“Learn from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge and how much happier that man is who believes his native town to be the world, than he who aspires to become greater than his nature will allow” (54).
A cautionary, moralistic tale about the dangers of modern science –indeed a foundational text in the genre of science fiction—Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus is a grotesque horror novel about the cataclysmic results that unfold when one lone scientist discovers the godlike secret of creating life. This chilling Gothic tale was first conceived when Mary Shelley (then Mary Godwin) was only a teenager and living with her lover, Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, on Lake Geneva. Mary was the daughter of two London radicals –William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft—but her famous mother died of an infection just eleven days after giving birth (maternal mortality was a tragically common occurrence in those days). When she grew up, Mary met and fell in love with one of her father’s followers, Percy Bysshe Shelley, then a married man. Nevertheless, despite her father’s wishes, Mary and Percy eloped as they traveled around Europe together. However, Percy was heavily indebted and he was still technically tied to his first wife, Harriet, who had just given birth to a child, so their romance was far from blissful. Shortly thereafter, Mary also gave birth to a daughter who died prematurely; while she and Percy were almost certainly having affairs with other people (for example, Percy was having an affair with Mary’s stepsister Claire). Mary gave birth to three more of Percy’s children (only one of whom survived –Percy Florence), at the same time he began suffering from panic attacks and delusions. Mary’s half-sister, Fanny, then killed herself in 1816; followed by the suicide of Percy’s first wife, Harriet, in 1816 (the same year Percy and Mary were married); and in 1922, Percy drowned in a boating accident at the age of twenty-nine. His badly decomposed body washed ashore several days later; his friends built a large funeral pyre to honor his memory. Ensconced in sorrow, Mary took young Percy Florence back to London where she continued to write and care for her father until her death in 1851.
I offer this brief biographical sketch to grant some context to the writing of Frankenstein –a deeply elemental, primordial, biological, and even existential novel. Frankenstein is a dark Faustian tale about a creature who is pieced together from various cadaver parts by an obsessive scientist who is then tormented by his own creation and regretful of his decision to trespass into the shadowy Gothic borderland between mortal and supernatural worlds. Frankenstein was first conceived on the cusp of great tragedy in Mary Godwin’s life (soon to be Mary Shelley) as she traveled to Lake Geneva with Percy Shelley and her stepsister Claire Clairmont where they planned to spend one rainy summer with Lord Byron and his physician John Polidori. One evening, at the suggestion of Lord Byron, the group began amusing themselves with a friendly competition –creating original German ghost tales– and the idea for Frankenstein apparently came to Mary in a dream. It was during this competition that Lord Byron produced his famous unfinished horror story “A Fragment” which later inspired his physician John Polidori to pen “The Vampyre: A Tale,” the first modern vampire story.
The structure of Frankenstein is fascinating. It is an epistolary novel and a framed narrative conveyed via a series of letters from a lonely, twenty-eight-year-old explorer named Captain Robert Walton who is leading an expedition in search of the furthest northern point on Earth, the region beyond which any man has ever traveled. He documents his voyage in a series of letters from St. Petersburg to his sister Mrs. Margaret Saville who lives in England, but the tone is ominous, not unlike Dracula, as Walton casts off for the far reaches of the earth (he calls upon the stars to bear witness, perhaps a nod to the dark deeds in Shakespeare’s tragedies like Macbeth). By believing he is conferring a “benefit upon all mankind” he feels exceedingly optimistic and even justified in his voyage, forgetting the old adage that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. But Walton’s expedition soon runs aground in northern Russia as the ship becomes entrapped in ice and the crew spots a large, mysterious figure followed by a carriage; then “a being which had the shape of a man” is rescued –“his limbs were nearly frozen, and his body dreadfully emaciated by fatigue and suffering. I never saw a man in so wretched a condition.” The man bears an expression of wildness, even madness, but he responds kindly to acts of compassion, despite being generally of a “melancholy and despairing” demeanor.
“Strange and harrowing must be his story, frightful the storm which embraced the gallant vessel on its course and wrecked it –thus!” (32).
