bring forth varied interpretations. Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar wrote “Mary Shelley’s Monstrous Eve.” Anne K. Mellor wrote “Possessing Nature: The Female in Frankenstein.” Gilbert and Gubar argue that Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein from the influence of her family in order to represent her personal life and life events. Mellor argues that the author wrote Frankenstein in order to represent many themes upon the subject of feminism. “Mary Shelley’s Monstrous Eve” is a better interpretation of Frankenstein over “Possessing Nature: The Female in Frankenstein” due to the more relevant and obvious facts such as family influence and tragic life events versus assumptions used by Anne K. Mellor.

When one looks upon something, they typically see only the most immediately visible aspects of the object. Take a painting for example. Let us say that this painting is a fairly faithful representation of the Hudson River. When the viewer gazes upon this work, that is what they will see (provided of course that they are familiar with the landmark). What the average observer might fail to realize however, are the influences upon the work, or how the political climate the artist experience might have be visible, or to take it a level deeper, the chemical composition of the paints and the technical limitations and techniques that contributed to the creation of the complete image. While an uninformed audience might judge the work based off of

After almost two hundred years of adaptations, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein has been virtually lost to pop culture references and mutations in story through film and other forms of media. All the different changed of the story has actually taken the original story of its As a result of so many different stories, all that is left is totally different version of the original creature. Shelley in her version of the book, looks at familial morality, man as God, and awareness that creator has responsibility for his own creation. Shelley’s does not put a name in the book for the monster, but for example, she shows the monster’s rejection from his creator. Everyone in this time thinks the monster’s name is Frankenstein. This issue is that it removes the author’s purpose to leave the monster nameless, which is ignoring the fact that he is nameless for a reason that is important to the novel. The transformation of the monster through cultural issues and changes has made the original monster forgotten, and has changed into an unrecognizable creature through all the stories changes. The first stage of change in the early nineteenth century to the parodies of the mid 1970s and early 1990s, the novel’s monster had been forgotten underneath many different changes.