MARY SHELLEY

(1797-1851)
1. BIOGRAPHY:
She was the daughter of radical philosopher William Godwin and of Mary Wollstonecraft, the author of
“A Vindication of the Rights of Woman”, a pioneer in promoting women’s rights and education. Shelley
never knew her mother, but she was influenced throughout her life by her mother’s writings and reputation.
Eleven days after her birth, her mother died leaving her father to look after Mary and her sister. Mary
developed an intense affection for her father. Mary never had a formal education but learned from the books
that she found in her father’s library. The Godwin household was also a place of lively intellectual
conversation. Many writers visited Godwin to talk about philosophy, politics, science, and literature. When
Mary was nine, she and her stepsister hid under a sofa to hear Samuel Taylor Coleridge recite his poem
“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” This popular poem later influenced Shelley as she developed her
ideas for Frankenstein.

Mary’s future husband, the widely admired poet Percy Shelley, was one of her father’s frequent visitors. In
1814 she met Percy Bysshe Shelley, who was an ardent admirer of her father and often visited their London
house. Mary and Shelley fell in love and met secretly; when she found she was pregnant they ran off to
Europe, wandering through France, Switzerland, and Germany. In 1816, the couple settled in Geneva. It was
from their evening discussions on art and life that Mary’s first and best work of fiction was written:
Frankenstein, published anonymously in 1818.

The last six years of Mary’s life with Shelley were filled with family disasters. She gave birth to four
children in five years, three of whom died as infants. In 1822, after Percy’s death in a boating accident, Mary
Shelley, at twenty-four found herself a widow and returned to England and supported herself, her son, and
her father with her writings. Mary Shelley wrote five more novels, besides Frankenstein, the best of which is
The Last Man (1826), a story of the decimation of mankind by a plague until only one man survives. She
also wrote short stories, the most interesting being Transformation, a study of a dual personality which
looks ahead to Stevenson’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. To preserve her husband’s literary legacy, she collected
and annotated Percy Shelley’s poems for publication. She died in 1851.

2. STYLE AND THEMES:

Frankenstein (1818) is not only Mary Shelley’s best-known novel, but it has also become one of the few
modern myths. It exploits the horrific and macabre of the Gothic tales; it derives from the Romantics’
interest in the effects of science on man. Of the tale of terror Shelley’s novel possesses the highly charged
emotional language and a prevailing atmosphere of suspense and danger. It differs from many tales of terror
for ignoring certain features – castles and medieval or exotic trappings – and for substituting the supernatural
with science.

The story can be read in two ways:

 On the one hand, Dr Frankenstein is a scientifically updated version of Faust. He wants to

overcome man’s limitations and acquire a God-like power over physical matter, taking life into his
own hands. Because of this he will be punished, like the Mariner because of the killing of the
albatross in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Coleridge (the limited nature of human beings is
connected to the respect they owe to God-Life)
 On the other hand, the monster created by Frankenstein is a symbol of Romantic preoccupation for
the isolation of the individual by society. In this sense, the monster is the scientific counterpart of
Shelley’s Prometheus (Frankenstein; or the Modern Prometheus) or Byron’s dark heroes: outcasts
(emarginati) of society who suffer for no specific fault of their own. At one point in the novel the
monster gives his own story of how he became a murderer after being rejected by men.
The interesting and rather modern feature of Frankenstein is that it is told in the first person by three different
narrators (An explorer, Robert Walton, who save Dr. Frankenstein; Dr Frankenstein; The creature). None of
the three narrators is omniscient and so they are all needed to have a complete version of the story.
Structurally, Frankenstein is an important link between the old and the new novel: it still relies heavily on
18th-century forms such as the epistolary form and the long written or spoken confession, with a marked
preference for indirect over direct speech; yet the three narrators’ interplay provides a very interesting and
modern shifting of the point of view (how Dr. Frankenstein is seen). This allows for some psychological
analysis, if not of the characters as single individuals at least as typical of certain aspects of human nature.

3. MAIN WORKS:

- Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus (1817), is Mary Shelley’s first and most famous novel.
- The Last Man (1826), a very powerful science fiction novel about the only man who survives on
earth. Some of the characters are based on Mary’s husband and Lord Byron.
- Lodore (1835), another novel which is strongly autobiographical.
- Rambles in Germany and Italy (1844), a lively account of Mary Shelley’s travels in Europe, quite
popular in its time.

