Outline on Frankenstein

Mary Shelley was a young, well-educated woman from England. She was born on August 30th 1797, in London. Her mother Mary Wollstonecraft, was the author of “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman”. She died giving birth to Mary, leaving her daughter in the care of her husband, William Godwin. The atmosphere that Mary Shelley grew up in exposed her to cutting-edge ideas, which are shown all throughout the novel. Mary Shelley’s lover, Percy Shelley was a young poet, and as he was already married, her relationship with him wasn’t the smoothest.

The novel Frankenstein; or the Modern Prometheus cannot be categorized into only one genre because it has various features of different genres. It is certainly a tragedy. Although the core narration starts with a story of how Frankenstein’s father meets and marries the protagonist’s mother, she first has to endure the death of her father called Beaufort. Thus, the novel already begins as a tragic exposition. As a result, the narrative fiction ends with almost everyone including the protagonist and the antagonist as dead.

“In Frankenstein, the narratives seem to grow organically from one another: it is impossible to extricate the narratives from one another, as they are so closely linked and interwoven.”

This quote is significant because it tells of the moment that Frankenstein’s troubles began. From this moment, when the monster comes to life, to the end of the novel, Victor is plagued by the horrors that the monster inflicts upon him. Had Victor not created the creature, or had his ‘experiment’ failed, he would not have lost so many loved ones and endured all the troubles that came with it.

Thesis Statement: Ambition and the quest for knowledge is a fatal flaw in the characters of Victor Frankenstein, Robert Walton, and the creature.

The critically acclaimed novel written by Mary Shelley and published in 1818, delves into a multitude of universal themes throughout the text. One value that drives the plot forward, and leads to character development is the theme, human fulfillment of the pursuit of knowledge. It is Dr. Frankenstein 's unquenchable thirst for knowledge that leads to the future predicaments that ensue after the Creature is conceived and future moral dilemma. An example of Dr. Frankenstein 's disposition that lends itself to the validity of the stated theme, is as follows; “It was the secrets of heaven and earth that I desired to learn; and whether it was the outward substance of things, or the inner spirit of nature and the mysterious soul of man that occupied me, still my inquiries were directed to the metaphysical, or, in its highest sense, the physical secrets of the world” (Shelley 30). The doctor 's preoccupation with his studies, that results in controversy over the suitable nature of such an unobtainable desire, is clearly exemplified in the quote, “If the study to which you apply yourself has a tendency to weaken your affections and to destroy your taste for those simple pleasures in which no alloy can possibly mix, then that study is certainly unlawful, that is to say, not befitting the human mind” (45).

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, illustrates an interesting story focusing in on many different themes, but what most readers may miss, is the similarities between Victor Frankenstein and the creature he created. As the story develops, one may pick up on these similarities more and more. This is portrayed through their feelings of isolation, thirst for revenge, their bold attempt to play god, and also their hunger to obtain knowledge. These are all displayed through a series of both the actions and the words of Frankenstein and his creature.

This extract belongs to Mary Shelley’s most famous novel entitled Frankenstein (1818), belonging to Gothic fiction. We can find the fragment located almost right at the beginning of the book, it being relevant because this is when Victor Frankenstein first discovers the secret of life and death or as he calls it in page 34 “the cause of generation and life”. He then starts thinking of the possibilities of what he can achieve with that. That is what later leads him to build his creature, thus unleashing its violence into the world. This is a clear passage of an underlying theme in the novel; how knowledge, if taken too far, can be rather dangerous. The fact that Victor decides to obtain a knowledge which is supposed to be inaccessible is the catalyst of all the action that takes place in the novel.

(Favert 1) We must begin to read Frankenstein more as a well-wrought "baggy monster" of correspondences, and less as a singular, alien phenomenon. If we read it as an interactive combination of tales, rather than one linear narrative, we can refrain from casting the novelist into the narrow role of a "young girl" with "so very hideous an idea." Frankenstein is Mary Shelley's novel; it is no more her story than Walton's, Victor's or the monster's. Within the text, the various narrators slide from their own stories into the histories of others, and with each movement, we are asked to extend our "willing suspension of disbelief." As the novel multiplies its story-tellers and listeners, it renews the problem of narrative authority. Whose story do we believe? -- the novel defuses such a question. The fantastic nature of the stories preclude rational explanation or judgment, and we do not,

     Romantic writer Mary Shelley’s gothic novel Frankenstein does indeed do a lot more than simply tell story, and in this case, horrify and frighten the reader. Through her careful and deliberate construction of characters as representations of certain dominant beliefs, Shelley supports a value system and way of life that challenges those that prevailed in the late eighteenth century during the ‘Age of Reason’. Thus the novel can be said to be challenging prevailant ideologies, of which the dominant society was constructed, and endorsing many of the alternative views and thoughts of the society. Shelley can be said to be influenced by her mothers early feminist views, her father’s

Victor Frankenstein’s fixation on the understanding of life, shows the negative psychological and physical effects of obsession as his mind becomes more centered around this passion. As a child Victor has explicitly said that “The world was to [him] a secret which [Victor] desired to divine. Curiosity, earnest research to learn the hidden laws of nature, gladness akin to rapture, as [the secrets] were unfolded to [him], are among the earliest

Thesis: is Frankenstein a warning to science? Yes because of the power of nature, forbidden knowledge, and the role of god shouldn’t be played by anyone except him. He was created by body parts from other people which is illegal.

Mary Shelley discusses the themes of birth and creation, appearance and the necessity of companionship, love and acceptance in her novel Frankenstein. The themes that are explored in Frankenstein are relevant to today’s modern world. Shelley challenges readers by endorsing and confronting attitudes and values in her text through the events, circumstances and outcomes that take place in the novel, thus causing the reader to reflect upon their own lives and in turn the society around them.

The novel Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, was a piece written in 1817 during a time when women weren’t considered to be adequate authors. Shelley’s work is both intriguing as it is thought provoking. She brings to light the true nature of society and life altogether when tested. She factors in how the outside world can influence our choices in writing. George Levine from “The Ambiguous Heritage of Frankenstein” and Benjamin Truitt from “Frankenstein Critical Analysis and Literary Criticism” both share their opinions about Shelley’s piece of written work.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is a literary classic that tells a story of a young scientist Victor Frankenstein who created a monster that tries to live in society but is rejected. The monster will later seek revenge by going after his creator. In this essay I will be evaluating two critiques about the novel. Beginning with Professor Naomi Hetherington’s critique and the second critique written by Professor Sherry Ginn.