The characteristics of Frankenstein’s monster:
The monster’s feelings throughout the story turns from confusion and sadness, to feelings of revenge and in the end hatred.
The monster was “born” into the world as innocent as any child, and is at first unaware of the effect his appereance has on people. His first attempts to contact his creator fails, and he is rejected harshly, and is left alone. Confused and sad, not knowing who he is, he heads for the mountains, where there are no people to judge him and flee from him. His only wish is to have friends and companions, but he is afraid of rejection and spends his time in a hovel. He then finds a cottage, where the De Lacy family lives, and begins to spy on then, and slowly learning their language. His wish to be accepted and seen as human, comes to show is this particular desire, the search of an identity and a sense of belonging. One day he collects his courage and enters the cottage, where the old, blind man De Lacey is left alone. They talk, and the monster tells about his trouble with some friends, who will not know of him, and the old man does not realise that he is talking about himself and his children. But at the very moment, the old man’s children returns and sees the monster and he is chased away.
He then roams the forrest, screaming with misery, feeling that he has missed his last chance to be accepted as a human being. He wishes he was dead, feels that the world is mocking him and that he is the only one, who is not loved and cared for in the entire world. He declares war against the species and especially the man who created him. This shows us, that Frankenstein’s monster’s biggest wish really is to be accepted, and when denied this, he goes completly berserk, not wanting to face the facts that are being presented to him. We can also tell, that he has a lot of selfpity, and a great understanding of the unfairness of his situation. But the next day he goes back, because deep inside he still has hope, and he convinces himself, that last nights incident was just too much too early. When arriving at the cottage he discovers that the family has moved, and his last shred of hope disapprears, and he burns down the cottage, and heads for Genevé, to find his creator, so he can take revenge.
He feels treated unfairly by Frankenstein, and calls him his “cursed, cursed creator”, but his need to find him is understandable. He wants to know where he comes from and he wants answers, which is a natural thing for any child, who is not in touch with its roots. On his way he saves a girl from drowning, but gets shot instead of being thanked, and this makes his feelings towards humans more intense.
When in Genevé, he captures a young boy, who turns out to be Frankenstein’s son. He kills him and sets a young girl up for the murder. His reason for doing this is clear: he wants to inflict pain upon Frankenstein. His reason for setting the girl up for the murder is, in his own words, because he is forever robbed of what she could have given him, because of his cursed apperenace.
But she gives him an idea. He wants Frankenstein to make him a bride, someone of his own species, as horrible and deformed as himself, so that he will have companionship, which is what he wants more than everything else.
The main characteristic of Frankenstein’s creation, is the longing for acceptance and company, this we can tell by his approces to first his creator and later to other people, and the facts that he has feelings and intelligence. He wants nothing more than to live a normal life, and he curses his creator for making it impossible for him to do that. In the beginning he is not evil, he does not want to kill, but the actions of the humans around him, make him the monster that Frankenstein thought him to be. He feels that humans are the most decietful of species, because they build up your hopes, and tear them back down again. His hunger for revenge is born from the constant defeat he experiences from day to day and especially from the one person who is supposed to love him, his creator, who also denies him a mate. He carries a lot of frustration, that he needs to direct somewhere, and the choice falls upon Frankenstein, the first to ever betray him.
Despite all of this, Frankenstein’s monster never gives really gives up his hope to find a place to belong. This comes to show in the way that he treats the girl he meets in the woods, Frankenstein’s son, and in the very end of the story, when Frankenstein himself dies. The monster begs for forgiveness and swears to kill himself. His will to live died with Frankenstein, his only connection to the human world, that he longed for so desperatly.
Comparative analasys:
Frankenstein and his creation are similar to each other in different aspects.
Frankenstein has created a thing so dreadful, that no one will ever love it, and has in another sense already killed all the possible loved ones in his creation’s life.
His monster, on the other hand, actually kills all the people Frankenstein holds most dear, continuing the evil circle.
The monster runs away from people and hides in the mountans, so that he will not experience any more pain, whilst Frankenstein runs away from the monster and his thought and feelings about his creation, but they both end up being drawn to one another, and the thing that bonds them together.