FRANKENSTEIN: OR THE MODERN PROMETHEUS

 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND:

May Shelley wrote Frankenstein in 1816 when she was 18 years old. Frankenstein: or The Modern
Prometheus, at the beginning, was published anonymously but two years later, a second edition with Mary
Shelley's name on it was published.

Mary Shelley was born into a world of scientific, artistic, and political revolution. Her father and husband
were famous radical thinkers and writers, and both (along with other important philosophers) had a large
influence on Mary and her novel. Mary Shelley's father was William Godwin, that wrote a very famous
book called “Inquiry Concerning Political Justice” (1793). The central idea developed by Godwin in his
work was that if people were all educated in the same way and were able to dominate emotions by
focusing their lives on equality, rationality and morality, there would be no need for a government. People
would be able to self-protect and self-regulate simply through right education. Another of her father's main
ideas was that everyone should act only for the good of mankind; otherwise, selfishness would lead to the
breakdown of society. This view influenced Frankenstein in that Victor largely thinks and acts only for
himself, ignoring the wishes of the Monster (for example, by not creating a wife for it). Victor is also a bad
parent, deserving punishment for abandoning his creature.

 FRANKENSTEIN AND THE SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION

Writing this book, Mary was influenced by the scientific revolution of the time. In Frankenstein, the pursuit
of scientific discovery leads to chaos, tragedy, and despair for all of the novel’s characters. Because so many
characters suffer because of scientific advances, many critics read the book as a critical response to the
Scientific Revolution. Beginning in the mid-sixteenth century with Copernicus’s argument for the sun being
located at the centre of the universe, the Scientific Revolution grow and influenced many contexts. During
the later eighteenth century, traditional philosophical and theological investigations into the meaning of life
began to be displaced (soppianate) by secular and materialist explorations of life's origins and nature.
In the 11814 there was a relevant scientific debate about the principles of human life: because and how we
are alive? This debate was caused by the different positions of John Abernethy, President of the Royal
College of Surgeons, and his pupil William Lawrence:
- William Lawrence's position was strictly materialistic. He believed that human life basically
depends on biological and mechanical processes, on the functioning of our organs, the circulation of
the blood, the breath ... etc.
 - John Abernethy argued that life could not be entirely explained in material terms; something else
was required, some vital principle that might be linked to the concept of the immortal soul. He kept
thinking that the soul played an important role in understanding why we are alive.
As science begins to create controversies and problems on the notions of the human being, it also becomes of
particular interest to the authors and writers of the time. It becomes an interesting subjects for Gothic writers.
- LAURENCE’S SCANDAL AND THE SECOND EDITION OF FRANKENSTEIN

In 1819, Lawrence published a series of lectures, essays that caused scandal. Indeed, Lawrence was
suspended at the Royal College of Surgeons, then forced to retire from the medical profession as well.
Lawrence's book was censored and continued to circulate only with illegal reproductions. Lawrence was
accused of being hostile to natural and revealed religion. He seemed to have set himself against religious,
ethical, and moral beliefs. After this scandal, something also happens in Mary Shelley's life: she decides to
revise, making a new edition of her novel Frankenstein: in this second edition, Mary, modify that passages in
which she refers to the mind, to the non-material spirit, to the divine creation. In fact, in this passages, she
seems to follow Lawrence's ideas and concepts, but in this second edition decided to move away from his
ideas.
- GALVANI’S THEORY
At the University of Bologna in Italy, noted surgeon Luigi Galvani was investigating the effects of
electricity on death animals. It was not an unusual line of inquiry. Researchers knew electrical shocks
produced violent spasms and speculated that electricity might cause muscular contractions. On January 26,
1781, while dissecting a frog near a static electricity machine, Galvani's assistant touched a scalpel to a nerve
in its leg, and the frog's leg jumped. Galvani repeated this and several other experiments, observing the same
violent muscle spasms. 
Mary Shelley knew all about Galvani because he was his father’s friend. The novel proposes the scientific
theory of Galvani: Victor’s thirst for knowledge leads him to experiment with electricity and the animation
of dead bodies. Thanks to his research he succeeds in giving life to a creature.
INTRODUCING THE NOVEL
Frankenstein opens with a preface, signed by Mary Shelley but commonly supposed to have been written by
her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley. In the preface to the 1831 edition of Frankenstein, Mary Shelley explains
how she came to write her famous novel. In the summer of 1816, she and Percy Shelley were living near the
poet Lord Byron and his doctor-friend John Polidori on Lake Geneva in the Swiss Alps. During a period of
incessant rain, the four of them were reading ghost stories to each other when Byron proposed that they each
try to write one. Then, while she was listening to 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.

