There are many themes in the story Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. Some of them are abandonment, neglect, revenge, and scientific knowledge, which are all related to each other in this novel.
Throughout the story you discover that a man named Victor Frankenstein wants to create a human life. He does not think through the repercussions of his desire only that he wants the power to create. After Frankenstein creates his creature, he is so frightened and disgusted by the creature?s appearance that he abandons it. In conclusion, Frankenstein abandons his creature because of its appearance.
To the creature, Frankenstein is his father and when he left him, he felt neglected and abandoned. The creature did not know how to take care of himself and was given no direction or leadership. He left not knowing where he would go or how he would survive. Frankenstein abandoned his creature as if it were an animal. When Frankenstein abandoned his creature, he didn't even think how the creature felt, he just deserted him. In other words, the creatures abandonment was neglect to its best interest.
The creature?s hatred grew from neglect and abandonment. Every person he came in contacted with immediately shunned him. Nobody could look past his horrifying appearance to see what was inside. His hatred then turned into revenge against his creator. The creature wanted Frankenstein to feel what he felt. This is where the revenge takes place and the creature killed everyone Frankenstein loved. The way people treated the creature just by his outwardly appearance is the way society in general views and treats people even today. Society is unjust and cruel at times to people who are less pretty, less thin, less attractive in general. The creature felt this every day of his life and lost the love of his creator and never found a suitable life partner all due to society shunning the less outwardly beautiful. Basically, the treatment from not only Frankenstein but also society led the creature to seek revenge on the one who created him.
Knowledge can be both good and bad. Frankenstein felt that the study of science was greater than another other subject because you can go further than the scientist before you had gone. What Frankenstein failed to understand is just because one becomes knowledgeable in science and has the ability to create something or do something new does not mean it is morally right to proceed with the knowledge.
Virtually all literature contain instinctive trends in the human consciousness to represent certain themes or motifs, these are defined as archetypes. Archetypes can be thought as blueprints or as bundles of psychic energy that influence the manner in which we understand and react to life. There are two different categories of archetypes, the plot archetype and the character archetype. The orphan, martyr, wanderer, warrior, magician, villain, wise child, temptress, rebel, underdog, fool, saint, virgin, wise, old man or woman are all considered to be character archetypes. Call to adventure, isolation, quest and monster that turns against its creator are all considered to be plot archetypes. The novel, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, contains archetypes.
The main themes in 'Frankenstein' are the themes of Nature versus Nuture, in which we find out that the monster was not intentionally villainous and that it was the way that the villagers treated the monster that he became evil and bad-tempered. Another one of the main themes is Science versus religion. This is because Frankenstein goes against God by creating life illegally. One of the secondary themes is the stereotypical villain and the way in which both Frankenstein and the monster both have villainous characte...
The creature request Frankenstein to create another creature like him and e will depart from the land and no one will know of him. This request thought it appears to be out of the ordinary it was quite respectable and understandable for the readers. The readers can accept the fact if the creature is given what he wants he will go away. Victor begins work on this new creature, it had taken him two years for his original creature to be created.
The creature was created with the intention of goodness and purity but because of this, he wasn’t equipped to deal with the rejection of his creator. After Victor Frankenstein’s death, Robert Walton walks in to see the creature standing over his friend’s lifeless body.
The creature displays his hatred toward Frankenstein for leaving him immediately and not providing guidance and protection in this harsh, new world by murdering his family and friends. While seeking his creator, the creature first murders Victor Frankenstein’s youngest brother William and exclaims, “I too can create desolation; my enemy is not invulnerable; this death will carry despair to him, and a thousand other miseries shall torment and destroy him” (Shelley 144). The creature wishes for Victor Frankenstein to suffer taking his own companions away, forcing him to be miserable as well by destroying his personal relationships with others by murdering loved ones. Through the rejection of the creature because of his physical appearance, he learns what is accepted as well as how you can treat another being as he succumbs to his anger and proceeds with his crimes. The creature tells Frankenstein, “your hours will pass in dread and misery, and soon the bolt will fall which must ravish your happiness forever.
Analysis of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Analyzing a book can be a killer. Especially when it contains tons of subtle little messages and hints that are not picked up unless one really dissects the material. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is a prime example.
In conclusion, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein shows readers how irresponsibility and the excessive need for knowledge can cause suffering among others as well as oneself. Victor never intends to cause such harm; however, he is not cautious and observant with his actions, which ultimately leads to his classification as a tragic hero. The desire to learn is most definitely a wonderful trait to have, as long as one’s knowledge doesn’t reach the extent that Victor Frankenstein’s unfortunately does.
An idea becomes a vision, the vision develops a plan, and this plan becomes an ambition. Unfortunately for Victor Frankenstein, his ambitions and accomplishments drowned him in sorrow from the result of many unfortunate events. These events caused Victors family and his creation to suffer. Rejection and isolation are two of the most vital themes in which many dreadful consequences derive from. Victor isolates himself from his family, friends, and meant-to-be wife. His ambitions are what isolate him and brought to life a creature whose suffering was unfairly conveyed into his life. The creature is isolated by everyone including his creator. He had no choice, unlike Victor. Finally, as the story starts to change, the creature begins to take control of the situation. It is now Victor being isolated by the creature as a form of revenge. All the events and misfortunes encountered in Frankenstein have been linked to one another as a chain of actions and reactions. Of course the first action and link in the chain is started by Victor Frankenstein.
