Power Struggle In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein '

In reality, he is disgusted by the sight of his creation so he abandons it leaving it all alone in the world without any guidance and runs away to the next room. Victor himself suffered from being a social outcast and now he bestowed the same feeling onto the creature by abandoning him. By treating the creature as an outcast, “he will become wicked … divide him, a social being, from society, and you impose upon him the irresistible obligations—malevolence and selfishness” (Caldwell). Not only is Victor selfish for abandoning his creature but he is shallow as well. Instead of realizing that he achieved his goal of bringing life to an inanimate body he runs way because of how hideous it is. "Never did I behold a vision so horrible as his face, of such loathsome, yet appalling hideousness. I shut my eyes involuntarily" (Shelley 228). Even Walton is repulsed by the creature’s

In life there are many evils that will try to defeat a person but the key to living a happy, fulfilling life is learning to have empathy for others who are facing their own evils. Empathy is hard to have if a person has not endured any real struggles in their life. Being able to know firsthand how it feels to go through difficulties helps create a level of empathy that leads to compassion for one another. Victor Frankenstein is a prime example of someone who has faced evils in their own life but in the end did not find compassion for others, instead he found his own hell. In the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, Victor’s lack of empathy opens the door into his world of selfishness, cruelty, and unhappiness.

Victor had two loving parents that gave him everything he ever needed or wanted to fulfill his physiological and emotional needs. Since Victor did not do this for his monster, the monster would kill all of Victor’s family and friends that he loved which would bring destruction to Victor’s life. For the rest of his days, Victor would go on a search for his monster to destroy it or die trying. Unlike Victor, the monster was never loved because of the way he looked. He was left alone, even by his creator, and lived a miserable life always escaping people that would “attacked [him], until, grievously bruised by stones and many other kinds of missile weapons” (Shelley). This caused a lot of anger for the monster, and he would then release this anger onto Victor to make him pay for abandonment. In the end Victor’s death was “caused by his creature” or really by “his own vengeful pursuit of it” (Lowe-Evans). The monsters death was through “self-immolation” because of the murders he committed to get back at Victor (Lowe- Evans). Both man and monster life was ended in cruel

Knowledge has the capability to be used for both good and evil. In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, there is a consistent message throughout the novel showing the dangerous and destructive power that knowledge can have. Two key characters, Victor Frankenstein and his monster, are shaped through their obsessions with knowledge and the power and responsibility that it brings. Ultimately, Victor’s downfall is a result of his uncontrollable thirst for knowledge, and is brought about through the monster which is the embodiment of his obsession.

Frankenstein. A name that is known around the world. Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein, wrote this classic in 1818 when she was 19 years old. Mary Shelley did not anticipate that her book would grow to be this well known. Though she did plan how the book’s motifs and themes would be significant, including internal conflict. The internal conflict in Frankenstein creates interest because it evokes emotion from the reader, causes character motivation, and displays dynamic characters.

He initiates the hostile relationship, threatening the creation, “We are enemies. Begone, or let us try our strength in a fight in which one must fall” (103). Just as Victor abandons the creation from the day he creates him, Victor demands for the creation to leave him. Victor’s first instinct is to escape, avoiding his creature, and the responsibility he has to him as the creator. He rejects love in the relationship, while the creation seeks it from his estranged author. Victor manifests hatred onto the embryonic creation, assuming the creature is programmed with evil nature. Instead, the creature, who desires affection, consumes his aversion and mirrors it. As Victor’s resentment becomes clear for the creation, he too forms animosity, forcing Victor to promise him happiness in the form of a female counterpart. Victor undertakes the promise, but reneges on it. He “destroy[s] the creature on whose future existence [the creation] depend[s] for happiness” and watches the creation, “with a howl of devilish despair and revenge, withdr[a]w.” (171). Victor describes the creation as “devilish”, but the “devilish” nature is a direct result of Victor’s actions. He agrees to deliver happiness, but accomplishes the opposite. Victor knows

He has spent almost two years of his life completely focused on his task, even at the expense of his own personal well being. Yet his beautiful dream is now completely gone and all Victor sees is horror. With the same amount of intensity that he desired to complete his task, he now desires to take back and forget the experience. Victor is “unable to endure the aspect of the being [he] had created”. He genuinely cannot stand the sight of the creature. If there was a person who should be able to overcome the creature’s physical presence, it is Victor. Not only is Victor the creator, but he also put so much of his own time and effort into the creature. But the creature’s body is too hideous. Furthermore, Victor attributes his change in feeling to “human nature”. This contrasts with the horrifying description that the reader is just given of the creature. Here Victor is explaining the creature’s disgusting body, and explaining his reaction to it as human nature.

