The story predicts the future uses of man’s ever growing scientific knowledge, to further preserve life and, in the most extreme cases, actually create new life artificially. It tells the tale of Frankenstein’s experiments and his eventual success in creating a new human man from the body parts of other dead people. The new human, however, becomes a “monster”, killing the innocent in his search for understanding. The resulting situations and moral debates are ones that are still under scrutiny today, as the technology that Mary Shelley wrote of is approaching fast.
Mary Shelley sub-titled her book “The Modern Prometheus”. Prometheus was a Greek demi-god who, according to legend, granted man the gift of fire. I think it is a very apt likening as the ability to raise the dead would cause much the same benefits and problems on such grand scales as fire has done. Frankenstein was essentially like Prometheus in this sense. Neither Frankenstein nor Prometheus wanted to cause pain or suffering but did so indirectly.
The characters that Mary Shelley created for her story are one of the reasons why it is so popular. Their personalities, views on Frankenstein’s work and evolving attitudes give rise to interesting and thought provoking scenarios throughout the story. They are detailed and well-documented characters and Mary Shelley describes and animates them very well.
Frankenstein’s monster is a very odd character. The reader is made to pity and hate him at different points throughout the story. At birth he is ridiculed and shunned away, which leads him to murdering innocent people in his attempts to understand what he is and how he should exist. He is not naturally a bad person, it is his surroundings and experiences that mould him into what he is and drives him to seek revenge on those who had treated him so badly, in whatever ways he could. By the standards of the author’s time, the reactions of those who came into contact with the monster would be perfectly acceptable and normal. It is only today that we would feel it necessary to get to get to know the person before making such harsh judgements, but that is only after we have become adjusted to seeing disabled and disfigured people in everyday life. Still, however, there is a natural and occasionally deliberate tendency to treat people who appear differently not as equals in today’s society. There is either a deliberate lack of communication and involvement or an over attentiveness to palm to the person’s every need, thus reducing their feeling of independence and their ability to physically care for themselves.
The monster is called “the monster” during the course of the story because he is not named by Frankenstein before things start getting out of hand. “He never gave me a name” is one of the most famous lines from the book and represents how the monster is anonymous. As one of the two central roles in the story, the monster and his actions occupy the majority of the plot. I think this is where the typical monster portrayal as a source of action comes from.
Frankenstein the scientist is a very strange character. Like the monster, the reader is made to feel different things for Frankenstein at different stages. This is possibly one reason why the book is so popular, because it has no clear cut “goody” and “baddy”. Frankenstein, after the death of his mother, becomes obsessed with his work towards resurrecting the dead. He questions the principles and practice of the doctors who teach him at medical school, never taking no for an answer. His enthusiasm leads him to meet with the professor, who had also believed that bringing back the dead was possible. After the death of the professor Frankenstein finds his notes on his research and continues the project himself. Frankenstein is completely preoccupied with his work during the story, even coming close to giving up Elizabeth in order to complete it at one point. He works hard and diligently to achieve his goal, to eventually bring back his dead friends and relatives. Frankenstein’s interaction with the monster is one of mutual understanding and one that his family and friends can not understand. He refuses to disclose to them the nature of the monster and how he brought it about, thus excluding himself slightly from them. In the end he becomes intoxicated with his emotions after the death of his fiancé and seeks nothing but to destroy the monster, essentially his lifetime’s work, and to end the suffering he has indirectly caused.
Elizabeth, Frankenstein’s fiancé, trusts and believes Frankenstein unconditionally for most of the story. It is through her support that Frankenstein finds the will to continue in the face of such adversary. She has grown up alongside Frankenstein after being adopted into the family as Frankenstein’s sister. They decide to get married after Frankenstein returns from his university education, and all seems happy and well at the start.
The story follows the three main stages of most plots quite distinctly, a beginning of equilibrium, then a middle of disruption and finally ending with calm. This leaves the reader with a cathartic feeling at the end of the story, a feeling that mostly, everything has been resolved.
The main theme throughout the book is the recurring morality and questioning of Frankenstein’s work. The actions of each character are brought under scrutiny and judged by others as well as the reader, leading to a sort of relationship between the reader and whichever character the reader has chosen to side with, as if that character were the reader’s voice in the story.
The location and settings used throughout the story aid the reader’s idea of what the situation is like and the emotions of the characters. Each setting has it’s own effects and has a pathetic fallacy that lends itself very well to help convey the image the author wanted to impress. The mountain setting when the monster and Frankenstein decide to make a wife for the monster creates a tension in itself.
The issues that the story raises question the morals of human society. Frankenstein’s creation of the monster brings into judgement man’s involvement with nature’s creations and is more applicable presently than it probably was at the time it was originally written. This is also a major factor of the text’s continued popularity, the fact that the conflicting views and situations that the story presents become more and more applicable to modern day events.
The empathy of the story is very involving. Our emotions change regarding the various characters very quickly, for example, the reader is made to hate the monster when he murders Frankenstein’s brother but then pity him when you are made to realise the magnitude of pain he has suffered.
The structure of the story keeps the reader guessing right until the end. The story starts with Frankenstein in the arctic describing the past events to Captain Walton, so you know vaguely how the story ends but are unsure how it gets there. Captain Walton is like Frankenstein in his own way in as such that he is willing to sacrifice his crew in order to be remembered as the first man to reach the North Pole. It is through Frankenstein’s story that he realises the extent of what the is doing as sees that the lengths he is willing to go to are not acceptable or justified at all. This culminates two stories, that of Frankenstein’s adventure and Captain Walton’s giving the reader an increased feeling of cathagy.
In conclusion, the two reasons I believe to be why Frankenstein has remained such a popular text are:
- That the central theme of the story and the issues and situations the arise throughout it are becoming more and more relevant in everyday society so people can relate to the story and
- That it is the first true science fiction story ever and so has been promoted as such that it has grabbed everyone’s attention. There are probably a number of stories quite similar and perhaps of even better quality than Mary Shelley’s work but few people have heard of them and so they remain in Frankenstein’s shadow.