This mystery man is soon revealed to be Victor Frankenstein, a Genevese (Swiss) man of distinguished blood, born in Naples, Italy. After several days of recovery, Frankenstein offers his whole backstory to Captain Walton. Frankenstein relates that his father rescued the orphaned daughter of an impoverished friend and then married her when his friend died (the two became Victor’s parents); and the Frankensteins later adopted an orphan named Elizabeth whom Victor married. Victor traveled to Ingolstadt for his university studies to investigate a variety of topics –dabbling in alchemy, chemistry, anatomy, the human frame, and so on. “I confess that neither the structure of languages, nor the code of governments, nor the politics of various states possessed attractions for me. It was the secrets of heaven and earth that I desired to learn; and whether it was the outward substance of things, or the inner spirit of nature and the mysterious soul of man that occupied me, still my enquiries were directed to the metaphysical, or in its highest sense, the physical secrets of the world” (39). He studied alongside a friend and partner named Henry Clerval. Notably, during Frankenstein’s lengthy story, I took note of a natural kinship between Captain Walton’s mission to reach the ends of the earth and Victor Frankenstein’s similar quest to uncover the physical secrets of the world. Both are extremes, pushing the boundaries of human knowledge, though Frankenstein’s unfettered inquiry is shown to be a thing of its own, a kind of transgression into divine knowledge; the secret of life, the ability to conquer death. As Frankenstein says to Captain Walton: “You seek for knowledge and wisdom, as I once did; and I ardently hope that the gratification of your wishes may not be a serpent to sting you, as mine has been… I imagine you may deduce an apt moral from my tale; one that may direct you in your undertaking, and console you in case of failure” (31).
“The world to me was a secret which I desired to divine” (38).
Soon, with his mind set on re-animating life, Frankenstein turns to isolating himself in dissecting rooms and a nearby slaughterhouse which furnishes him with grotesque materials. He retreats into his laboratory for long hours, day and night, in pursuit of his Faustian ambition, searching for the Philosopher’s Stone or the Elixir of Life. And then one “dreary night” in November, he finally accomplishes his dark task when the spark of life suddenly ignites in an inanimate limb… but Frankenstein immediately regrets his experiment:
“After days and nights of incredible labour and fatigue, I succeeded in discovering the cause of generation and life; nay, more, I became myself capable of bestowing animation upon lifeless matter” (53)
“One secret which I alone possessed was the hope to which I had dedicated myself; and the moon gazed on my midnight labours, while, with unrelaxed and breathless eagerness, I pursued nature to her hiding-places. Who shall conceive the horrors of my secret toil as I dabbled among the unhallowed damps of the grave or tortured the living animal to animate the lifeless clay?” (55).
“It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs… 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 into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself 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” (58).
Like a mummy out of hell –the likes of which even Dante couldn’t conceive– the unnatural Creature is described as terrifying and grotesque to look upon. When Frankenstein sees the Creature begin to move about in the night, he flees in terror only to return later to find that the Creature has vanished! What has he unleashed upon the world?
In Volume II, time has passed and Frankenstein returns home after his brother William has been killed, with the nanny Justine taking the blame, but Frankenstein soon discovers that William’s death was actually at the hands of the “filthy daemon to whom I had given life.” As Frankenstein goes walking through the mountains to a neighboring town in order to calm his mind, he says, “…I suddenly beheld the figure of a man, at some distance, advancing toward me at superhuman speed… I perceived, as the shape came nearer (sight tremendous and abhorred!) that it was the wretch whom I had created” (101). In shock, the Creature approaches Frankenstein (revealing that he can now communicate), and he endeavors to tell his own life story to his maker. Thus the novel descends into another layer of flashback.
After leaving Frankenstein’s laboratory, the Creature explains that he traveled extensively and came to the realization that he only inspires anger and terror among humans. He exhibits many of the “blank slate” curiosities of Locke and Rousseau –he is a Creature devoid society– however, he is nevertheless a permanent outcast. Eventually he finds a family living in a cottage and he quietly observes them from a distance. Over time, he learns how to communicate with other humans by observing this family’s words and actions –he is aided by the acquisition of a few classic books like Paradise Lost, Plutarch’s Lives, and The Sorrows of Young Werther. But things go awry when the Creature decides to reveal himself to the family, and once again, he is forced to flee, lamenting his own existence.
