Mary Shelley & Frankenstein:

Introduction/Context

“The Modern Prometheus”• Prometheus

– In Greek mythology, he was a titan who created man in the image of the gods

– Stole the gift of fire from Mt. Olympus and gave it to man

– Punished by Zeus and chained to a rock on a mountain. Every day for 30 years, Zeus’ eagle would eat his liver

Based on our knowledge of Prometheus, what

predictions can we make about the novel?

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley• Daughter of two of England’s

leading intellectual radicals.

– Her father, William Godwin, was

an influential political philosopher

and novelist.

– Her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft,

the author of A Vindication of the

Rights of Woman, was a pioneer in

promoting women’s rights and

education.

• Her future husband, the admired poet Percy B. Shelley,

was one of her father’s frequent visitors.

• When she was sixteen, she and Percy eloped to France.

• She gave birth to four children in five years, three of

whom died as infants—rumored that her children were

in mind in creating Frankenstein

• Percy died eight years later, due to a boating accident.

When?

In the summer of 1816, 19 year old Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin and her lover, the poet Percy Shelley, visited the Lord Byron at his villa beside Lake Geneva in Switzerland.

The MotivationStormy weather frequently forced them indoors, where they and Byron's other guests sometimes read from a volume of ghost stories. One evening, Byron challenged his guests to each write one themselves. Mary's story, inspired by a dream, became Frankenstein.

• For days Shelley couldn’t think of an idea, but then

heard Lord Byron and Percy discussing the

probability of using electricity to create life

artificially, according to a theory called galvanism, an

idea began to grow in her mind.

The next day she started work on Frankenstein. A year later,

she had completed her novel. It was published in 1818,

when Shelley was nineteen years old.

The Baby and The Dream

Mary’s daughter Clara had died.

Mary dreamed that her daughter was brought back to life through vigorous rubbing and being held near a warm fire.

This inspired her to write Frankenstein.

Mary’s Contest Submission

• Not intended to be a tale of the supernatural – she even made her main character a scientist so that his building of a man would seem logical.

• Was a combo of Gothic elements and science

• Might be considered early sci-fi

Society’s Influence: Educational

Theories of the 1800sNature vs. Nurture

• John Locke’s Essay Concerning Human

Understanding (1690) argued that a child is

a “blank slate” (tabula rasa) that is formed

only through experience.

• Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s’ Emile, or On

Education (1762) promotes the idea that a

child’s upbringing is responsible for his

nature.

Other Historical Events

• 1789—Start of the French Revolution; British were happy that French were trying to rid themselves of an absolute monarchy and common people were standing up for themselves. They, however, became disillusioned with bloodshed and the common leaders who turned to tyrants themselves.

• 1793-1794 French Reign of Terror

• 1804 Napoleon crowned Emperor

Romanticism• 1798-1865

• Movement contrary to Enlightenment and

Industrialization which emphasized how man’s

reason and logic can improve society—science

and reason

• Emphasized the importance of the individual,

subjectivity, imagination, and expression of

emotions

• During this time of bloodshed and turmoil,

Romantic writers were turning to nature as an

escape from the harsh realities of the world.

• Nature was a place where human tyrannies did

not exist or reign.

• During the Romantic period, a

journey to find one’s self through

nature, isolation, and meditation

• Natural science should lead to

discovery

• Could be a physical journey or a

mental, psychological, or spiritual

one

The Romantic Quest

Writing Style:

Elements of the Gothic Novel

• Setting in a castle

• An atmosphere of

mystery and suspense

• An ancient prophecy

• Omens, portents,

visions

• Supernatural or

otherwise inexplicable

events

• High, even

overwrought emotion

• Women in distress

• Women threatened by a

powerful, impulsive,

tyrannical male

• Metonymy of gloom

and horror

• Vocabulary of the

gothic

In Frankenstein, Shelley adds a psychological component by delving into

the psyches of the characters in an attempt to explain why they react as

they do and what drives them to make their decisions.

What was Science Up to at this

Point?

During Mary’s time,

scientists and physicians

were fascinated by the

elusive boundary between life

and death.

Experimented with lower

organisms, performed human

anatomical studies,

attempted to resuscitate

drowning victims, and

performed experiments using

electricity to restore life to

the recently dead.

The Structure of the StoryThe novel is constructed of three concentric layers, one within the other:

A Framework Narrative

– outermost--Robert Walton's letters to his sister (MWS);

– middle--Frankenstein's story as he tells it to Walton;

– innermost--Monster's description to Frankenstein of the development of his mind at the deLaceys’

Allusion-Indirect reference to a person, place, thing or idea

of historical, cultural, literary, or political significance

Main allusions in Frankenstein:

•Prometheus (Greek myth)- Gods made man out of clay;

creation gave humans fire; Punished by Gods

•Paradise Lost (John Milton)- creation of Adam and Eve;

lost place in Garden of Eden by eating forbidden

fruit/being tempted by Satan (extension of story in The

Bible—Book of Genesis)

•The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (Samuel Taylor

Coleridge)-sailor kills an albatross; learns (through

spiritual and supernatural events) to respect the sea

(natural world); disregard for nature and tradition leads to

demise

Allusions Continued:

• Cornelius Agrippa: German mystic and alchemist. Lived 1486-

1535, and best known for his writings defending “hidden

philosophy” or magic, drawing on diverse mystical traditions such

as alchemy, astrology, and Kabbalah and fusing them with

scientific study.

• Adam and Eve: biblical story about the original human couple

(“parents” of the human race). God created Adam, gave him the

Garden of Eden, and created Eve so Adam wouldn’t be lonely.

• Paracelsus: Swiss physician, alchemist, and astronomer of the

German Renaissance. Pioneer in the “medical revolution” of the

time, and felt the university did not teach all things, so he sought

out other mystical solutions to answer questions

• Albertus Magnus: German Catholic friar and bishop well known

for his writings on philosophy and alchemy; referred to as a

magician, and said to have found the philosopher’s stone.

Monstrosity

• The monster is only the most literal of a number of monstrous entities in the novel, including the knowledge that Victor used to create the monster.

• One can argue that Victor himself is a kind of monster, as his ambition, secrecy, and selfishness alienate him from human society. Ordinary on the outside, he may be the true “monster” inside, as he is eventually consumed by an obsessive hatred of his creation.

• Finally, many critics have described the novel itself as monstrous, a stitched-together combination of different voices, texts, and tenses.

Ready to read what some call the first major science fiction novel...the book that established the genre of horror fiction?