Victor creates the Creature with the ideals of making it a paragon as he states, “[...] I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful! Great God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath” (60), however, he was in a state of semblance believing his creation was preeminent. Victor selfishly creates the Creature to gain prestige, pretentiously claiming himself as a human god when he succeeds and saying it was for the sake of humanity. In reality, he creates a grotesque being and abandons it the moment his illusions shatter, making the creature a victim because he denies the responsibility of raising it causing hardships for it. Victor also believes the creature is a reprobative individual since it kills his brother and foists Justine’s execution, thus he acts inimical towards it throughout the whole novel as he invectively exclaims, “Abhorred monster! Fiend that thou art! The tortures of hell are too mild a vengeance for thy crimes” (93). He is fully aware he the root of all problems, yet he believes the Creature to be censurable and denying to give it a chance of salvation when he breaks his promise and destroys the female creature he was working on; his actions result in his father and Elizabeth’s deaths. This also makes the

“Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change.” (Mary Shelley Quotes). Mary Shelley publishes Frankenstein in 1818. The novel includes many interesting events. By her choice of words readers are hooked to think Victor is the antagonist. Victor creates the Creature, but there are many situations throughout the novel where the Monster displays as the victim. He seeks love from different people, but everyone treats him bad. His anger towards his father drives him to kill Victor’s family. The Monster later feels devastated for the murders he commits. All the monster wants is love. The Monster is the victim because his creator abandons him, his appearance affects his relationship with the people he meets, and his desire to feel loved.

Due to neglect and immediate abandonment during the beginning of his life, the creature develops a hostile attitude and seeks revenge on Victor Frankenstein. In response to the cottage dwellers attacking him, the creature exclaims “cursed, cursed creator! Why did I live? Why, in that instant, did I not extinguish the spark of existence of which you had so wantonly bestowed” and reveals his feelings “of rage and revenge” (Shelley 135). Because the creature only experiences negative encounters with society, he becomes aware of his societal status as an

Power, the one thing everybody desires, plays a major role in the lives of the characters of Frankenstein. Throughout the story, Shelley frequently emphasizes the theme of power and the constant struggle that the characters face to gain power over themselves and others. The two main characters, Victor Frankenstein and The Creature, show the most struggle for power throughout the story, both internally and over each other. They look to gain power of knowledge, power of themselves and power over one another. This struggle for power creates a constantly shifting dynamic amongst characters.

How does Mary Shelley’s construction of the secondary characters reflect upon the protagonist? Throughout Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, character parallels and analogies between Victor Frankenstein and the creature are strongly emphasized. More evidently, the character doubles between the creator, Victor, and his creature are presented through their demeanor, their desires, and their demands. Shelley emphasizes parallelisms of nature, alienation and vengeance to underscore their similarities, leading some readers to interpret Victor and his creature being so similar that indeed, they are the same person. Both lonely and outcasts in the world, Victor and his creation live forlorn and dreary lives, hungry for the love of another, desperate for

Soon after Victor creates the monster he falls into depression and illness. Victor was found in his room by his longtime friend Henry Clerval. “‘My dear Victor,’ cried he, ‘what, for God's sake, is the matter? Do not laugh in that manner. How ill you are! What is the cause of all this’” (47)? Henry took care of Victor and nursed him back to health. Victor could not tell Henry what caused his illness, because he was too ashamed to tell him. After his illness, he grew very worried of what the creature is capable of doing. He returned home and learned that his youngest brother William was strangled. Victor immediately knew that his creation was responsible for his brother’s murder. Justine is accused of William’s murder and is sentenced to death. Victor is worried that if he tells everyone the truth that they will think he is crazy and put the blame on him. Lastly, Victor changes from happy to scared. He is scared of what the creature will do next. Victor is approached by the creature on the mountain. The creature asks Victor to create a female mate for him. Victor, being too scared to say no, agrees and goes to London to start on the female

It is quite telling that the most severe punishment in our society other than the death penalty or torture is solitary confinement. Although, isolation is in itself a form of torture, it can drive someone to the brink of insanity. Although published nearly 200 years ago, Mary Shelley clearly understood the potential detrimental effects of isolation, as demonstrated in her famous novel, Frankenstein, where both main characters, Victor Frankenstein and his creation, suffer from and cause isolation for the other. Mary Shelley directs the reader to believe that isolation is the true evil, not the monster, Victor or any emotion inside of them. At the beginning of the novel, Victor is isolated from other people, causing to forget his scientific

An eye for an eye or the law of retaliation is the principle most people live their lives by. As Gandhi once stated, “an eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind” (Gandhi). For the characters in Frankenstein, this concept is apparent as the main character, Victor, creates a monster and instantly abandons him which sets off the chain of events revolving around revenge. Throughout the novel, the creature and Victor engage in a recurring cycle of vengeance, but these acts of revenge are bittersweet as in the end it destroys both of them. In the novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley reveals how revenge consumes and destroys those who surrender to it.