The novel provides no explanation for the creature 's ugliness, and if we are tempted to account for it psychologically as a mere projection of Frankenstein 's guilty revulsion from his deed, we run up against the evidence of the other characters ' reactions. The monster appears frighteningly ugly not just to his creator but to all who see him.” The fact that the monster is ugly, made him receive different treatment from his creator and from everyone else who saw him. So, when the creature finally realizes that he can no longer hope to be treated nicely by anyone, he must start viewing them the way they look upon him. This is shown when he states, “Yet mine shall not be the submission of abject slavery. I will revenge my injuries; if I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear, and chiefly towards you my arch-enemy, because my creator, do I swear inextinguishable hatred. Have a care; I will work at your destruction, nor finish until I desolate your heart, so that you shall curse the hour of your birth." (Shelley, 175). After being treated with disrespect and as a terrifying outcast by so many people he eventually became a sadistic monster. Frankenstein’s creature is finally starting to experience some evil villainous thoughts. So at this point, he can be distinguished as a villain not just because
Frankenstein was abandoned by his creator Victor, he yells to him “yet you, my creator, detest and spurn me, thy creature, to whom thou art bound by ties only dissoluble by the annihilation of one of us. You purpose to kill me” (Shelley 90). Frankenstein speaks on how he was created and left by the one person who should have been there for him. This abandonment cause Frankenstein to view himself as a monster who can never belong. Frankenstein when looking at his reflections says “at first I started back, unable to believe that it was indeed who was reflected in the mirror; and when I became fully convinced that I was in reality the monster that I am, I was filled with the bitterest sensations of despondence and mortification.” (Shelley 103). He does not want to be a monster he feels hopeless that he will never belong. He yearns for belonging and companionship. In the novel, he watches a family through a window and longs to belong. He teaches himself how to talk so that he could communicate with them. Through this communication he can become part of their family and be
The creature was created as a clean and uneducated slate, as he knew nothing upon awaking in Frankenstein’s chamber. But through his journey of discover her comes across the De Lacey’s who he observes and learns everything from words like “fire, milk, bread and wood” to “a cursory knowledge of history” in hiding (139, 148). The creature’s education is pure as he learns by observing an open learning environment, but his knowledge causes him great distress as he learned the “system of human society” and how social class, wealthy and title can create vastly different lives (149). The creature begins to question is part in society as he “possessed no money, no friends, no kind of property” and knew that he was viewed as “hideously deformed and loathsome” (149). However, he believed the De Lacey’s could “overlook [his] personal deformity” once they became “acquainted with [his] admiration of their virtues” (162). But his attempts proved futile as his conversation with the father De Lacey interrupted by the family. Felix, the son, “tore [him] from his father… and struck [him] violently with a stick” (168). This interaction with a family the creature deemed with compassion and honesty, lead him to believe on one could love him. The creature became angry and hateful towards his creator and all humans, as he “gave vent to [his] anguish in fearful howling” and fled into the woods. The creatures vengeful attitude led to the death of many in Frankenstein’s life, including his brother William, a house maid and
The theme in a piece of literature is the main idea or insight on characters. Most pieces of literature do not limit itself to one but many other themes all collected into one. This is just like in Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. This horrifying story was produced in 1818 and has several themes that she portrays throughout. The theme of dangerous knowledge is unmistakably seen theme in Frankenstein. In Frankenstein we see this theme through three of the main characters, Victor Frankenstein, Robert Walton and the creature. We can see how their desire for knowledge can take them places and show them eventually what they are looking for. Sooner or later it will take them to dangerous and unwanted places. The desire for knowledge can eventually lead one to its grave. Victor Frankenstein’s scientific endeavor, Robert Walton’s search for the North Pole, and the creature’s kind heart but scary features creates this theme of dangerous knowledge.
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.
Mary Shelley discusses many important themes in her famous novel Frankenstein. She presents these themes through the characters and their actions, and many of them represent occurrences from her own life. Many of the themes present debateable issues, and Shelley's thoughts on them. Three of the most important themes in the novel are birth and creation; alienation; and the family and the domestic affections.
In both Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Voltaire’s Candide, there is a common theme of the main characters as well as other figures pursuing or receiving knowledge. Some of these characters can be seen as students who receive or seek knowledge from other characters. In Frankenstein, tragic events happen to characters like Victor Frankenstein, the creature and Henry Clerval who pursue knowledge. In Candide, Candide goes through a series of tragic events while listening to Pangloss and Martin’s teachings, which proved to be flawed. These stories give us insight on the human compulsion to learn and through the actions of the characters in both books we see that there is a price to pay for the pursuit of knowledge.