Analysis Of Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein In A Better Light'

In Lisa Nocks article appropriately titled “Frankenstein, in a better light,” she takes us through a view of the characters in the eyes of the author Mary Shelly. The name Frankenstein conjures up feeling of monsters and horror however, the monster could be a metaphor for the time period of which the book was written according to Nocks. The article implies that the book was geared more towards science because scientific treatises were popular readings among the educated classes, of which Shelley was a member of. Shelley, whose father was wealthy and had an extensive library, was encouraged to self-educate, which gave her knowledge of contemporary science and philosophy, which also influenced Frankenstein as well as circumstances of her life.

(Nocks 3)” The second assumption is that “our natural impulse to continually recreate the universe quiet often ignores fundamental human needs: Besides depriving himself of health and companionship during the two years that lead to the reanimation experiment. (Nocks 3)” Nocks goes ahead to point out that some biographers have relate the relationship between Victor and the monster to that of Shelley and her father. Shelley’s father was said to have abandoned her after she eloped with her husband Percy Shelley, who was still married at the time. Another great observation by Nocks is that, Shelley’s mother, who died two weeks after she was born, also left her with feelings of abandonment; she was said to have spent many hours over the years at her gravesite. One can imagine the level of abandonment felt by a young motherless girl. Shelley must had thought about this fact in writing Frankenstein; it probably aided Victor’s acquiring the body parts for his monster. Shelley understood what true sadness abandonment meant; she it lived the life she wrote and Nock enlightens the reader of this in her

Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably exclude. (Shelley 69)” This statement by the monster compares to Nock’s interpretation of Shelley being abandoned by both parents. The monster like Shelley was disowned by its “father” Victor, when it did not live up to his expectations of what it should have looked like after his creation; Shelley’s abandonment was due to her elopement with a married man. The monster, like Shelley, only wanted to belong to a true family; the monster only wanted a female companion, which was more than due