Who is the real monster within the boundaries of society? In the classic novel written by Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, the monster was characterized as an evil antagonist who has the murderous tendencies to annihilate the precious beings of mankind. However, the readers have yet to understand the victim underneath the distorted flesh and inhumane features since “the monster” was under the clutches of injustice because of the unreasonable ostracization, deplorable reason of creation, and unbearable misery. In the beginning of the story, we are under the impression that the creature was left on this earth without a person to connect with, yet has outstanding qualities and has admiration for man. Even though, the monster is not at fault, he …show more content…
Furthermore, Victor had a vision to create life out of death but didn’t fully comprehend his outcome then when the results came in then it was too late to destroy the atrocity he has made, he ran away from his creation and hid under his blanket as a victim instead of the criminal. In fact, Victor should’ve made it his main duty to take the responsibility as the creator of a benevolent being, but he ostracized his own creation and ran away like he had done to many of his problems throughout the story. Instead, Victor claimed himself a victim and personified the creature as a manipulative, murderous monster that was in evil entity and had a soul black as the vast night. For example, Victor mentioned to Captain Walton near the end of the story that the monster needed to be stopped and his actions will cause chaos in the world of man if Walton were to step down from Victor’s request to eliminate the monster before he were to murder again. Yet, the monster was in a constant circle of injustice from his own creator, Victor Frankenstein, from being abandoned to being characterized as a villain without being given the voice and care he needed to in order to change his path of violence into the generosity of a cordial
If Victor had stayed around and showed the monster the real world, he might have not have went on to perform violent actions. This portrays Victor as a selfish character and gives more of an insight on his personal life. As a child, Victor is only interested in furthering his own knowledge and not worried about anyone else. He spent much of his time “drawing the picture of [his] early days... when [he] would account to [himself] for the birth of that passion which afterwards ruled [his] destiny” (Shelley 34), or otherwise a magnificent creation that would change his future. When constructing the Monster, he put all of his relatives in the back of his mind, and only focused on his own success and victory. This further explains the theme of being selfless and only doing certain things that will benefit
In Frankenstein, everyone treats Victor’s creation like a monster, including Frankenstein himself. This leads to the creation accepting that title and going on a murder spree. His creation says “When I reflect on his crimes and malice, my hatred and revenge burst all bounds of moderation” (69). Victor’s creation shows that he did not ask to be created, and his existence is miserable.
It is through these actions that the monster acts out his evil doings and murders those that Victor loves. The monster does this because he wants to seek revenge on Victor and wants to make him pay for neglecting him all throughout his life. The monster is seen as awful and evil in every aspect by every person, but if he was nurtured and cared for by Victor, and the human societies didn’t initially judge him based on his appearance, he could have kept the goodness that he originally had when he was
One way the monster can be considered human is his want for a companion. A human longs for a companion from birth; starting with a motherly figure, to a friend and later a significant other. The novel suggests that the creature cannot be accepted as human because he is a singular being. His singularity makes it so that the creature cannot relate to humans and without the ability to relate, he cannot be human. Thus the monster asks victor for a companion to attempt to bar his destructive, murderous actions, assuming that feeling more human and having someone like him will resist his urge to destroy and seek revenge on human society. The monster begs, “I am alone and miserable: man will not associate with me; but one as deformed and horrible as myself would not deny he...
Victor Frankenstein’s search for knowledge is a key factor in this novel’s gloomy timeline of events. As Victor slaves away over his creation of new life, by combining various limbs of scavenged human body remains, he detaches himself from everyone important in his life. He abandons his fiancée, Elizabeth, and forces her to wait for him to return so they can be married. All of Victor’s family members love and adore him, and he becomes selfish in his ambitious goal to create human life. After Victor accomplishes his work of genius, with the creation of the monster, he is suddenly filled with terror and hatred towards the hideous being that stands before him. Even after his goal has been attained, he is not pleased, and flees in horror of the monster. This abandonment of the monster by Victor, the creator, builds hatred inside the monster that will soon lead it to destroy everyone who Victor holds dear to his heart. Victor’s quest for creating new life and playing God demonstrates the dangers of seeking knowledge that should not be acquired. Even though Victor is successful in creating a human heart beat with the use of dead human rem...
Humans find it far too easy to make judgments based upon the outward appearance, deeming one individual to be of lesser value than the other because of society’s standards. However, when the true character of a person is brought to light, any previous assessment becomes highly questionable. In the novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley leads readers to inquire as to who the real monster is through the conveyance of both Victor and the creature’s differing perception of women.
The novel “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley involves the complex issues with the creation of life through an inanimate life. Shelley uses these character archetypes to develop a deeper meaning of the characters intentions. Shelley does an excellent job at allowing the reader to have a peak at the characters inner thoughts and feelings. The archetypes presented in Frankenstein allow readers to identify with the character's role and purpose.
As a tragic hero, Victor’s tragedies begin with his overly obsessive thirst for knowledge. Throughout his life, Victor has always been looking for new things to learn in the areas of science and philosophy. He goes so far with his knowledge that he ends up creating a living creature. Victor has extremely high expectations for his creation but is highly disappointed with the outcome. He says, “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” (Shelley 35). Frankenstein neglects the creature because of his horrifying looks, which spark the beginning of numerous conflicts and tragedies. At this point, the creature becomes a monster because of Victor’s neglect and irresponsibility. The monster is forced to learn to survive on his own, without anyone or anything to guide him along the way. Plus, the monster’s ugly looks cause society to turn against him, ad...