“Cursed, cursed creature! Why did I live? Why, in that instant, did I not extinguish the spark of existence which you had so wantonly bestowed? I know not; despair had not yet taken possession of me; my feelings were those of rage and revenge” (138).
“Why did I not die? more miserable than man ever was before, why did I not sink into forgetfulness and rest? Death snatches away many blooming children, the only hopes of their doating parents: how many brides and youthful lovers have been one day in the bloom of health and hope, and the next a prey for worms and the decay of the tomb! Of what materials was I made, that I could thus resist so many shocks, which, like the turning of the wheel, continually renewed the torture” (181).
One of the more maddening aspects of Frankenstein’s Creature is his elusiveness. Is he villainous? Perhaps evil? Or is he sympathetic? Even pitiable? The novel remains remarkably tight-lipped. Regardless, the Creature demands that Frankenstein create a female for him to enjoy –he desires a mate. This leads Frankenstein to venture back to England where he reluctantly embarks on the creation of another “foul,” “fiendish” being, stolen away in complete solitude using inanimate cadaver parts. But he soon abandons the project, claiming “never will I create another like yourself, equal in deformity and wickedness” (172)– which leads the Creature to angrily murder Frankenstein’s school friend, Henry Clerval, before also threatening vengeance on his whole family –“It is well. I go; but remember. I shall be with you on your wedding night.”
When Frankenstein is summoned home by his father to marry his betrothed, Elizabeth, the Creature fulfills his promise and brutally murders Elizabeth along with Frankenstein’s father, which pushes Frankenstein into a blind rage. He vows “fury and revenge” against his inhuman creation. He follows the Creature all across Europe and through Russia up into the icy north (the Romantic tradition on display in Frankenstein shows us a vast world that is both towering and expansive). Here, Frankenstein procures a sled and eventually becomes entrapped on an ice block over the tempestuous sea. He nearly manages to catch the Creature before being rescued by Captain Walton’s ship. And here ends Frankenstein’s story (in continuing the themes of realism as found in Cervantes’s Don Quixote, Captain Walton explains in another letter to his sister that he has faithfully copied all of Frankenstein’s story and that Frankenstein reviewed his notes and made some corrections and revisions, thus reminding us that we are relying on Captain Walton for this whole story).
In Volume III, we return to Captain Walton’s letters as the ship is trapped once again in ice and the crew is threatening to mutiny until Walton decides the expedition can no longer continue forward. They plan to turn back for home, just as Frankenstein falls deathly ill. With his last words, Frankenstein counsels Walton to avoid ambition. Captain Walton then leaves Frankenstein’s cabin but later returns to find a dead Victor Frankenstein lying in the arms of the hideous Creature who looms over him:
“I entered the cabin where lay the remains of my ill-fated and admirable friend. Over him hung a form which I cannot find words to describe – gigantic in stature, yet uncouth and distorted in its proportions. As he hung over the coffin, his face was concealed by long locks of ragged hair; but one vast hand was extended, in colour and apparent texture like that of a mummy” (221).
The horrifying Creature does not stay long. He escapes on an ice raft headed for the northernmost extremes of the world where he plans to commit himself to the flames on a funeral pyre. He leaps out the cabin window and “he was soon borne away by the waves, and lost in darkness and distance” (225). Thus concludes Frankenstein, a novel which takes us on a journey to the far reaches of human knowledge and human civilization, a horrifying tale which speculates that perhaps humanity has its own natural limits beyond which it should not trespass. Frankenstein has often been interpreted through a feminist lens, in addition to Marxist and Psychoanalytic interpretations, but perhaps the most compelling interpretation of the novel, in my view, is one which suggests Mary Shelley intended to write a counter-revolutionary novel (that is, against the spirit of the then-relatively recent French Revolution and its accompanying schools of thought). We might rightly place Frankenstein somewhere squarely in the era of Romanticism. The promise of a science-based rational political order, while preferable to the medieval theocratic order, still poses many problems for humanity. Unshakable faith in the inherent goodness of modern science and technology has brought about a revolution in the human condition over the past two centuries –with extraordinary breakthroughs in medicine and space travel—but it has also unleashed a foreboding seed of unfettered inquiry which might well cause the complete destruction of humanity –as evidenced in our present conundrum: a rapidly warming climate and the stockpiling of nuclear weapons. These twin existential crises are the two chief dilemmas of our age, and like Frankenstein chasing down his horrendous Creature, many thinkers today are still searching for ways to prevent these two human-caused catastrophes-in-waiting from threatening to eliminate life on earth.