 SUMMARY:
Plot is complex and the story is not told chronologically. The novel itself begins a series of letters written by polar
explorer Robert Walton to his sister, Margaret Saville, who is home in England.

1. In the first letter, he tells his sister of the preparations leading up to his departure and of the desire burning in him to
accomplish “some great purpose”—discovering a northern passage to the Pacific, revealing the source of the Earth’s
magnetism, or simply setting foot on undiscovered territory.
2. In the second letter, Walton tells her about his lack of friends. He feels lonely and isolated, too sophisticated to find
comfort in his shipmates and too uneducated to find a sensitive soul with whom to share his dreams. He shows himself a
Romantic, with his “love for the marvellous, a belief in the marvellous,” which pushes him along the perilous, lonely
pathway he has chosen.
3. In the brief third letter, Walton tells his sister that his ship has set sail and that he has full confidence that he will achieve
his aim.
4. In the fourth letter, the ship is stuck in sheets of ice in the ocean when the crew sees a giant figure in the distance going
across the ice on a "sledge." (slitta) The next day, the ship's crew finds a man on another sledge. All but one of the dogs
drawing the sledge is dead, and the man on the sledge—not the man seen the night before—is weak, and starving. Despite
his condition, the man refuses to board the ship until Walton tells him that it is heading north. The stranger spends two days
 recovering, nursed by the crew, before he can speak. The crew is burning with curiosity, but Walton, aware of the man’s
still-fragile state, prevents his men from burdening the stranger with questions. As time passes, Walton and the stranger
become friends, and the stranger eventually consents to tell Walton his story. At the end of the fourth letter, Walton states
that the visitor will commence his narrative the next day; Walton’s framing narrative ends, and the strangers begins.

CHAPTER 1-2-3:

The stranger is Victor Frankenstein that begins his narration. He starts with his family background, birth, and early childhood,
telling Walton about his father, Alphonse, and his mother, Caroline. Alphonse became Caroline’s protector when her father,
Alphonse’s long-time friend Beaufort, died in poverty. They married two years later, and Victor was born soon after. Frankenstein
then describes how his childhood companion, Elizabeth Lavenza, entered his family. At this point in the narrative, the original
(1818) and revised (1831) versions of Frankenstein diverge. In the original version, Elizabeth is Victor’s cousin, the daughter of
Alphonse’s sister; when Victor is four years old, Elizabeth’s mother dies, and Elizabeth is adopted into the Frankenstein family. In
the revised version, Elizabeth is discovered by Caroline, on a trip to Italy, when Victor is about five years old. While visiting a poor
Italian family, Caroline notices a beautiful blonde girl among the dark-haired Italian children; upon discovering that Elizabeth is the
orphaned daughter of a Milanese nobleman and a German woman and that the Italian family can barely afford to feed her, Caroline
adopts Elizabeth and brings her back to Geneva. Victor’s mother decides at the moment of the adoption that Elizabeth and Victor
should someday marry. Elizabeth and Victor grow up together as best friends.

He spends his childhood happily with Henry Clerval and surrounded by this close domestic circle. As a teenager, Victor becomes
increasingly fascinated by the mysteries of the natural world and goes to Ingolstadt University to study. He becomes obsessed with
creating life and puts together a human form from parts of dead bodies.

CHAPTER 4:

Victor began his studies with enthusiasm and, ignoring his social life and his family far away in Geneva, makes rapid progress.
Fascinated by the mystery of the creation of life, he begins to study how the human body is built (anatomy) and how it falls apart
(death and decay). After several years of work, he masters all that his professors have to teach him, and he goes one step further:
discovering the secret of life. Privately, hidden away in his apartment where no one can see him work, he decides to begin the
construction of an animate creature. Passionate devoting himself to this labour, he neglects everything else—family, friends, studies,
and social life—and grows increasingly pale, lonely, and obsessed.

