Shelley, Mary - Frankenstein (6)

Frankenstein (Mary Shelly 1818)

The plot:
-is simple, Frankenstein, a Swiss scientist try to create a man combining parts selected from other corpses,
-the result of experiment is ugly and revolting,
-the monster become a murderer and in the end he kills his creator;

The origin of the model:
Probably “Frankenstein” is born from:
-Mary’s anxieties about her role of mother;
-the death that surrounded her life;
-also from other ghost stories;

Influences:
-historical background (the age of revolution with the theme of social justice and with the personification, in the monster of the age of revolution)
-science, she reads a lot of scientific books and she was very interested in chemistry, evolutionism and electricity, and she knew the latest scientific theories, (the monster is the result of science that is a key of the story;)
-Rousseau (the monster is the typical man of the state of nature, not influenced by civilization)
-the taste of gothic (although this novel doesn’t respect the tradition: there isn’t a castle and there aren’t supernatural events)
-romantic poems like Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

Narrative structure:
-the story is not told chronologically
-this novel is told by different narrators that inform different characters giving different points of view, according to this chronological scheme: Walton to his sister, Frankenstein to Walton, Monster to Frankenstein.
-the form of the novel is epistolary, Mary Shelly wanted to disguise her voice behind male narrators.

Themes:
-the research of forbidden knowledge;
-the overreacher (in Walton and Frankenstein);
-the double (Frankenstein and the monster seem to be two parts of the same being, in anticipation of Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Stevenson),
-social injustice;
-the usurpation of female and god’s roles (the creation of a man become possible without the participation of women and god);
-scientific actions (of Frankenstein);

The double:
the three most important characters are all linked to the theme of double
-Walton is a double of Frankenstein (because they have the same ambition of overcoming human limits);
-Frankenstein is the double of his creature (because they both suffer from a sense of alienation and isolation, both have the desire to be good but become observed with hate, the creature is the negative self of the scientist)

What the monster represents:
-the monster symbolizes the fear of technology and the repercussions of man “playing God”, it represents the product of the industrialization that can gives bad results;
-It may be a symbol of the outcast from society: the weak the poor the dispossessed and a comment on the way that society treats them.
-It may be a symbol of human nature;
-It may be a symbol of the parent child relationship;