The concept of “otherness” is common idea throughout the world that describes how majority and minority identities are created. It is the “quality of being different or unusual” (“Otherness”). “Others”, during the early abolitionist period, were those that did not meet the European norm: white, male, and Christian. Members of the “others” were most often marginalized people, mainly those of a different race and gender. This concept of “otherness” and “others” prevented people of a different race or gender from being truly accepted into society with full rights and privileges. During this time period, “otherness” was utilized in numerous anti-slavery and anti-racism literatures. With some of the most famous poems and books in history, Mary Shelley, …show more content…
She tells of Frankenstein’s obsession to create life out of nothing. After his successful attempts to bring life to an animal, he becomes excited at the prospects of potentially giving life to a perfect human being. Frankenstein aspires to make a “being like myself” or something “as wonderful as man” (Shelley 32). Here, it is evident what he considers to be the perfect human being or the norm. Frankenstein aspires to create a being that is male, white, and educated, an ideal that is impossible for women and black people to achieve. From scavenged body parts, Frankenstein is able to finally create his being. However, on the “dreary night of November”, he sees “the dull yellow eye of the creature open…” (34-35). Already, the being that Frankenstein creates is seen as an “other”. Instead of referring to him as a “child” or simply a human being, he calls his creation a “creature”, a “catastrophe”, and a “wretch” (32, 35). He is far from the Frankenstein’s or, more broadly, European standards for normalcy. Frankenstein, expecting a creation with beautiful features and proportionate limbs, was surprised seeing “his yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath” and “his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shriveled complexion and …show more content…
When the Victor Frankenstein flees, the monster is forced to discern life on his own, eventually learning that he is not only loathed by his creator, but also by everyone else. He tries to obtain food from a local village, but before he can even step foot into a hut “children shrieked, and one of the women fainted. The whole village was roused; some fled, some attacked me, until, grievously bruised by stones…I escaped…” (74). Both his creator and society reject him. He seeks comfort in watching a family from afar. He enjoys watching the family, Agatha and Felix, eventually regarding them as “superior beings” (81). He admired their “grace, beauty, and delicate complexions, but how was I terrified” when he saw his own reflection in a pool (80). With no knowledge of how he was born or how to live life, the monster was forced to learn how to survive on his own. With constant rejection, he eventually understands that he is inferior, especially to Agatha and Felix, because of his appearance. Had people, especially Victor, exercised tolerance and acceptance, perhaps the monster could have learned something different. Mary Shelley gives her audience the “other’s”, in this case the monster’s, perspective when he tells his journey to his creator. With Frankenstein, Shelley provides the “others” of the world with a
For centauries, women have been forced to live life in the outskirts of a male dominated society. During the 1800’s, the opportunities for women were extremely limited and Mary Shelly does an excellent job in portraying this in her gothic novel, Frankenstein. Furthermore, in this novel, Mary Shelly shows how society considers women to be possessions rather than independent human beings. In addition, the female characters rely heavily on men for support and survival, thus proving their inability to do it on their own. Lastly, the female characters in this novel are in many ways victimized by the male characters. In conclusion, in Mary Shelly’s novel Frankenstein, the female characters always fulfill the limited and archetypical roles that are set for them by society.
The greater detail provided by the book about the monster’s experiences allows the reader to sympathize with the monster more so than an audience member. When the Frankenstein monster is retelling the story of the hardships he has endured, he mentions events that were overlooked in the play. One example of this is when the monster saved a girl’s life. Such an act would normally be considered very heroic and receive much praise under any circumstances, but instead the monster is rewarded by being shot, receiving only “the miserable pain of a wound which shattered the flesh and bone.” (Shelley 135) The book also examines the months of hard work the creature put into learning about human nature and language in order to be fully accepted when he chose to reveal himself. The monster hid by the cottage for around a year, listening and learning during t...
With austere, scientific accounting of human nature, Shelley documents how zealous Captain Walton rescued Victor Frankenstein, the passionate student of natural philosophy and impetuous, chance creator of life, from death in the remote regions of the North Pole. It is through Walton's journal entries that readers comprehend Frankenstein's tale. After animating a lifeless human form, Victor recoiled in terror, afterwards recollecting, "Great God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath" (56). The monster's ghastly physical aspect and murder of five people, both directly and indirectly, introduced this instinctual horror to the people he had contact with, including peaceable cottagers. Driven to this homicidal extremity by acute loneliness, the brute pleaded with Frankenstein to imbue life on a female counterpart, that they might never plague humanity again. Frankenstein began to appease this human necessity, but at the essential moment of creation, destroyed her, fueling a bitter vengeance and the final, fatal chase of Frankenstein across pastoral and rustic Europe to the bleak immenses of the North Pole.