CHAPTER 5

One stormy night, after months of work, Victor completes his creation. Doctor Victor Frankenstein manages to create a
human being trying to join parts selected from death corpses. The result of the experiment is ugly and revolting: the
creature became a murderer, and, at the end of the story, he destroys his creator. The monster opens his “yellow eye”
and at the beginning is described by Frankenstein as a “beautiful” creature. Soon after he becomes aware of the
monstrosity he had originated and tries to avoid the creature. Frankenstein starts wandering through the streets of
Ingolstadt with the anxious feeling of the monster following his traces.

He went to the next room and tries to sleep, but he is troubled by nightmares about Elizabeth and his mother’s cadaver.
He wakes to discover the monster was over his bed with a grotesque smile and escape out of the house. He spends the
night walking in his garden. The next morning, he goes walking in the town of Ingolstadt, frantically avoiding a return
to his now-haunted apartment. As he walks by the town inn, Victor comes across his friend Henry Clerval. Delighted
to see Henry—a breath of fresh air and a reminder of his family after so many months of isolation and ill health—he
brings him back to his apartment. But, weakened by months of work and shock at the horrific being he has created, he
immediately falls ill with a nervous fever that lasts several months. Henry nurses him back to health and, when Victor
has recovered, gives him a letter from Elizabeth that had arrived during his illness.

CHAPTER 6

In chapter six we find the letter from Elizabeth Lavenza, worried for the health conditions of Frankenstein. She even tells him
about the story of Justine Moritz, a young girl that started living in the Frankenstein’s house in Geneve after she was badly
repudiated by her original parents. She then became a servant in their house. Justine Moritz even took care of Frankenstein’s mother
when she was on her deathbed. At the end of the letter, he prays Frankenstein to write to his family. Soon after Frankenstein comes
back to the university with his friend Clerval, however, he seems not interested in natural philosophy anymore. Frankenstein is
unable to tell the secret of the monster to anybody, including Clerval, who was mainly interested in languages. Frankenstein starts
learning languages such as Arabic and Greek with his companion. Frankenstein leaves Ingolstadt at this point as well as his friend
Clerval.

CHAPTER 7:

The seventh chapter opens with a letter from the father of Viktor, Alphonse Frankenstein, in which he announces his son the death
of his younger brother William, whose killer left no trace. Saddened, shocked, and apprehensive, Victor departs immediately for
Geneva. As he walks near the spot where his brother’s body was found, he saw the monster and becomes convinced that his creation
is responsible for killing William. The next day, however, when he returns home, Victor learns that Justine has been accused of the
murder. Victor proclaims Justine’s innocence, but the evidence against her seems irrefutable, and Victor refuses to explain himself
for fear that he will be considered insane. Victor begins a life tormented by remorse, despair, and madness.

THE MONSTER'S STORY

A guilty Victor goes alone into the Alps where, eventually, he meets up with the Monster. He is surprised to find that not only has the
thing he made survived, but that it also has the power of language. The Monster tells a long story about how he has secretly lived in
an outbuilding next to the De Lacey family following their lessons as they teach a foreign visitor their language and learning about
other subjects such as history, geography, religion and culture. He repays the family by secretly doing many of their household
chores. One day, he reveals himself to the family, but they are so horrified by his appearance that the Monster run away again. He
finds similar treatment from everyone he meets and becomes lonely and isolated. The Monster asks Victor to accept that he is
responsible for his loneliness and misery and to make him a female companion to be his partner through life.

CHAPTER 8 TO THE END:

At first Victor approve, but then, overcome by the thought that would be born a progeny of monsters, destroy what has been done.
The monster vows revenge on Victor. Victor feels miserable knowing he has caused the deaths of so many but recovers enough to
finalize the plans for his marriage to Elizabeth. With a wedding date set, Victor torments himself with the thought of the monster's
threat to be with him on his wedding night. The wedding goes off as planned. While Victor makes sure he covers all possible
entrances that the monster could use to get into the wedding chamber, the monster steals into Elizabeth's room and strangles her.