In this respect, Frankenstein might rightly be read as a withering attack on idealism and the virtues of modern science. It blends together old world motifs of magic, witchcraft, alchemy, and the occult with modern scientific theories of biology and electrochemistry, as harnessed by one lone, fanatically-obsessed scientist searching for his own godlike command over the power of life itself. Likewise, with themes of mortality, existential dread, and anxiety over what science might uncover, Frankenstein is an atmospheric Gothic novel that reveals a dark truth to us about modernity. Mary Shelley once called the novel her own “hideous progeny” in the 1831 edition preface, though she also claims to avoid “prejudicing any philosophical doctrine of whatever kind.” Instead, her claim is that she sought to “speak to the mysterious fears of our nature and awaken thrilling horror.”
With its influences being many in number, including the seafaring adventure setting in the novel which reminds readers of other great swashbuckling travelogues like Robinson Crusoe, Rime of the Ancient Mariner, or Gulliver’s Travels; and its epistolary style which is a nod to the tradition of Samuel Richardson’s novels, like Pamela or Clarissa, as well as Henry Fielding’s satirical Shamela, and even Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther (a book which features prominently in Frankenstein as one of the Creature’s primary sources of education), there is a deep font of richness springing forth off the pages of Frankenstein. Of course, Cervantes’s Don Quixote looms large over Frankenstein with its faux sense of realism (apparently, Shelley was actually reading Cervantes while writing Frankenstein). Stretching across the storm-tossed globe from the safe, lush forests of Europe to the unforgiving, frigid tundra north of Russia, in Frankenstein we are offered a world of extremes as well as sublimity. And by invoking the Promethean myth, Shelley hearkens back to pre-Christian classical Greece, echoing a mythology that is more elemental and truly tragic in the human spirit when new discoveries like fire were awakened within the human consciousness, irreversibly changing the course of human life. And yet Shelley also points us toward the modern world of Christianity in her epigraph to the novel which is taken from Milton’s Paradise Lost:
“Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay
To mould me man? Did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote me?”
–this is a quotation from Adam in Milton’s Paradise Lost after being banished from the garden as he lashes out at God, reminding Him that he never asked to be born, and suggesting that God bear some blame for the unfortunate creation of humanity (according to the Christian tradition). In the same way, the Creature in Frankenstein also laments his very birth. Neither Adam nor the Creature are ever given a satisfying answer to the question of “why am I alive?” or “why has my creator abandoned me?” Accordingly, the happy accident of life yields more sorrow than joy. Therefore, who is the real monster in Frankenstein –the creation or the creator?
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein remains a potent example of Gothic horror blended with science fiction and Romanticism. It was also a deeply personal tale for Mary Shelley. Her private journals of the time reveal the portrait of a woman who was utterly despondent over the loss of a child, wishing to reanimate her ghostly child, yet knowing, unlike Victor Frankenstein, that life is chaotic, unpredictable, and not to be tampered with. She initially published Frankenstein anonymously in 1818 before a pair of further publications were released in 1823 and 1831. I read the Penguin Classics edition which offers a helpful series of appendices highlighting the differences between each published version –as well as a magnificent introduction written by Mary Shelley, herself, for the 1831 edition.
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus. Penguin Books, New York, NY. Third edition, published in 1831. The book was originally dedicated to Mary Shelley’s father, William Godwin.
Interesting to learn about the difficult life of the woman who created one of the most influential SF horror classics of all time. Thank you.