Sacrificing In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

How far can a man go before he hits a wall? In science, there seems to be no wall. But a barrier, a barrier of ethics. In modern times, man has turned himself into god with astonishing scientific advances. Vaccines, artificial intelligence, too many modern accommodations, and the subject of Mary Shelley's classic horror novel, giving life to the dead. In Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein is a scientist who brings a conglomeration of human and animal parts back from the dead. Despite his logical act of destroying the monster’s bride, Frankenstein still imprints hate, and hunts down his monster, making him the villain of his own story.

The novel Frankenstein brings to light many problems and situations that shed light on the faults of mankind. Cruelty was a huge factor in the novel; throughout Frankenstein is cruel to his body and to his creation. When he first makes the creature he runs from it, leaving the creature to fend for himself; even when reuniting with the creature he continues displays cruelty. The creature, in turn exhibits Victor cruelty right back. Within Frankenstein cruelty can be attributed, often affecting both Victor and the creature; serving as a crucial motivator and revealing their anger, pain, frustration till eventually both die.

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley is a gothic novel that tells the story of scientist, Victor Frankenstein, and his obsession with creating human life. This leads him to creating a gruesome monster made of body-parts stolen from grave yards, whom upon discovering his hideousness, the monster seeks revenge against his creator, causing Victor to regret the creation of his monster for the rest of his life. Shelley uses the literary elements of personification, imagery, and similes to give a vivid sense and visualization of Victor Frankenstein’s thoughts and feelings as well as to allow us to delve deeper into the monster’s actions and emotions.

Victor occupies the role of God in creating life. In contrast, the creature shows weaknesses though he is referred to as a ‘monster’ committing murder. The reader has the impression that for both it is important to have someone beside them. For Victor, it is his family, while the creature has no family and can only relate to his creator. Furthermore, both can be seen as wrongdoers as both cross socially established boundaries. While the monster crosses the border between life and death as well as humanity and bestiality, Victor resists moral guidelines of the society by creating the monster through

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

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

Beginning with Victor abandoning the creature at birth, the series of revenge and hatred-filled events begin to occur as both attempt to find justice and retribution. The creature stole the lives of everyone beloved by Victor, and Victor stole the monster’s chance at happiness by abandoning him. As the characters continuously harm each other, their isolation increases as well as their sanity. In the end, numerous family members perish, Victor Frankenstein dies of physical exhaustion, and the creature conveys his desire to

However, despite the fact that they have slight differences, when comparing their experiences and characterization, it is apparent that they are more similar than they are different. They are similar because, they both lived in isolation, were abandoned, and lived like outcasts in the modern society. They both lived in isolation because other people thought that they were different. For instance, Victor Frankenstein was left all alone at a tender age after the death of his mother, and he never got a feeling of having a family. In addition, Victor was obsessed with dead bodies and creating a being. Due to this, he was isolated from the society and he started creating his creature. His isolation persisted especially after he created a hideous being that brought destruction and pain to the people. Similarly, just like Victor, the creature lived in isolation because he was left alone by his creator after he created him. The monster never got a chance to experience a mother or fatherly love just like his creator. Moreover, he also lived in isolation because of his monstrous appearance that made people to reject him. Victor created a monstrous and deformed being that was feared and rejected by the society; this made the society to shun away from the creature leaving him all alone. Both the creature and his creator were outcasts and lived in isolation from the rest of the

In Frankenstein, Mary Shelley tells a fictitious tale of the scientist Victor Frankenstein executing his dream of forming life. As soon as his creation awakens, Frankenstein sprints away full of disappointment and dread. Consequently, this sparks the beginning of the creature’s infamous attitude of anger. Despite him carrying around the stereotype of emitting evil, the creature counters it throughout the novel. Part of the novel examines his immense kindness and his unavoidable loneliness. Unfortunately, those two, manageable emotions don’t last long due to his unmanageable rage outweighing them. Shelley conveys these three sentiments on pages 128-131 through imagery and tone in order to tie those rhetorical functions into the greater theme

