Here is my essay copied and pasted below. Glad that's done!
Heather Baskins
Cline
English 102
October 13, 2011
Frankenstein in Context
Frankenstein is a story of two similar beings- one human and one a monster. Frankenstein focuses on the main character, Victor Frankenstein, and his unfathomable loss but his extraordinary creation of a monster that he fears yet resembles at the same time. Through this monster, Victor creates a being that carries out his revenge, but it ends up being used on Victor.
Victor Frankenstein is portrayed by the author Mary Shelley, as a victim of loss and heartbreak from the beginning of this story. When he opens himself up and tells his story he begins with the loss of his own mother. He described his feelings by saying, “I need not describe the feelings of those whose dearest ties are rent by that most irreparable evil, the void that presents itself to the soul, and the despair that is exhibited on the countenance” (Shelley, Frankenstein, pg. 25.). Victor has such a sense of grief and loss that he says it is “irreparable evil,” letting the reader know that he has no sympathy for death or grief and considers them an enemy. This evil can cause a person or creature to do things that cannot be predicted, as George Levine stated in his summary, “Evil is a deadly and fascinating mystery originating in men’s minds as an inexplicable but inescapable aspect of human goodness” (Levine, Frankenstein and the Tradition of Realism, pg. 208). Because Victor feels such loss and pain it could lead him to find a way to release his anger towards this evil which will then seek revenge against him.
Victor’s creation of a monster is an outlet for his revenge. When Victor first creates his monster he is pleased with the beauty but then his feelings of fear and the ugliness within got the best of him:
“The different accidents of life are not so changeable, as the feelings of human nature. I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life in 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” (Shelley, Frankenstein, pg. 34.)
From the beginning of the monster’s creation, he was cursed, treated as an outcast and not wanted by anyone. Knight’s Quarterly says of Frankenstein’s creation of him, “he heaps on him all sorts of abuse and contumely for his ugliness, which was directly his work, and for his crimes to which his neglect gave rise” (Anonymous, Knight’s Quarterly, pg. 199). Victor creates this monster and instead of destroying and preventing the death of his loved ones, he allows the creature to roam free on his own to figure the world out alone. Victor lives in fear of the creature and knows he has power but does not stop him. This lack of response shows Victor is willing to let this creature roam free and carry out his plans, are they his plans or Victor’s thoughts being put into action?
Victor ends up alone because of the evil actions his monster has achieved. Victor’s creation learns how to speak, read, and be clever and conniving. He uses his skills to seek revenge on his own creator, killing those closest to him. Victor will not
create a partner for his monster, and the monster will not let Victor live in wedded happiness with his partner. Victor knows Elizabeth his beloved will not survive, but he does nothing to stop it because he and the monster are destined to be alone- with only each other. Victor in fact cried out in the cemetery when visiting the graves of his brother, William, his beloved Elizabeth and his Father, “I swear to pursue the daemon, who caused this misery until he or I shall perish in mortal conflict” (Shelley, Frankenstein, pg. 140). The pursuit of the monster continues for Victor and it seems this is what both beings are living for. As George Levine says in his summary, “they increasingly resemble and depend upon each other so that by the end Frankenstein pursues his own monster, their positions reversed, and the monster plants clues to keep Frankenstein in pursuit” (Levine, Frankenstein and the Tradition of Realism, pg. 209). Victor continues on his solo journey in pursuit and not knowing what the outcome will be.
Victor and the monster continue in their pursuit, but the end is disenchanting. Victor continues in pursuit of the monster, follows his clues, and risks his life to find him. In the end Victor dies in a peaceful fashion, “he pressed my hand feebly, and his eyes closed for ever, while the irradiation of a gentle smile passed away from his lips” (Shelley, Frankenstein, pg. 152). He died without capturing, killing, or stopping his monster. His monster pays him one last visit on the ship when he has taken his final breath and knows that his days are numbered as well and he has no reason to live:
“But soon,” he cried, with sad and solemn enthusiasm, “I shall die, and what I now feel be no longer felt. Soon these burning miseries will be extinct. I shall ascend my funeral pile triumphantly, and exult in the agony of the torturing flames. The light o that conflagration will fade away; my ashes will be swept into the sea by the winds. My spirit will sleep in peace; or if it thinks, it will not surely think thus. Farewell.”’
The monster has no further reason to live and Victor could not keep up the chase. The end result is anticlimactic and readers are left feeling disappointed and left with no real purpose to the story. As Hugh Reginald Haweis said in his summary:
“The general conception of a creature created non-natural by the appliance of art and science, and impelled into crime after crime simply by a despairing contest with a world into which he should never have been introduced at all, is certainly powerful; but the tale of horror is unrelieved by any real poetical justice, and the moral threat- if there is any- is vague and indeterminate” (Haweis, Introduction to the Routledge World Library Edition, pg. 200).
Victor and the monster never met to battle or accomplish a purpose in the end or even throughout their journey. Ultimately, Victor died from his pursuit and the monster gave up living, one can assume, because of the lack of pursuit.
To end with, Frankenstein is a story of two similar beings- one human and one a monster. Victor and the monster both suffered loss and sought revenge for the evil they faced. Victor’s creation of the monster can be perceived as his own outlet for revenge- against others and ultimately turning on himself. Victor ends up alone because of the monsters’ actions and pursuing his own creation. The end result is disenchanting, Victor dies from his efforts to chase and catch his own creation, and his creation in the end gives up because of Victor’s absence. Victor was surrounded by people who loved and cared for him, but he seemed to thrive and feel the most emotion only when he was abandoned and left alone. The monster on the other hand was so in need of companionship that he was willing to kill for it. Victor and the monster were one in the same- what one lacked the other had but still could not be complete in the end. They were two similar beings- one human and one a monster.
Works Cited
Anonymous. Knight’s Quarterly. 1824. Print.
Hawes, Hugh Reginald. Introduction to the Routledge World Library Edition.
1886. Print.
Levine, George. Frankenstein and the Tradition of Realism. 1973. Print.
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1996. Print.
