Analysis Of Coleridge's Beliefs In Frankenstein By Mary Shelley

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Texts of the Romanticism era aim to emancipate the ideological values of the enlightenment in revolt to the products of the Age of Reason and exalted the limitless boundaries of creativity through the immeasurable capability of the imagination. The Romantic artist indulges in the gratification they can derive from the supreme faculty of the mind, allowing engagement of social and moral issues through what Coleridge saw as the ‘esemplastic power’ of the imagination. Coleridge’s Beliefs, as one of the earliest romantic poets, heavily influenced the idealized perception of subsequent Romantics artists. Coleridge’s greatest contribution to the construction of these values was manifested in the autobiographic discourse of Biographia Literature, …show more content…

Specifically the act of galvanisation became of point of moral foreground resulting Shelley’s underlying message of rejection for rationalism. The limitless potential of the imagination results in the suspension of disbelief allowing Shelley to disclose the ‘human interest’ ‘through a sembelance of truth’ (Coleridge, 2004) , acting as a hyperbolic moral standpoint against ideals of scientific rationalism. Shelley illustrates this issue through the character framing of Ernest and Frankenstein, manipulating the audience into viewing characters which become representations of ideological thinking. Earnest, portrayed as a romantic individual “full of activity and spirit” carrys the trope of the innocent child as he is blissful to works of rationalist science and ‘looks upon the study as an odious fetter’. Whilst Frankenstein believes that ‘Often did my human nature turn with loathing from my occupation” portraying Frankenstein’s curiosity for modern-day rationalism as a character flaw forcing himself into a state of contempt as his arrogance or desire to become greater than Nature results in the melodramatic destruction of his life. Through Shelley’s characters she is able to convey enlightenment as the “cold-hearted attempt to extort knowledge from nature” through the beliefs of Frankenstein placing man above nature, consequently disturbing the symbiotic natural order of coexistence where science “improvised on nature as a great instrument”. Secondly Shelley subverts the epistemological values through the glorification of the natural power. Shelly plays with the Construction of Frankenstein’s

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