Mary Shelley’s

FRANKENSTEIN

1945

The original title was

Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus. Prometheus was a mythological Titan stole fire from Zeus to help the mortals on earth. Zeus punished him by bounding him to a rock where during the day an eagle ate his liver which grew back at night. Man was punished by making a man marrying Pandora who opened her vase dispersing all evils on earth.

Another version of this mythis that Prometheus actuallycreated a human being by breathing life into a clay body.

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The author, Mary Shelley, was born Mary Wollstonecraft in London in 1797 and died in 1851 at the age of 54 from a brain tumor.

M. Shelley was 19 years old when she wrote this Gothic novel in 1816. At the time she was married to a poet, Percy Shelley, who helped her with its editing process.

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She wrote the novel one summer during a vacation at Lake Geneva in Switzerland with her husband and some friends.

The weather was unseasonably cold. For entertainment, Mary Shelley, her husband (poet) Percy Bysshe Shelley, (poet) Lord Byron, and Jane Clairmont would sit around reading ghost stories.

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On June 15th 1816, a challenge was issued among the four of them to see who could write the most terrifying ghost story.

Mary Shelley based her story on her life experiences, her dreams, and scientific research and experiments of that time period.

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Mary Shelley had previously suffered with nightmares in 1815 after her daughter died two weeks after birth.

Repeatedly Mary dreamt her baby was just cold, and that she herself brought her daughter back to life after massaging the infant’s lifeless body while sitting next to a warm fire.

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On June 15th 1816, Mary experienced a different nightmare in which she dreamt, “a pale student of ‘unhallowed* arts’who created a living being from dead parts.” (Frankenstein p.x)

*unhallowed: against what is considered holy and sacred; immoral and unethical according to social standards

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That dream was the basis for her gothic story. Ironically, Mary Shelley was the only one out of the group to finish her tale of terror.

Mary Shelley’s gothic novel was published in 1818 when she was just 21. She went on to publish other works, but none of them ever matched the popularity of FRANKENSTEIN.

Mary Shelley’s novel was not based on her dreams alone. In the early 1800’s, scientists were obsessed by finding a way to bring the dead back to life. Mary found this idea fascinating and kept current with all new science experiments taking place during her time.

Luigi Galvani, for example, was one scientist that believed that “electricity” was the life force for living beings.

Galvani took dead animals and shock their bodies with high currents of electricity. The corpse would jolt when shocked with electrical currents.

Galvani’s nephew, Giovanni Aldini, took the experiment one step further. In London, on January 17th 1803, he publicly performed this experiment on the corpse of a human being, a prisoner that had been executed by hanging.

Giovanni attached live wires to the corpse: 120 plates of zinc and 120 plates of copper.

Giovanni reported, “the jaw began to quiver, the adjoining muscles were horribly contorted, and the left eye actually opened.”

(Frankenstein, p. xx)

The muscles of the corpse were shocked to such a degree that the corpse appeared “animated” to the public.

With Frankenstein, the sci-fi (science fiction) era began.

The novel contains the 3 elements essential for all science fiction works: 1. it’s based on valid scientific research; 2. it gives a persuasive prediction of what science might achieve in the future; 3. it offers a humanistic critique of the benefits and dangers of either the achievement or scientific thought.

Romantic Movement: (1770-1870)

This movement is not about “romance or love” but about disillusioned liberals who were tired of the common people being oppressed by tyrant rulers. This time period happens simultaneously with revolutions around the world: the American R. 1776, the French R. 1789, the French Reign of Terror 1793, Napoleon is crowned Emperor--1804.

Nature imagery is a key element in Romantic literature because human tyranny could not control nature. For the Romantics, nature represented peace and they believed that all emotional healing came from nature.

Nature imagery is abundant in Frankenstein.

Mary ShelleyMary

Shelley

1997

Gothic Literature is an offshoot of Romantic literature. “Along with nature having the power of healing, Gothic writers gave nature the power of destruction. Many storms arise in the book, including the storms in the night the creature comes to life.

The most common feature of Gothic literature is the indication of mood through the weather. When bad things are going to happen in a Gothic novel, the reader knows it because there is inevitably a storm outside.

In addition, Gothic literature is “a style of fiction, especially in the late 18th century and early 19th century, with historical and picturesque settings, an atmosphere of mystery, gloom and terror, supernatural or psychological plot elements, with violent, gruesome deaths.”

The setting is usually in medieval castles built in the Gothic of architecture—with secret passageways, dungeons, and towers.

The Novel Frankenstein: A Brief Background

• Frankenstein novel was written by the British novelist Mary Shelley. This novel is an early example of science fiction works.

• Dr Frankenstein wanted to answer the question of life and death.

• Dr Frankenstein succeeded to create a ‘creature’ from different dead bodies through Galvanism techniques.

• The end of his dream is that he left him lost without a guide, education, or caress from his ‘birth ‘ until his death .

• As a result, Dr Frankenstein met a miserable end because of the monster.www.physics.arizona.edu

The Use of Dead Bodies for Experimentation

• Dr Frankenstein used dead bodies to create the ‘monster’.

• He used the most advanced technology during the Industrial Revolution which is Galvanism.

• Galvanism is” The science of electrifying dead bodies” to reanimate them.

Science for science• Dr Frankenstein has no clear purposes

for conducting his experiments. Example :the first impression when the creature became alive.

• Science without values can destroy humanity. Example: “William, Justine, and Henry, all died by my hands” not by technology

• Technology can go out of control.

Science and Imagination

“”The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination” Albert Einstein

•Cloning•Genetic Engineering •Playing God •2 years of solitude exiled in his lab •The absolute in science

• The myth of Prometheus Frankenstein is an example of ouster.

• Rousseau The Monster is a noble savage.

• Locke The Monster’s self-awareness and education.

Influences: from Prometheus to Frankenstein

Influences: from Prometheus to Frankenstein

• Gothic stories read by Mary and Percy B. Shelley.

• S. T. Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner Both the novel and the poem

are stories of a crime against nature due to an excessive ambition.

Walton’s narration to his sister Margaret Walton Saville (chapters 1-10)

Frankenstein’s narration to Walton(chapters 11-17)

Narrative structure: an epistolary novel

The Monster’s narration to Frankenstein(chapters 18-24)

• Both Captain Walton and Doctor Frankenstein tried to go beyond human limits.

• The Monster is complementary to his creator:they both suffer from isolation and they both

begin with a desire to be good.

Main characters: Captain Walton, Dr. Frankenstein, Frankenstein

Conclusion

The importance of this controversial work is that it was written at the heart of Industrial Revolution .

Mary Shelley portrayed the negative relationship the humanity may have with technology.

She raised some ethical questions regarding this relationship.

Finally, how many Frankensteins do we have now?!