In Frankenstein, Shelley tried to show that a person is shaped by the way that they are treated and their environment. She wanted people to understand that Frankenstein’s monster was born like a baby, innocent and free, and she showed the reader in the novel that it was the way that he was treated that made him who he was. The way that the monster was created would have been seen as immoral by the reader, although he was clearly not evil to begin with, despite the way that he had been created. However the way that he appeared led people...
In the novel Frankenstein Victor succeeds in creating life after years of constant work and study. Soon after his success however, he abandons his creation because of its horrific physical appearance. The monster is forced to survive in isolation, where, unlike a normal human being, he is not nurtured into adulthood by a parental figure. He becomes unable to form relationships with other human beings and whenever the monster, whom Mary Shelley refers to as “Adam,” attempts to have contact with another being he is reminded of the physical difference that exists between himself and everyone else. It is primarily this difference
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley introduces the change from good to evil with the attention that guardians give a child. William Crisman, in his critique of Mary Shelley’s work, identifies the “sibling rivalry” between Victor and the rest of his family. Crisman remarks that Victor feels as if he is the most important person in his parents’ lives, since he was Alphonse’s and Caroline’s only child. The Frankensteins adopt Elizabeth and Victor sarcastically remarks that he has a happy childhood. This prompts Victor starts to read essays about alchemy and study natural science. Anne Mellor, another critic of Frankenstein, proposes that Frankenstein’s creature was born a good person and society’s reaction to him caused him to turn evil. Victor’s makes the creature in his own perception of beauty, and his perception of beauty was made during a time in his life when he had secluded himself from his family and friends. He perceived the monster as “Beautiful!”, but Victor unknowingly expressed the evil in himself, caused by secluding himself from everybody, onto the creature (60). In this way, the creature is Victor’s evil mirrored onto a body. The expression of Victor onto the monster makes the townspeople repulsed by the creature. The theory of the “alter ego” coincides with Crisman’s idea of sibling rivalry (Mellor). Mary Shelley conveys that through Crisman’s idea of sibling rivalry, Victor isolates himself from society. Mellor describes the isolation during his creation of his creature leads to him giving the creature false beauty that causes Victor to abandon him and society to reject him.
It is when Frankenstein realizes how different he is to other people that he realizes his uniqueness and individualism. “I was, besides, endued with a figure hideously deformed and loathsome; I was not even of the same nature as man. I was more agile than they and could subsist upon a coarser diet; I bore the extremes of heat and cold with less injury to my frame; my stature far exceeded theirs. When I looked around I saw and heard of none like me. Was I, then, a monster, a blot upon the earth, from which all men fled and whom all men disowned?” (Frankenstein, 150). While Frankenstein is by no means a human, he is made up of human parts and still craves love and affection. His rejection from everyone he sees, including his creator makes him feel like an outcast. It was because of Victor that Frankenstein couldn’t bear to be who he was made to be and felt a need to run into isolation. Victor not only created a monster physically, but also mentally turned him into someone he didn’t have to be. Both Frankenstein and Victor struggle with balancing their personal wants and needs with societies expectations and the people around them. That is one of the true struggles of being one person living in a world of many, you have to do what makes you happy while making sure it doesn’t effect other peoples happiness negatively. Victor doesn’t do a good job of
We are shown that this ‘monster’ is a ‘creature’ and more of a human than we think. It is in the complex structure of the novel that Mary Shelley creates sympathy. We shift from Robert Walton to Victor Frankenstein to the monster and finally back to Walton. With each shift of perspective, the reader gains new information about both the facts of the story and the reliability of the narrator. Each perspective adds pieces of information that only they knows: Walton explains the circumstances of Victor’s last days, Victor explains his creation of the monster, the monster explains his turn to evil.