When the creature was brought back to life, it was like an infant. It only has the basic sensations, “I felt light, hunger, and thirst, and darkness” (74). The creature is not born evil. It was called monster simply because it has an awful appearance. Although the creature is monster outside, it has a benevolent heart inside. As the creature learns language from the cottagers, it starts to read. After it absorbs knowledge from the books, it despises killing. “When I heard details of vice and bloodshed, my wonder ceased and I turned away with disgust and loathing” (84). The creature’s attitude shows readers that it is not a slayer at the beginning. Also, the creature says, “I admired virtue and good feelings and loved the gentle manners and amiable quantities of my cottagers” (84). It is obvious that the books and kind cottagers shape the creature into a humanized being. Besides, the act of saving a drowning girl from a precipitous river indicates that the creature is actually a good being. However, people never try to look under its ugly appearance. When the creature proceeds to a village, where people attack it. Felix, one of the kind cottagers, drives the creature away immediately at the first sight of it. The man who plays with the drowning girl shoot the creature when it approaches to them. After all these rejections, the creature’s world falls
He created a life, and then spontaneously he quickly decided to run away from his creation. Victor’s actions after creating what he created were really irresponsible, and did not correctly took care of the circumstance’s he put himself in. The creation was never actually evil, but he felt abandoned by what could had been called his father. Frankenstein, the monster, was only a seeker for companionship. He strongly desired to feel loved, rather than abandoned. Society’s evil behavior toward the monster is what altered the monster’s conduct and followed to how he acted.
As a romantic novel Victor is responsible, because he abandoned his creation. As an archetype novel, Victor is the villain, because he was trying to play god. Finally, Victor as a Gothic novel, Victor is at fault, because, he and the creature are two different parts of the same person. If Frankenstein is looked at as a romantic novel, Victor, not the creature, is truly the villain. When Victor created the creature, he didn't take responsibility for it. He abandoned it, and left it to fend for itself. It is unfair to bring something into the world, and then not teach it how to survive. The creature was miserable, and just wanted a friend or someone to talk to. On page 115, the creature said, "Hateful day when I received life! Accursed the creator. Why did you form a monster so hideous that even you turned from me in disgust." This line shows the agony the monster was in, because of how he looked when he was created which led to even Victor running away from him. If Victor didn't run, he could have taught the monster and made his life happy. After the creature scared the cottagers away he said, "I continued for the remainder of the day in my hovel in a state of utter ...
The creator of the monster, Victor Frankenstein is a man full of knowledge and has a strong passion for science. He pushes the boundary of science and creates a monster. Knowledge can be a threat when used for evil purposes. Though Victor did not intend for the being to be evil, society’s judgement on the monster greatly affects him. As a result he develops hatred for his creator as well as all man-kind. Victor’s anguish for the loss of his family facilitates his plan for revenge to the monster whom is the murderer. While traveling on Robert Walton’s ship he and Victor continue their pursuit of the monster. As Victor’s death nears he says, “…or must I die, and he yet live? If I do, swear to me Walton, that he shall not escape, that you will seek him and satisfy my vengeance in his death…Yet, when I am dead if he should appear, if the ministers of vengeance should conduct him to you, swear that he shall not live-swear that he shall not triumph over my accumulated woes and survive to add to the list of his dark crimes” (pg.199). Victor grieves the death of William, Justine, Clerval, Elizabeth and his father. Throughout the novel he experiences the five stages of grief, denial/ isolation, anger, bargaining, depression and finally acceptance. Victor denies ...
It has been said that God created man in His own image. Whether this statement is true or not has had no bearing on the desires of mankind to do as God supposedly did, and create a being in its likeness. Ancient Jewish legends tell stories of constructs, known as golems, that were made of worked dirt or mud and brought to life with magic, and would obey any command to the letter (Kopelman Foundation). As mankind turned from the arcane and began to embrace science, so too did the focus of such stories. However, the concept remained remarkably similar. A woman by the name of Mary Shelley wrote an almost universally famous novel by the title of . In it, she tells the tale of a young man named Doctor Victor Frankenstein who, obsessed with bringing the dead to life, creates a creature pieced together from human remains. It was, in essence, a golem made of flesh and animated through science and electricity. As time and science progressed, mankind’s thoughts shifted even further from the mystical and monstrous and more toward the technological. Robots emerged from the imagination of mankind, machines made of metal and synthetic materials built to resemble human beings and programmed to act and react, to think and learn for themselves, just as humans can. Half of this imagining is already a scientific fact. Automated robots fill America’s factories, and a humanoid robot, Honda’s ASIMO, is already able to run, jump, and otherwise navigate a normal human environment (American Honda Motor Co.). Still, one aspect of mankind’s dream remains in imagination: artificial intelligence. However, due to the work of Subrata Ghosh and his colleges, mankind may be just a few steps away from realizing its desire to create a thinking, evolving robot in i...
“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 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,” writes Mary Shelley, describing the moment in which Victor Frankenstein fully identifies his creation. He realizes that this monster could ruin both his life and the lives of many more people. Shortly after this realization, the creator rushes out of the room. What to do now that this creature is alive and ready to do as it pleases?
In Frankenstein, Mary Shelley uses the motif of monstrosity to convey the theme that a person’s outward appearance is not what makes them a monster but rather their actions or inactions that classify true monstrosity. Despite the fact that the monster Victor Frankenstein creates is a literal example of monstrosity in the novel there are many parts that give meaning to monstrosity within character’s actions. Although Victor appears normal, since he is human his ambitions, secrets, selfishness, and inaction makes him a monster himself. Along with monstrous characters the pursuit of knowledge that is seen in Victor, his monster, and Walton in Frankenstein prove that knowledge can be a monstrosity. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is created using the life stories of different characters in the novel. The novel itself could be seen as a monster created similarly to Victor’s monster.