Frank was so skilled at flying kites always in control of them just like he tries to control everything else. But one day he decides to kill yet another family member, without even thinking about what he was actually doing. Having killed two of his male relatives as a child himself, his motive for killing “poor little Esmerelda,” a cousin whom he confessed he liked, was simply to even out the balance of men to women in the world. Here Banks shows the reader the clash of Frank’s personalities; such a complex mind, doing things others wouldn’t dare, yet such simplicity in the way he carries out his decisions without thinking twice. That morning when he was alone with his cousin to play, Frank had prepared a kite “bigger than ever before” made of thick planks of wood and metal that even he wasn’t able to control. Having planned it all out beforehand, he offers the kite to Esmerelda and gets her caught up in the strings, the kite taking her away. His thrill of power took him away in this scene and he used his control, his meticulous planning to make the kite do the opposite and go out of control; this is yet another contradiction of two opposites that Banks gives us on the idea of control.
The dams that Frank builds, although at the time causing no real harm show the readers what Frank’s about. Having warmed to him through a light hearted activity that one can relate to, you go off him instantly when he turns even a fun game everybody’s done to a way of controlling death. Having put the effort into building the structures, creating yet again another of his “own little worlds” and playing God, Banks puts in our head the imaginary people Frank is thinking of being destroyed by the sea water that comes flooding in. Here Frank gets to decide the people’s fate, their destiny; destiny being an idea which Frank himself is so keen on. Then he gets to decide whether to save them or let them fall with the walls of the dam at the hands of the sea, the one thing in the world Frank feels is as powerful as him.
Frank controls everything on the island and feels most comfortable when he’s there, but surrounding his island is the sea. The sea being the most powerful thing in the world is something that Frank considers his rival, together with him at the top of a chain of power that he is, in fact, far nearer the bottom than he thinks at first. The oceans is not fixed and so is the one being that Frank can never contain, control or measure. At one in the book he even claims a victory, a small one but nonetheless, a battle he feels he won. He manages to throw a bottle, washed up on his island, back out into the sea, and when it remained, “victory came over him.” Frank seems to believe here that the sea is purposefully trying to get one up on him as if it’s living and thinks about what its actions, which is an absurd thing for a human to think let alone a teenager.
But there are several instances where Frank does appear to be above humans and he certainly never acts like a teenager, always appearing older by the crimes he commits or younger through his perpetual childishness, building dams etc. For example in the middle of the story, Frank’s concern over Eric (his brother) overrides him and he soon feels the need to control him too. So he begins to search for the skull of Old Saul in order to contact and take control over Eric’s mind telepathically. It is one of many surreal moments in Banks’ novel but different to the others. While previously they all suggest he is just disgusting in every way as a child, this episode suggests that Frank is, in his own way different to humans and looking down on the human population.
He is so controlling and although this usually comes across to the reader in a tyrannical and evil way, his control does have its benefits. Frank as a person is very meticulous just like his father and plans everything to every last detail getting nothing wrong. And even more beneficial is the responsibility he takes to himself, as seen near the start when he is trying to mark his territory, peeing on the sacrifice poles. Frank cuts himself when he falls, but he’s prepared as he had brought with him a first aid kit something most teenage boys wouldn’t think about. He is almost playing the mum that he never really had and a mum is something he ends up being much closer to being than he would’ve liked. Girls at his age tend to be more mature and responsible and meticulous and Frank in the end was a girl maybe explaining all of that kind of behaviour.
My final and perhaps most influential point on Frank’s controlling is about the wasp factory, his very own death chamber where he can control once again the fate/destiny of another of his created worlds. The Factory gives him power and feeds his God complex and while Factory’s traditionally for making things, Frank’s is for destroying them another irony out of many contradictions Banks gives us to ponder. The “religion” that Frank creates here drives him forward as his subjects struggle and fight for freedom.
But Frank is not always in control in Banks’ book once again coming back to the contradictions Banks creates. In fact there are two main examples of Frank’s lack of control, one of which is voluntary. Despite always seeming in control on his beloved island, in both episodes when he leaves it, he is just like any other human. For all of his controlling behaviour When he goes to the pub on the mainland, we see him on the other side of control, out of it. In fact he drinks a lot deliberately and he wants to be out of control when he isn’t in his world, on his island. Banks has a few interesting points about Frank’s control outside his comfort zone and the second time he leaves is for the rabbit grounds, where once again Frank loses control and ends up being controlled… by a rabbit. The crazed rabbit, teeth “huge and yellow”… “The biggest he’d ever seen” was eventually killed by Frank but in the process he lost his most prized weapon, “the Black Destroyer”.
Frank, however, is not alone in controlling in the Cauldhame household. It is in fact Angus, Frank’s dad, where the compulsive and controlling behaviour begins. He is the one who begins a chain of God complexes, and although it may not have been through quite such sinister actions like animal sacrifice we are told at the beginning that all of the furniture is marked by measurements and even the leaves have been marked in pencil so Angus can constantly monitor their growth. So although Frank sees this as a pointless obsession, it runs through his veins too.
And it’s not just measurements Angus is keen to keep a close eye on. Throughout Banks’ novel, Angus is obsessed with having the edge on his son Frank. Whether it be through teaching him lies to retain a higher knowledge level or just lying about knowing exactly what he’s drinking through the smell of Frank’s wind, Angus always has a need to retain his place at the head of the hierarchy. Through calling the barman to discover Frank’s purchases, teaching him ridiculous word meanings and keeping a lock on his study door, Angus was able to keep his place of power right up to the final few pages when Frank finally discovered his real self. Throughout the whole book Frank is just his dad’s idea of a fun experiment in the same kind of way Frank’s wasps are to him.
We see Frank at the beginning seem to do anything he feels he wants without thinking, but can anybody make all their own choices? Can anyone do exactly what they want like Frank or do higher powers intervene? Both Frank and his dad try to be in control of everything below them but neither really is. Frank wants his own world but in the end can’t even be his own person, control his own gender. Banks suggest to us maybe free will never did exist and everybody is dominated by something higher than them, whether it’s conscience, or another God, the real one. And by the end you really end up understanding the hierarchy of God complexes that Banks has presented us with develop. Frank rules his wasps as their God while he ends up being his dad’s very own wasp to experiment on. Are any of us in control or we all just one big bunch of God’s wasps in a factory designed for his satisfaction?