Feminism And Anti-Feminism In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

690 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: what is the role of women in frankenstein

A Multifaceted Research Analysis of Feminism and Anti-Feminism in Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein”
A Victorian Era writer named Mary Shelley was ahead of her time in her way of thinking. She had what were considered radical thoughts for women, who she believed were deserving of more rights in their homes and in society. This progressive rationale aided her in her literary works; particularly a novel she wrote called “Frankenstein.” The fundamental understanding of “Frankenstein” comes from understanding Mary Shelley’s influences and upbringing in life. Becoming familiar with who Mary Shelley was as a person will assist in the exploration of feminist and anti-feminist influences in her novel, “Frankenstein.”
Mary Shelley was born on August 30, 1797, during the French Revolution – a time where Enlightenment ideals and concepts of absolute individual rights were campaigned. William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft, her parents, got married to legitimize her birth even though they did not believe in the institution of marriage (ClassicLit.About.com). William Godwin was philosopher, who did not believe in a higher deity or in government rule. Mary Wollstonecraft was regarded as one of the first active feminists and published her controversial novel, “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman” in 1792 (Bartleby.com). She also was inspired by the ideals that Thomas Paine advocated, such as women and human rights.
Mary’s mother died less than two weeks of giving birth, so she never knew her mother. She was raised by her father until he remarried when Mary was still young. She did not get along with her step mother, instead she looked up to her father while growing up, and so his revolutionary ideals were of great influence toward her. ...

... middle of paper ...

...sly in 1818, though Mary Shelley’s name was added in 1823. Mary’s name did not appear as the author for five years because it could not be believed that a nineteen year old female wrote the novel (EGS.edu). “Frankenstein” was pivotal in aiding the contribution of literature made by women acceptable (FamousAuthors.org).
The influences in Mary’s upbringing and experiences certainly inspired Mary to write Frankenstein from both a feminist and anti-feminist viewpoint…………………………………

Works Cited
“Mary Shelley.” BritainUnlimited.com. n.d. Web. 27 Apr. 2014.
“Mary Shelley.” ClassicLit.About.com. n.d. Web. 27 Apr. 2014.
“Mary Shelley.” EGS.edu. n.d. Web. 27 Apr. 2014.
“Mary Shelley.” FamousAuthors.org. 2012. Web. 27 Apr. 2014.
“Mary Wollstonecraft.” Bartleby.com. 1999. Web. 27 Apr. 2014.
“Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley.” Kirjasto.Sci.Fi. n.d. Web. 27 Apr. 2014.

Show More
Related

  • Women's Individual Capability In Frankenstein By Mary Shelley

    1122 Words  | 3 Pages

    Mary Shelley’s novel entitled Frankenstein demonstrates women of the Romantic Era as powerless citizens of society. Throughout the novel, the women are secondary characters and are portrayed through the men’s perspective. Therefore, many would think that these female characters are passive and dependant as they are often described as companions and nurturers. Despite the unequal rights of women, Shelley, one of the earliest feminist, has developed female characters who show agency. This trait of taking charge of one 's course of life is reflected through Justine Moritz as she is willing to die for her beliefs, in Safie who defies her father’s and religious wishes and when Victor Frankenstein decides to abort

    Read More

  • Mellor's Essay 'Possessing Nature: The Female In Frankenstein'

    811 Words  | 2 Pages

    Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is set in a patriarchal nineteenth century society where men take up significant occupations outside the home and women are often limited to the household. In Anne K. Mellor’s essay “Possessing Nature: The Female in Frankenstein,” the writer explores the gender divide in Frankenstein and depicts the injustices towards the women in society. Mellor ultimately portrays Frankenstein as a feminist

    Read More

  • Examples Of Individualism In Frankenstein

    1159 Words  | 3 Pages

    After learning about the life of Mary Shelley, I have grown to appreciate the novel, Frankenstein, even more since the first time I read it. She led a life nearly, as tragic as the monster she created through her writing. Mary seems to pull some of her own life experiences in Victor’s background, as in both mothers died during or after childbirth. Learning about Mary’s personal losses, I have gained a better appreciation of her as an author and a woman of the 17th century. She had association with some the most influential minds of that

    Read More

  • psychoanalysis of frankenstein

    1073 Words  | 3 Pages

    “Allure, Authority, and Psychoanalysis” discusses the unconscious wishes, effects, conflicts, anxieties, and fantasies within “Frankenstein.” The absence of strong female characters in “Frankenstein” suggests the idea of Victor’s desire to create life without the female. This desire possibly stems from Victor’s attempt to compensate for the lack of a penis or, similarly, from the fear of female sexuality. Victor’s strong desire for maternal love is transferred to Elizabeth, the orphan taken into the Frankenstein family. This idea is then reincarnated in the form of a monster which leads to the conclusion that Mary Shelley felt like an abandoned child who is reflected in the rage of the monster.