Frankenstein’s creature places himself in a submissive position when he begs his creator to have mercy on him and asking the creator to “create a female for [him] with whom [he] can live in the interchange of those sympathies necessary for [his] being.” The monster continues by reassuring the creator of his independent intelligence and power over the creature by telling Frankenstein, “This you alone can do”. Here, the creature assumes a role of submissiveness and reliance on Frankenstein. Frankenstein’s monster gains the sympathy of the reader who, despite condemning the murder of innocent people, commiserate with the lonely creature who is in search of an acquaintance, which he will likely never find. The monster also displays power and aggressiveness over Frankenstein; “You are my creator; but I am your master; obey!” The monster wants to desolate Victor’s heart, not by killing him directly,

In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, a conflict as old as life itself emerges as the story progresses; parent versus posterity in a struggle for reconciliation.Victor Frankenstein and his creation become tied up in a constant battle as the creation seeks his origins, finding a horrifying truth; the creator had abandoned the creation. This central conflict derives from the creation of the creature, inability of Frankenstein to appreciate his creation, and the creation’s need for a parental figure. The conflict addresses themes of the book such as human desires for prestige, acceptance, and the intimacy of a relationship with one’s creator. Not only does Shelley capture the resentful conflict between a father and his “son”, but she derives this conflict from her own rebellious battle against her father.

There is no other creature in existence that is as communal and gregarious as human beings, due to this, whenever one feels deserted or segregated by the rest of society, they tend to become cold and bitter. In Frankenstein, or, The Modern Day Prometheus, Mary Shelley portrays the monster, as well as its creator, as outcasts from society. Although, Victor has a family, and a wife while the creature does not, Victor feels he is emotionally detached from the rest of his loved ones. Due to his emotional confinement, Victor feels that he cannot trust even his wife with the knowledge of the horrible creature in which he has created. This sense of being an

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley is a gothic horror novel about how, after weeks of being at sea, explorer Robert Walton comes across a very ill man named Victor Frankenstein. In a series of letters to his sister in England, he retells Victor’s story of the creation he made and how it forever changed his life. In the novel Frankenstein, readers know the real monster is Victor Frankenstein because he was selfish and only focused on himself, abandoned his creation, and let other people die as a result of his actions. In the beginning, Victor Frankenstein starts to show how selfish he truly is by ignoring his family’s requests to write letters to them while he is away. Instead, Frankenstein spends all of his time focusing on himself and bringing

Victor created a nameless being whom, is greatly held in great opprobrium. Due to this opprobrium the creature has a symbiotic hatred for Victor, which Victor arouses in him, and in the creature. For instance “Why in that instant did I not extinguish the spark of existence which you had so wantonly bestowed?”(Frankenstein 116) Victor’s progeny regrets being made since his creator does not love, embrace, and teach him as his scion. Victor resents his creation, just like his creation resents himself, and his creator. The unnamed being has a surrealistic image, which Victor highly detests. The novel shows that both the creature and Victor have a mutual desire for a mate. In the beginning of the novel, Victor is promised the hand of Elizabeth by his mother “All praises bestowed on her I received as made to a possession of my own.”(Frankenstein 21) Elizabeth in the novel exemplifies a sheep whose only purpose in life is to be slaughtered. The creature wants to be closer to humanity and in their likeness desires a companion. The mate which the creature wants is supposed to be in his likeness much like Adam and Eve. All beings desire a another one of their own to love. Besides the creature which Victor created being a mirror image of himself the creature is also the embodiment of Victor’s

The conflict between Victor and his creature is outlined in Frankenstein through the monster’s attempt to hurt Victor through the killing of William and Victor’s destruction of the creature’s future mate, representing how revenge often cultivates a normalization of immorality. Before William’s murder, the monster had been rejected by the DeLaceys and shot at for saving a young girl from drowning. As a result, the creature’s wish for revenge upon all