Heroism In Frankenstein: The Modernization Of The Prometheus

The modernisation of the Prometheus myth does not completely validate Frankenstein’s actions, however, even if we see overreaching as an acceptable form of heroism. Certainly, the moment of endowing ‘the spark of life’ (52) in the monster can be seen as akin to the deliverance of Promethean fire – updated as electricity – but the preparation of the physiology of the creature undermines this. Although he forms the monster out of ‘lifeless clay’ (81), in reference to Prometheus sculpting man from clay in versions of the myth, Frankenstein’s work is notably ‘filthy’ (81) and involves a great deal of ‘painful labour’ (79) which physically sickens him. He becomes ‘oppressed by a slow fever’ (83) compared to his previous ‘excellent health’. Hence,

While we possess thee, thy changes ever lovely, thy vernal airs or majestic storms, thy vast creation spread at our feet, above, around us, how can we call ourselves unhappy? There is a brotherhood in the growing, opening flowers, love in the soft winds, repose in the verdant expanse, and a quick spirit of happy life throughout, with which our souls hold glad communion; but the poor prisoner was barred from these: how cumbrous the body felt, how alien to the inner spirit of man, the fleshy bars that allowed it to become slave of his fellows

She grew up with an unconventional religious background, first under the influence of her father, the philosopher and ‘humanist’ William Godwin, and in her late teens, she also developed a relationship with ‘atheist’ Percy Shelley (Bloom 10). However, it should be noted that Percy Shelley’s professed beliefs deviate from what is now understood as atheism. For example, in his pamphlet on the subject, entitled ‘The Necessity of Atheism’, he advocates rational inquiry can only come to the conclusion that ‘there is no God’, but he adds the caveat that ‘this negation must be understood solely to affect a creative Deity’ and that ‘the hypothesis of a pervading Spirit co-eternal with the universe remains unshaken’ (Necessity 14). The pervading Spirit, that seems to present itself in the aforementioned passage of Mary Shelley’s Falkner, is also evident in his creative works such as ‘Mount Blanc’ where it is the ‘everlasting universe of things’ suffusing through both the cosmos and mind (Works 196). Likewise, in the ‘Hymn to Intellectual Beauty’, there is an ‘unseen power’ of the ‘Spirit of Beauty’ which gives the light of ‘grace and truth to life’s unquiet dream’ (Works 195). Percy Shelley, therefore, roots divinity deeply in nature; ‘gods’ are merely a falsity born from an ‘ignorance of nature’ and so ‘knowledge of nature is