    Read More

  • The Inferiority of Women in Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

    938 Words  | 2 Pages

    Mary Shelley depicts the Romantic ideal of inferiority of women in Frankenstein. These ethics can be compared and contrasted with values of today’s society. Shelley had all male narrators to accentuate the belief of male superiority. The female orphans of the story portray the assumption that women are helpless and the lack of letters from Margaret emphasizes the essential worthlessness of a woman’s opinions. Finally, the female presence in the workforce contradicts Romantic ideals, however housewives and male proposals parallel the ideals Shelley uses in Frankenstein. The Romantic ideals that women are secondary to men are expressed throughout Frankenstein as well as in Romantic times and today.

    Read More

  • The Importance Of Romanticism In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

    1270 Words  | 3 Pages

    Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was published in 1818 during the Romanticism era. Romanticism describes the period of time from the late 18th century to the mid 19th century. This period was seen as a response to the Enlightenment; overall there was an increase in the desire to understand the world in an objective matter (lecture). Though Romanticism is commonly viewed as a literary and artistic movement, Mary Shelley gives evidence on the development of Europe in a historical sense through her novel, Frankenstein. Through the motifs and personal experiences of her characters, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein gives insight on scientific development, emerging roles of women, and how the individual is viewed the

    Read More

  • Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as a Critique of Masculinity

    1775 Words  | 4 Pages

    The idea for the novel of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein came to her one night when she was staying in the company of what has been called ‘her male coterie’, including Lord Byron and her husband, Percy Shelley. Mary Shelley’s whole life seems to have been heavily influenced by men. She idolised her father, William Godwyn, and appears to have spent a good part of her life trying very hard to impress both him and her husband. There seems to have been a distinct lack of female influence, her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft, having died weeks after her birth, being replaced by a neglectful step-mother. These aspects of her life are perhaps evident in her novel. The characters and plot of Frankenstein were perhaps influenced by Shelley’s conflicting feelings about the predominately masculine circle which surrounded her, and perhaps the many masculine traits that we see in novel were based upon those of the male figures in Shelley’s own life. In this essay I will attempt to show some of these traits.

    Read More

  • Romanticism in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

    2058 Words  | 5 Pages

    Mary Shelley, with her brilliant tale of mankind's obsession with two opposing forces: creation and science, continues to draw readers with Frankenstein's many meanings and effect on society. Frankenstein has had a major influence across literature and pop culture and was one of the major contributors to a completely new genre of horror. Frankenstein is most famous for being arguably considered the first fully-realized science fiction novel. In Frankenstein, some of the main concepts behind the literary movement of Romanticism can be found. Mary Shelley was a colleague of many Romantic poets such as her husband Percy Shelley, and their friends William Wordsworth and Samuel Coleridge, even though the themes within Frankenstein are darker than their brighter subjects and poems. Still, she was very influenced by Romantics and the Romantic Period, and readers can find many examples of Romanticism in this book. Some people actually argue that Frankenstein “initiates a rethinking of romantic rhetoric”1, or is a more cultured novel than the writings of other Romantics. Shelley questions and interacts with the classic Romantic tropes, causing this rethink of a novel that goes deeper into societal history than it appears. For example, the introduction of Gothic ideas to Frankenstein challenges the typical stereotyped assumptions of Romanticism, giving new meaning and context to the novel. Mary Shelley challenges Romanticism by highlighting certain aspects of the movement while questioning and interacting with the Romantic movement through her writing.

    Read More

  • The Presentation Of Women In Mel Brooks 'Young Frankenstein'

    507 Words  | 2 Pages

    With the presentation of women we need to understand what time era this is all taking place in. The book Frankenstein by Mary Shelley takes place in the 18th century around the Geneva / Naples where he was born and raised. The women of Frankenstein represent the treatment of women in the early 1800’s. Shelley’s embodiment of suffering and death of her female characters shows that in the 1800’s it was acceptable.

