The above quote by Bloom is an explanation of the view that all the gothic novels are interpretation of psychological and social factors and this is especially true in the case of Mary Shelley. Shelley began her novel at the age of 18 when the most prominent materials in the consciousness and unconsciousness of Shelley were concerned with the conflicts stemming from the death of her mother. Frankenstein is the outcome of Shelley’s unresolved grief for the death of her mother which was the crisis she needed to work through to forget her own adult identity.
Mary was the daughter of a revolutionary author Mary Wollstonecraft who is regarded as one of the earliest feminist writers by the critics (Zimmerman, 2007, 65-123). By some of the critics, this story is considered to be an account of Mary’s personal life, and there are several examples which actually coincide with the personal life experiences and the narrative itself.
Frankenstein is considered as a genre of Gothic and science fiction, and it comprises the aspect of both these genres. The name “Frankenstein” or Modern Prometheus (see note 3) is not likely with the general beliefs of a monster that the name holds but it is referred to the main characters of the story named Victor Frankenstein who is a young man interested in knowledge and science. From her real life, Mary employed direct parallels and people who were around her to the situations, events and figures in the novel to show that the goal of this novel is more than just to shock and scare. The creature, which is shown in this novel, is created without any female companion by its side. This is a clear warning to science and a mark of women marginalization in literature and society. The same way, the life of Mary had...
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Shelley, Mary: Frankenstein, or, the Modern Prometheus. Wordsworth Editions Limited. 1993, pp. 6-9. http://www.rc.umd.edu/editions/frankenstein/textual.html
Sunstein, Emily W. Romance and Reality. Johns Hopkins Paperbacks edition. Baltimore: The John Hopkins UP, 1991, pp. 2-237. http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=S4Q0Yv_7tawC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Sunstein,+Emily+W.+Romance+and+Reality.+Johns+Hopkins+Paperbacks+edition&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Oi9RUpu5KMTQtAaR6YEw&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Sunstein%2C%20Emily%20W.%20Romance%20and%20Reality.%20Johns%20Hopkins%20Paperbacks%20edition&f=false
Zimmerman, Lee. "Frankenstein, Invisibility, and Nameless Dread." American Imago 60.2: 135-158. Project Muse. John Hopkins U. Kingwood Coll. Lib., Kingwood. 2007, pp. 65-123. https://muse.jhu.edu/login?auth=0&type=summary&url=/journals/american_imago/v060/60.2zimmerman.html
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus. Edited with an Introduction and notes by Maurice Hindle. Penguin books, 1992
Victor Frankenstein: The Real Monster. & nbsp; Science is a broad field that covers many aspects of everyday life and existence. Some areas of science include the study of the universe, the environment, dinosaurs, animals, and insects. Another popular science is the study of people and how they function. In Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, Dr. Victor Frankenstein is an inspiring scientist who studies the dead. He wants to be the first person to give life to a dead human being. He spends all of his Frankenstein is to blame for the tragedy, not the monster he has created, because he is the mastermind behind the whole operation, and he is supposed to have everything under control, working properly as a good scientist should. & nbsp; Although some critics say that the monster Victor has created is to blame for the destruction and violence that followed the experiment, it is Victor who is the responsible party. First, Victor, being the scientist, should have known how to do research on the subject a lot more than he had done. He obviously has not thought of the consequences that may result from it such as the monster going crazy, how the monster reacts to people and things, and especially the time it will take him to turn the monster into the perfect normal human being.  something that would take a really long time and a lot of patience which Victor lacks. All Victor really wants is to be the first to bring life to a dead person and therefore be famous. The greed got to his head and that is all he could think about, while isolating himself from his friends and family. In the play of Frankenstein, when Victor comes home and sets up his lab in the house, he is very paranoid about people coming in there and & nbsp; I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I deprived myself of rest and health. 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. (156) & nbsp; Victor is saying that he has isolated himself for two years and in the end, he is not at all happy because of the bad outcome. He also adds, "Winter, spring and summer passed.so deeply was I engrossed in my occupation" (156). By spending most of his time inside on his experiment, never going out, but mostly worrying about his success, he has got himself crazier. This has made him lose sight of his surroundings and judgment & nbsp; Moreover, the monster should not be held responsible for killing Victor's family members and friends as shown in the book and movie, because it is Victor who has brought a dead creature back to life. He expects the monster to know everything when he wakes up cool, calm, and collected. But when the monster is awakened, he does not know anything. He sees a world different from what he is used to, which makes him get nervous and scared, so he&nb has removed him from dead. With the dawning of life, the monster has to learn about his new environment. In the play of Frankenstein, the monster starts to gradually get used to things. The problems he encounters are with Victor's assistant, Peter Krempe, Victor's friend, Henry, and other family members, including Elizabeth, and these are reactions to how these people treat him. These reactions are clearly shown in the movie of Young Frankenstein, where Victor tries to teach the monster how to live like to show off the monster to an audience in a dance routine of sorts. But then people start to scream, panic and throw things at the monster, so he reacts by attacking them to defend himself. In this case, it is clear that Victor tries to push the monster too hard because he wants to be famous.
Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, Walter James Miller, and Harold Bloom. Frankenstein, Or, The Modern Prometheus. New York: New American Library, 2000. Print.
“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.
The literary elements of remote and desolate settings, a metonymy of gloom and horror, and women in distress, clearly show “Frankenstein” to be a Gothic Romantic work. Mary Shelley used this writing style to effectively allow the reader to feel Victor Frankenstein’s regret and wretchedness. In writing “Frankenstein” Mary Shelley wrote one the most popular Gothic Romantic novels of all time.
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus. Edited with an Introduction and notes by Maurice Hindle. Penguin books, 1992
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus. The 1818 Text. New York: Oxford UP, 1998.
Shelley, Mary. “Frankenstein.” In A Norton Critical Edition. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. 1996.
Romantic writer Mary Shelley’s gothic novel Frankenstein does indeed do a lot more than simply tell story, and in this case, horrify and frighten the reader. Through her careful and deliberate construction of characters as representations of certain dominant beliefs, Shelley supports a value system and way of life that challenges those that prevailed in the late eighteenth century during the ‘Age of Reason’. Thus the novel can be said to be challenging prevailant ideologies, of which the dominant society was constructed, and endorsing many of the alternative views and thoughts of the society. Shelley can be said to be influenced by her mothers early feminist views, her father’s radical challenges to society’s structure and her own, and indeed her husband’s views as Romantics. By considering these vital influences on the text, we can see that in Shelley’s construction of the meaning in Frankenstein she encourages a life led as a challenge to dominant views.
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.
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus. Edited with an Introduction and notes by Maurice Hindle. Penguin books, 1992
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein or; The Modern Prometheus, published in 1818, is a product of its time. Written in a world of social, political, scientific and economic upheaval it highlights human desire to uncover the scientific secrets of our universe, yet also confirms the importance of emotions and individual relationships that define us as human, in contrast to the monstrous. Here we question what is meant by the terms ‘human’ and ‘monstrous’ as defined by the novel. Yet to fully understand how Frankenstein defines these terms we must look to the etymology of them. The novel however, defines the terms through its main characters, through the themes of language, nature versus nurture, forbidden knowledge, and the doppelganger motif. Shelley also shows us, in Frankenstein, that although juxtaposing terms, the monstrous being everything human is not, they are also intertwined, in that you can not have one without the other. There is also an overwhelming desire to know the monstrous, if only temporarily and this calls into question the influence the monstrous has on the human definition.
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s Frankenstein (sometimes also known as The Modern Prometheus) is the classic gothic novel of her time. In this eerie tale, Dr. Victor Frankenstein – suffering from quite an extreme superiority complex – brings to life a creature made from body parts of deceased individuals from nearby cemeteries. Rather than to embrace the Creature as his own, Frankenstein alienates him because of his unpleasant appearance. Throughout the novel, the Creature is ostracized not only by Frankenstein but by society as a whole. Initially a kind and gentle being, the Creature becomes violent and eventually seeks revenge for his creator’s betrayal. Rather than to merely focus on the exclusion of the Creature from society, Shelley depicts the progression of Dr. Frankenstein’s seclusion from other humans as well, until he and the Creature ultimately become equals – alone in the world with no one to love, and no one to love them back. Frankenstein serves as more than simply a legendary tale of horror, but also as a representation of how isolation and prejudice can result in the demise of the individual.
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. ...
Mary Shelley becomes mother at the age of seventeen. But unfortunately, her first daughter dies after several days. This trauma seems to be hard for her to recover. It affects her a lot. She is such a strong young woman who can suffer the loss of her first eleven days old daughter. Fr...