“Frankenstein” by Mary Shelly explores the concept of the body, life, ‘the self’ and most of importantly humanity, which is repeatedly questioned throughout the novel. The definition of humanity is the quality of being humane or in other words someone that can feel or possess compassion. Despite all the facts against the “monster” in “Frankenstein” he is indeed what one would consider being human. Humanity isn’t just about ones physical appearance but also includes intellect and emotion. Some people argue that the “monster” is not a human for he was not a creature that was born from “God” or from a human body. That being said, the “monster” is not only able to speak different languages, he can also show empathy - one of many distinct traits that set humans apart from the animals. Both the “monster” and his creator, Victor, hold anger and feel a sense of suffering throughout the novel. Victor is a good person with good intentions just like most individuals, but makes the mistake of getting swept up into his passion of science and without thinking of the consequences he creates a “monster”. After completing his science project, he attempts to move forward with his life, however his past – i.e., the “monster” continues to follow and someone haunt him. While one shouldn’t fault or place blame on Frankenstein for his mistakes, you also can’t help but feel somewhat sympathetic for the creature. Frankenstein just wants to feel accepted and loved, he can’t help the way he treats people for he’s only mimicking how people have treated him, which in most cases solely based on his appearance. Unlike most of the monsters we are exposed to in films past and present, the character of the “monster” ...
Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein centers around a creator who rejects his own creation. The plot thickens as Victor Frankenstein turns his back on his creation out of fear and regret. The monster is cast out alone to figure out the world and as a result of a life with no love, he turns evil. Shelley seems to urge the reader to try a relate with this monster and avoid just seeing him as an evil being beyond repentance. There is no doubt that the monster is in fact evil; however, the monster’s evilness stems from rejection from his creator.
The greater detail about the monster’s experiences provided by the book is the first thing that allows a reader to sympathize with the monster better than an audience member. When the Frankenstein monster is retelling the story of the hardships he has endured, he mentions events that were overlooked in the play. One example of this is when the monster saved a young girl’s life. An act such as this would be praised with the greatest heroism if it was done by a human, but as a reward he is shot, receiving only “the miserable pain of a wound which shattered the flesh and bone.” (Shelley 135) The book also examines the months of hard work the creature put into learning about human nature and language in order to be fully accepted when he chose to reveal himself. The monster hid by the cottage for around a year, never leaving during the day and working to help the cottager’s at night in order to learn from them. The monster went ...
...e seeking help and strength to take care of problems in their lives. Victor Frankenstein is a man with a loving and caring family. Family and friends are an important part of his life. He has his whole life in front of him, when creates his monster. He creates the monster in the likeness of man with same need of love and affection as man. Although, this is his creation, he lets the monster down and does not care for him. The monster begins to feel neglected and lonely and wants desperately to have a human relationship. The monster turns angry and revengeful because he is so sad and abandoned. He wants Victor to feel the way that he does, all alone. The monster succeeds and Victor ends up losing all the important in his life and his own life. In the end, the monster dies and the need for human relationship becomes the destruction for both the monster and Victor.
The concept of “otherness” is a common idea throughout the world that describes how majority and minority identities are created. It is the “quality of being different or unusual” (“Otherness”). “Others”, during the early abolitionist period, were those that did not meet the European norm: white, male, and Christian. Members of the “others” were most often marginalized people, mainly those of a different race and gender. This concept of “otherness” and “others” prevented people of a different race or gender from being truly accepted into society with full rights and privileges. During this time period, “otherness” was utilized in numerous anti-slavery and anti-racism literatures. With some of the most famous poems and books in history, Mary
In Frankenstein, Shelley creates two very complex characters. They embody the moral dilemmas that arise from the corruption and disturbance of the natural order of the world. When Victor Frankenstein is attending school, he becomes infatuated with creating a living being and starts stealing body parts from morgues around the university. After many months of hard work, he finishes one stormy night bringing his creation to life. However, “now that [Victor] had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled [his] heart” (Chambers). Right after Victor realizes what he has done, he falls into deep depression and must be nursed back to health by his friend. Victor spends the rest of the story facing consequences and moral problems from creating unnatural life. When he realizes that the ‘monster’ has killed his brother, even though no one believes him, he feels responsible for his brother’s murder because he was responsible for the existence of the ‘monster’. Also feeling responsible, Victor...
One of the most influential contributions in the formation of the monster’s character is Victor’s failure as a creator and a father. As a creator, Victor has the responsibility of providing for his creation, just as God provided for Adam and Eve. At the same time, Victor also falls under the role of a father, and should therefore seek to strengthen the familial bond between the two of them. However, Victor fails in both of these endeavors, because he cannot accept the monster in his deformity. “Frankenstein’s sole regret… is that he did not create an aesthetically pleasing being” (Bond). Victor, due to his skewed vision of humanity, believes outer beauty to be a reflection of inner character, and that because of the monster’s hideous appe...