Victor now wants revenge and search the monster through Europe and Russia. Victor nearly catches the monster near the Arctic
Circle when Robert Walton discovers him. Victor, now near death, is taken aboard Walton's ship to recover from exhaustion and
exposure.

Walton once again continues the narration in the letters to his sister. He tells her how Victor eventually dies from a combination of
exhaustion and exposure to the cold and how he finds the Monster in Victor's cabin full of sorrow for the death and destruction he
has caused. Telling Walton of the misery it has suffered, the Monster leaps back onto the ice and disappears into the Arctic night,
apparently intent on killing itself.

LITERARY CONTEXT
It contains elements of the Gothic novel and the Romantic movement. It was also a warning against the
“over - reaching” of modern man and the Industrial Revolution.

 MARY SHELLEY AND ROMANTICISM

Frankenstein exemplifies many of the values associated with Romanticism. The characteristics of
Romanticism include a focus on individual emotions, enthusiasm about the natural world, and a celebration
of creativity and the figure of the artist. Mary Shelley’s life intersected with some of the most famous writers
and thinkers of the Romantic period. She was the daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft, a writer and intellectual
who advocated for gender equality, and William Godwin, a political philosopher and novelist who was
fascinated by questions of justice, rights, and social inequality. When she was just sixteen years old, Mary
Shelley fell in love with the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, who was passionate about writing bold and
innovative literature that reflected his somewhat radical ideals of creativity, freedom, and equality. As a
result of her family connections and relationship with Percy Shelley, Mary developed friendships with other
famous Romantic writers, notably the poet Lord Byron.
The context of Romanticism influenced both the origin and content of Frankenstein. Many of the
trademarks of Romanticism are evident in the novel. Walton and Frankenstein are ambitious geniuses
who are determined to live up to their destinies; while neither is an artist, both engage in works of ground-
breaking creativity by pushing the limits of geography and science. The impact and beauty of the natural
world, always significant to Romantic writers, play an important role in creating an appropriate setting for
the novel’s dramatic events. The monster’s experience of coming into the world without any knowledge of
social norms and behavioural expectations reflects Romanticism’s curiosity about how innate human nature
is gradually shaped by society and culture.

 GOTHIC NOVEL
Frankenstein is a Gothic novel because it employs mystery, secrecy, and psychology to tell the story of
Victor Frankenstein’s monster. The Gothic emerged as a literary genre in the 1750s, and is characterized by
supernatural elements, mysterious and secretive events. In literature the term “gothic” applies to works with
an atmosphere that emphasize the unknown and inspire fear. Gothic novels focus on the mysterious and
supernatural. In Frankenstein, Shelley employs the supernatural elements of raising the dead and macabre
research into unexplored fields of science unknown by most readers. Just the thought of raising the dead is
horrifying enough. Imagining Victor wandering the streets of Ingolstadt or the Orkney Islands after dark on a
search for death body parts adds evoke to the readers a feeling of revulsion.
- Gothic novels also take place in gloomy places like old buildings (particularly castles or rooms with
secret passageways), dungeons, or towers. Otherwise, Frankenstein is set in continental Europe,
specifically Switzerland and Germany. Further, the incorporation of the scenes through the Arctic
regions takes us even further from England into regions unexplored by most readers.

- Unlike traditional Gothic supernatural elements such as ghosts or vampires, the monster’s origins are
deliberate and not mysterious. We know exactly where he comes from, who created him, and why.
There’s never any question about whether the monster exists. 

- The use of electricity also represents a Gothic element, given that in that period electricity is not part
of everyday life of many people, even in the context of the Industrialism. So, it is looked upon as a
supernatural, mysterious force. This attitude towards electricity manifests itself in Mary Shelley’s
Frankenstein, where it is even capable of give life to death bodies.
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus can be placed somewhere in between the ideas of
the Enlightenment and Romanticism, directed towards the Romantic movement.
- ROMANTICISM AND NATURE
Romantic writers portrayed nature as the greatest and most perfect force in the universe. They used words
like "sublime" (as Mary Shelley herself does in describing Mont Blanc in Frankenstein) to convey the power
and perfection of the natural world. In contrast, Victor describes people as "half made up" The implication
is clear: human beings, weighed (appesantiti) down by preoccupation and countless flaws (difetti) such as
vanity and prejudice, feel inferior in front to nature's perfection. In fact, that crises and suffering result when,
in Frankenstein, imperfect men disturb nature's perfection.
As science is an element of culture, Victor is associated with culture. But he represents the darker side of
culture: scientism misused as fantasy. On the other hand, the creature is associated with nature.
Frankenstein contaminated the nature through scientific experiment.  The creation of the monster
in Shelley’s Frankenstein comes because of man’s defiance (sfida) of nature, Victor wants to  “penetrate the
secrets of nature’. His desire to stand at the top of power drive him beyond humanity and to transgress the
human limitation. The scientific discovery (electricity) of that period was replacing the power of the Gods.
THEMES