    Read More

  • Mary Shelley's Frankensteing

    1432 Words  | 3 Pages

    Frankenstein is among one of the most iconic novels written during the early 19th Century. This novel was written by a distinguished Mary Shelley and first published in the year 1818. Shelley’s story is considered to written before its time as it challenged many themes and ideas of humanism, natural science, ambition, abortion, etc. The novel itself sparked many controversies and debates as numerous different topics are challenged and discussed throughout the novel. Shelley flawlessly executes the story as she writes in a dramatic gothic drama tone and allows the reader to step into different views of the story by changing perspectives.

    Read More

  • Feminist Criticism In Frankenstein

    1030 Words  | 3 Pages

    Within Frankenstein, the level at which a female is portrayed is quite low. Like we have heard in class, women were not necessarily respected as much as men were when the novel was written. Published in 1818 by Mary Shelley, her story tells of the adventure of young Victor Frankenstein and the creation of his creature. Though deep within this narration of Frankenstein’s life, there seems to be an underlying theme seeping through Shelley’s writing. Shelley seems to venture into the idea of feminism and grotesquely show how men are treated much better than women. Her novel includes various concrete examples to support this hypothesis.

    Read More

  • How Does Shelley Present The Female Characters In Frankenstein

    1334 Words  | 3 Pages

    Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel, Frankenstein, tells the fictitious tale of young scientist Victor Frankenstein and the creature he creates as part of a scientific experiment. Throughout the novel, readers hear about the challenges that Victor, his family, the creature, and Shelley’s other characters experience. Shelley includes many female characters in her novel’s world; however, the women do not often assume a central or essential role. Although a woman wrote Frankenstein, and therefore one might assume the novel would contain strong female characters, nevertheless, Shelley does not portray her female characters this way. Women often appear weaker than men in Frankenstein’s world because Shelley frequently presents her female characters as

    Read More

  • The Analysis Of Women In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

    1317 Words  | 3 Pages

    From the beginning of time in history, women have always been portrayed as and seen as the submissive sex. Women especially during the time period of the 1800s were characterized as passive, disposable, and serving an utilitarian function. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is a prime example displaying the depiction of women. The women in Frankenstein represent the treatment of women in the early 1800’s. Shelley’s incorporation of suffering and death of her female characters portrays that in the 1800’s it was acceptable. The women in the novel are treated as property and have minimal rights in comparison to the male characters. The feminist critic would find that in Frankenstein the women characters are treated like second class citizens. The three brutal murders of the innocent women are gothic elements which illustrates that women are inferior in the novel. Mary Shelley, through her novel Frankenstein, was able to give the reader a good sense of women’s role as the submissive sex, through the characters experiences of horrific events including but not limited to brutal murder and degradation, which is illuminated by her personal life experiences and time period of romanticism.

    Read More

  • A Feminist Reading of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

    591 Words  | 2 Pages

    When reading Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, one cannot help but notice that the women characters seem to have little substance compared to the male characters. This may have been caused by the time period in which she wrote: one in which females were considered inferior to males. This difference between the sexes can be looked at using a variety of different perspectives. Johanna M. Smith, a professor at the University of Texas at Arlington, discusses this issue using feminist eyes in her essay entitled "'Cooped up': Feminine Domesticity in Frankenstein." The main points in Professor Smith's essay are that the female characters are there only to reflect the male characters, and that the Frankenstein family has a weird style of living, which she describes as a "bookkeeping mentality" (Smith 279).

    Read More

  • Roles of Women in Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

    1128 Words  | 3 Pages

    In “Frankenstein” penned by Mary Shelley, one cannot help but notice the role of women in the novel compared to men. Even though Mary Shelley is the daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft, a mother advocating for women’s rights in society, she displays the roles of Caroline, Elizabeth, and Justine as passive women. This may be the time period when women were considered inferior to men. Caroline, Elizabeth, and Justine are depicted as possessions by men, admired for their superficial beauty, and do not take action without the permission of men. On the other hand, Shelley illustrates Safie as a woman who speaks up for her own rights when her father forbids her to find Felix. The three points that contribute greatly to the passive role of women are the lower of rank women in society compared to men, women being seen as possessions for men to protect, and women admired for their superficial beauty.

    Read More

More about Feminism And Anti-Feminism In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

Open Document