They are both, at some point, after revenge. The monster chases Frankenstein down to confront him and Frankenstein chases the monster, after it has killed his family. The hunter becomes the hunted.
They both have big dreams, Frankenstein about creating life and his creation about living life, but none of these dreams ever come true for any of them.
Sometimes it seems that Frankenstein and his monster are two halves of the same person, each half competing for the chance to be the ruler of the other half, or that the monster is the result of Frankenstein’s ego or conscience, that comes back to haunt him. They are forever bonded with each other, the bond of creator and creation, and Frankenstein’s unwillingness to accept this, leaves both mens’ lives ruined in the end.
Themes of the text
Invironment vs. heritage
The question is very relevant for this story. This novel can be a great starting point, if you wish to discuss, if heritage or the invironment has the greatest inpact upon someone, who is new in this world. In this story, it is defienetly the invironment that has the greatest influence upon Frankenstein’s creature. You could say that everyone is born with the same basic needs. The need for love, companionship and a place to belong. Nobody is born evil, niether is the creature, despite the fact, that he is death brought back to life. He has the same needs as everybody else, but the constant rejections of his well-intended feelings and his failures, changes him into something he did not have to become, changes him into what everybody thinks that he is; a monster. In this case, the invironment has destroyed something potentially beautiful.
Love and revenge:
The story is based upon the topic of love and revenge, in all its different forms.
The monster wants only to be loved and accepted in a society that rejects him because of his looks. This superficial society does not look beyond his scary appereance, and he swears that he will revenge himself, which he does to his fullest, killing everyone that Frankenstein holds dear. He claims to hate the human world at this point, but at the same time, he longs for it with an aching heart. Frankenstein never realises that his creation is more than a monster, and feels very little regret towards the treatment of it, he feels that it is more important to protect mankind against this “threat” than it is to take responsebility of his actions. He spends the rest of his life following the monster to the North Pole, where he dies on board a ship, never succeeding in revenging his loved ones.
When the monster discoveres this, he gives up; his last connection to the world has dissappeared, and he begs for forgiveness, and swears to burn himself and all evidence of his existence.
Frankenstein only felt love for his creation when it not yet excisted and was only in his mind. As soon as it came to life, he rejected it and never thought a kind thought about it again. The creation is here his opposite; he starts off only wanting to love, later wanting revenge, but with the hope of recieving love still deeply a part of his nature.
The modern Prometheus
Mary Shelley subtitles her novel, “The modern Prometheus”. Prometheus, an ancient Greek, stole fire from the gods, to give to the humans. As punishment for his undoing, he was chaining to a rock, and everyday a bird-of-prey would come and eat his liver, which would then grow back.
Mary Shelley did not chose this subtitle for no reason. It most certainly relates to Victor Frankenstein and his creation. Victor “stole” a power from God, the power to create life, and he is severly punished for this. His horrible creation comes back to haunt both his mind and his psysical being every day for the rest of his life. Victor’s “gift” to the world causes death, and the same does Prometheus’. Though both men meant well, their interference with forces beyond their power, brings only death and destruction, especially for the two men themselves.
Perspective to the period:
The novel was written during an early phase of the , at a time of dramatic advances in science and technology. The fact that the creation rebels against its creator, can be a warning from Mary Shelley, that science can lead to terrible consequences, if you do not take responsebility for your actions. This was a time, where young scientist felt, that the world was at their feet and that they had endless possibilities, and experiments to try and revive dead bodies did indeed take place when Mary grew up, and has most likely inspired her to write the story. This was also a time, were people were both facinated and scared by the new science of electricity, and Mary chose to include both this science and the science of chemistry, which was of high interest to the generel public and to herself, in her book.
Mary Shelley wrote her novel not long after the gothic novels heyday in the 1790’s, and there was definitely a market for these kind of stories.
It is hard to make a final conclusion of this book. There are so many topics and themes, questions and feelings to discuss, that it would take forever to get through them all, which makes this book more than just a horror story meant to frighten you. This is a novel of great seriousness, and you instantly get caught in the whirlwind of emotions, that Frankenstein and his creation both have. Mary Shelley tries in her book, to dissect the human nature, while telling a captivating tale of two mens’ journey through life, and the terrible things humans can do to one another.