 PROMETHEUS AND FRANKENSTEIN:

The full title of the novel, Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus, hints at the significance of
Frankenstein’s ambition and subsequent punishment. According to Greek mythology, Prometheus was one
of the wisest Titans who stole fire and gave it to humankind. Use and knowledge of fire was restricted
strictly to Gods. So, when Prometheus disobeyed the dictum, Zeus sentenced him to severe eternal
punishment. His daring act and subsequent eternal punishment are the allegory that guides Victor
Frankenstein’s life. Both Prometeo and Frankenstein, committed a crime, doesn't respected the human limits:
Prometeo stole the fire from gods and for this reason he was punished, while Frankenstein, gave life to death
body ‘parts through scientific experimental. In both cases the main characters dared to overcome human
limits and was punished. Frankenstein is considered a modern Prometeo.
His life becomes a warning tale for Walton to learn about the consequences of playing with the laws of
nature. Walton’s ambitious voyage mirrors Frankenstein’s desire to push the boundaries of the known
knowledge. Shelley uses not one, but two characters to emphasize the terrible consequences of nursing an
unbridled ambition. Walton has the opportunity to turn back to the safety of his crew, but Frankenstein pays
the ultimate price for his folly.

 CREATION
Shelley gives ample allegories between the biblical creation of man and Frankenstein’s creation of the
creature. Frankenstein goes against the natural processes of procreation in his desire to play God and create
life. But, in his hurry to bring to life his scientific experiment, he forgets the importance of parenting. He
doesn’t think and ideate about the fact that the creature needs to be taught the very basics of society. He
needs to be taught language, social mores of acceptable behaviour, education, and to be provided a loving
family. He ignores the most fundamental tenets of parenting. He also alienates his creation by not giving a
name upon him. His lack to provide love, care, food, clothes etc. is a testament to his failure as a creator and
a parent.
The creature of Frankenstein is legitimately frightening and grotesque because of his enormous size and
composition from parts taken from corpses. At the same time, the monster encounters persistent rejection and
loneliness. He struggles to find a sense of family and community and is rejected by everyone he comes in
contact with. He doesn’t have any moral guidance in life except for what he observes from the De Lacey
family. The rejection and alienation he experiences explain his violent behaviour, even if they do not justify
it, so that he can be considered a sympathetic figure in the novel.
Frankenstein is driven by an insane need to seek vengeance from the creature. He dies a premature death
from cold and exposure and his creation is left to live a miserable lonely life. Revenge consumes both the
creator and the creation.

