Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein is a Gothic novel that contains two genres, science fiction and Gothicism. The novel is a first person narrative that uses a framing technique, where a story is told within a story. Shelley gives the book a distinctive gothic mood tone by the use of her chosen setting which is dark and gloomy, by doing this it reflects the hideousness of the creature; the point of views helps towards the realism of the novel; and characterization able the reader to interact with the characters and feel sympathy or hatred towards each one. To entice the readers into her suspenseful novel Shelley uses foreshadowing. The narrative structure shows a wide range of perspectives rather than just one, by doing this it provides the reader with greater insight of the characters personalities. Symbolism and imagery evokes the readers’ emotions where sympathy is concerned. Shelley has entwined these techniques to produce a novel where the readers’ sympathy jumps from character to character and moral judgements are made due to the characters actions.

The weather is also important in the novel as it adds to the atmosphere. For instance on a ‘dreary night of November’ (p38 Frankenstein) the creature is born and during ‘a heavy storm of rain’ where the wind ‘rose with great violence’ (p164 Frankenstein) Elizabeth is murdered. The connection between the two is that the reader can sense when something bad/traumatic is going to happen due to the weather alone. However doom and gloomy weather does not fill the entire novel. When Spring is present the creature feels ‘emotions of gentleness and pleasure, that had long appeared dead, revive within [him]. Half...

... middle of paper ...

...ses the readers emotions through figurative language for example the tone of the creatures narrative is very sullen, therefore when those sections are read we feel his sadness and understand the suffering he has went through which causes us to sympathise with him. Gothic and realistic techniques give the sense of realism. The combination of all of the above techniques used to write Frankenstein has produced a novel that evokes our moral judgements and sympathy.

Bibliography

The Open University (2006), Approaching Literature, The Realist Novel, Milton Keynes, The Open University.

The Open University (2006), Approaching Literature, Approaching Prose Fiction, Milton Keynes, The Open University.

Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, Oxford 1998