 THE DICHOTOMY BETWEEN NATURE AND SCIENCE

Shelley wrote Frankenstein during an age where scientific advances were exploding rapidly. 'Frankenstein'
reflects the hopes and fears of every scientific era, in fact, the novel is usually considered a cautionary tale
for scientists. We talk about “limits of science” since Frankenstein attempts to create a monster without
respecting the rules of nature as far as creation and life are concerned. In facts, he joins parts selected from
corpses and the result is ugly and revolting. The scientist regrets his creation and becomes afraid of it.
One of the main theme of this novel is the penetration of nature's secrets. Frankenstein examines the pursuit
of knowledge in the context of the industrial age, shining a spotlight on the ethical, moral and religious
implications of science. The tragic example of Frankenstein serves to highlight the danger of man's unbridled
thirst for knowledge. Victor is the main symbol that the acquirement of knowledge is dangerous. Science
without morality is detrimental because it can be used for negative purposes such as nuclear weapons,
genetic modification, and unethical medical research. There's a little contradiction, though. While Shelley
exemplifies the disastrous effect of unmitigated desire to possess the secrets of the earth, she says that such
curiosity is innate to human condition.
Mary Shelly is believed to be not against modern science. Her father was a politician with a strong
background in science, while her mother was a feminist author of her generation. During her growing-up,
Mary was introduced to many scientists at the time. Her husband was also a figure in the scientific field, who
came to some scientific lecture with her companion. From her pro-science background, the author was
undoubtedly introduced to novel scientific knowledge at the time and was more or less under its influence.
At the time the novel was written and published, new inventions in modern science were introduced and
appreciated.
At the time it was written, scientific development in England was becoming of great importance and was
beginning to influence every aspect of human life. Shelley portrays the natural environment that surrounds
us, the lakes, the mountains and the forests, as both beautiful and consoling whereas when scientists interfere
with nature, a hideous monster is created. Whether Shelley intended it or not, her message is of great
importance today in serving as a warning of the disastrous consequences that genetic engineering may have
if not accompanied by moral and ethical responsibility

 THE FEMINIST CRITIQUE

Even if, the novel is predominantly male oriented, it does provide a critique of patriarchal society. All the
female characters in Frankenstein doesn’t have a narrative role and exist in a subordinate position to their
male counterparts. Shelley presents a refined account of the patriarchal nineteenth century society. She
critics the superiority of men by creating a self-absorbed protagonist who treats the women around him as
secondary to himself. Each female characters exists in relation to Victor Frankenstein. They are all docile,
submissive, and without any voice of their own. Their existence is to serve him in the roles of nurturing
mother, caring fiancée, and dutiful maidservant. The feminist critique can be explicitly seen in Victor’s
refusal to create a female monster. Above anything else, Victor fears the female monster’s reproductive
powers, especially her capacity to reproduce more monsters. He had no desire to create a female being whose
sexuality he could not master. Female autonomy is a threat to him, and he exerts male power by dismantling
her. Shelley uses this episode to highlight fragile masculinity and its inability to cope with the idea of female
liberation.

 NATURE AND SUBLIME

Mary Shelley was inspired by the great romantics of her time. Her own writings display great fascination
with romanticism. Her treatment of nature as a grand force and a restorative relief is evident in Frankenstein.
The novel can be read as an allegory of nature’s fury against industrial revolution and hasty advancements in
science. Frankenstein’s imagination is captivated by nature, and he uses scientific knowledge to understand
and replicate the natural phenomenon. He is able to replicate the mysteries of nature, but he is plagued by
misery and loss for the rest of his life. He finds that nature is as unforgiving as it is beautiful.
INFLUENCES: FROM PROMETHEUS TO FRANKENSTEIN
- The myth of Prometheus: Frankenstein is an example of overreached.
- Rousseau: The Monster is a noble savage.
- Locke: The Monster’s self-awareness and his education.
- 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.

FRANKENSTEIN, OR THE MODERN PROMETHEUS (1818)

IT WAS on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost
amounted to agony, I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless
thing that lay at my feet. It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle
was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it
breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs.

Fu in una lugubre notte di novembre che vidi la realizzazione delle mie fatiche. Con un’ansietà che rasentava quasi
l’angoscia, raccolsi gli strumenti della vita attorno a me, così da poter infondere una scintilla di esistenza nella cosa
inanimata che giaceva ai miei piedi. Era già l’una di notte; la pioggia picchiettava lugubre contro i vetri, e la mia candela
era quasi consumata, quando, alla debole luce semi-estinta, vidi l’occhio giallo, fermo, della creatura aprirsi; respirava a
fatica, e un moto convulso agitava le sue membra.

How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch whom with such infinite pains and care
I had endeavored to form? His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful! Great
God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black and
flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes,
that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and
straight black lips.

Come posso descrivere le mie emozioni di fronte a questa catastrofe e come descrivere lo sventurato che, con infinite
sofferenze e attenzione, ero riuscito a creare? Le sue membra erano proporzionate, e io avevo selezionato i suoi
bellissimi lineamenti. Bellissimi! Buon Dio! La sua pelle gialla copriva a malapena il lavoro dei muscoli e delle arterie
sottostanti; i suoi capelli erano fluenti, neri, lucenti; i denti erano bianchi come perle; ma questa rigogliosità formava solo
un contrasto ancora più terribile con i suoi occhi timidi, che sembravano quasi dello stesso colore smorto delle orbite
bianche in cui erano inseriti, la sua [ielle era raggrinzita e le labbra erano nere e diritte.

The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature. I had worked hard for nearly two
years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had
desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished,
and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. Unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of
the room, continued a long time traversing my bed chamber, unable to compose my mind to sleep. At length lassitude
succeeded to the tumult I had before endured; and I threw myself on the bed in my clothes, endeavouring to seek a few
moments of forgetfulness. But it was in vain: I slept, indeed, but I was disturbed by the wildest dreams. I thought I saw
Elizabeth, in the bloom of health, walking in the streets of Ingolstadt. Delighted and surprised, I embraced her; but as I
imprinted the first kiss on her lips, they became livid with the hue of death; her features appeared to change, and I
thought that I held the corpse of my dead mother in my arms; a shroud enveloped her form, and I saw the grave-worms
crawling in the folds of the flannel.

I vari incidenti della vita non sono così mutevoli quanto i sentimenti della natura umana. Avevo lavorato duro per circa
due anni, con il solo scopo di infondere vita in un corpo inanimato. Per questo avevo sacrificato riposo e salute. Lo avevo
desiderato con un ardore che superava di molto la moderazione, ma terminata l’opera, la bellezza del sogno svanì, e
l’orrore e un disgusto tale da togliere il fiato riempì il mio cuore. Incapace di sopportare la vista dell’essere che avevo
creato, mi precipitai fuori dalla stanza e, per un bel po’, continuai a camminare avanti e indietro nella mia camera,
incapace di convincere la mia mente a dormire. Alla fine, la stanchezza ebbe la meglio sul tumulto che avevo provato
prima, e mi gettai sul letto, vestito, cercando di trovare qualche momento di oblio. Ma fu inutile; dormii, è vero, ma fui
turbato dai sogni più paurosi. Mi sembrava di vedere Elisabeth, nel fiore della salute, camminare per le strade di
Ingolstadt. Felice e sorpreso l’abbracciai, ma non appena le diedi un bacio sulle labbra, queste divennero livide come il
colore della morte; i suoi lineamenti sembravano cambiare, e mi sembrò di tenere fra le braccia il corpo di mia madre
morta; un sudario avvolgeva la sua forma, e vidi i vermi brulicare fra le pieghe della flanella.

I started from my sleep with horror; a cold dew covered my forehead, my teeth chattered, and every limb became
convulsed: when, by the dim and yellow light of the moon, as it forced its way through the window shutters, I beheld the
wretch ― the miserable monster whom I had created. He held up the curtain of the bed and his eyes, if eyes they may
be called, were fixed on me. His jaws opened, and he muttered some inarticulate sounds, while a grin wrinkled his
cheeks. He might have spoken, but I did not hear; one hand was stretched out, seemingly to detain me, but I escaped,
and rushed downstairs. I took refuge in the courtyard belonging to the house which I inhabited; where I remained during
the rest of the night, walking up and down in the greatest agitation, listening attentively, catching, and fearing each sound
as if it were to announce the approach of the demoniacal corpse to which I had so miserably given life.

Mi svegliai con orrore; un sudore freddo mi copriva la fronte, i miei denti battevano, e le mie membra erano in preda a
una convulsione; allora, alla luce pallida e gialla della luna, che penetrava attraverso le imposte della finestra, vidi lo
sventurato, il miserabile mostro che avevo creato. Alzò la cortina del letto; i suoi occhi, se occhi si possono chiamare,
erano fissi su di me. Aprì le mascelle, ed emise alcuni suoni disarticolati, mentre una smorfia gli increspò le guance.
Poteva aver parlato, ma io non udii; una mano era tesa, come se volesse trattenermi, ma io scappai e mi precipitai giù
dalle scale. Mi rifugiai nel cortile che faceva parte della casa in cui abitavo, vi rimasi per il resto della notte, camminando
su e giù nella più grande agitazione, ascoltando attentamente, cogliendo e temendo ogni suono come se annunciasse
l’avvicinarsi del demoniaco cadavere al quale io avevo così miserabilmente dato vita.