Frankenstein; or, The Modern
Prometheus is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary
Shelley (1797–1851) that tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a
young scientist who creates a sapient creature in an unorthodox
scientific experiment. Shelley started writing the story when she was
18, and the first edition was published anonymously in London on 1
January 1818, when she was 20. Her name first appeared in the second
edition published in Paris in 1821.
Shelley traveled through Europe in 1815
along the river Rhine in Germany, stopping in Gernsheim, 17
kilometers (11 mi) away from Frankenstein Castle, where two centuries
before, an alchemist engaged in experiments. She then journeyed to
the region of Geneva, Switzerland, where much of the story takes
place. The topics of galvanism and occult ideas were themes of
conversation among her companions, particularly her lover and future
husband Percy B. Shelley. In 1816, Mary, Percy and Lord Byron had a
competition to see who could write the best horror story. After
thinking for days, Shelley dreamt about a scientist who created life
and was horrified by what he had made, inspiring the novel.
Though Frankenstein is infused with
elements of the Gothic novel and the Romantic movement, Brian Aldiss
has argued that it should be considered the first true science
fiction story. In contrast to previous stories with fantastical
elements resembling those of later science fiction, Aldiss states the
central character "makes a deliberate decision" and
"turns to modern experiments in the laboratory" to
achieve fantastic results. It has had a considerable influence in
literature and popular culture and spawned a complete genre of horror
stories, films and plays.
Since the publication of the novel, the
name "Frankenstein" has often been used to refer to
the monster itself.
Summary
Frankenstein is written in the form of
a frame story that starts with Captain Robert Walton writing letters
to his sister. It takes place at an unspecified time in the 18th
century, as the letters' dates are given as "17—".
In the story following the letters by Walton, the readers find that
Victor Frankenstein creates a monster that brings tragedy to his
life.
Captain Walton's introductory frame
narrative
The novel Frankenstein is written in
epistolary form, documenting a fictional correspondence between
Captain Robert Walton and his sister, Margaret Walton Saville. Walton
is a failed writer and captain who sets out to explore the North Pole
and expand his scientific knowledge in hopes of achieving fame.
During the voyage, the crew spots a dog sled driven by a gigantic
figure. A few hours later, the crew rescues a nearly frozen and
emaciated man named Victor Frankenstein. Frankenstein has been in
pursuit of the gigantic man observed by Walton's crew. Frankenstein
starts to recover from his exertion; he sees in Walton the same
obsession that has destroyed him and recounts a story of his life's
miseries to Walton as a warning. The recounted story serves as the
frame for Frankenstein's narrative.
Victor Frankenstein's narrative
Victor begins by telling of his
childhood. Born in Naples, Italy, into a wealthy Genevan family,
Victor and his brothers, Ernest and William, all three being sons of
Alphonse Frankenstein by the former Caroline Beaufort, are encouraged
to seek a greater understanding of the world through chemistry. As a
young boy, Victor is obsessed with studying theories that focus on
simulating natural wonders, though later at university he is informed
that such theories are considerably outdated. When Victor is five
years old, his parents adopt Elizabeth Lavenza, the orphaned daughter
of an expropriated Italian nobleman, with whom Victor later falls in
love. During this period, Victor's parents, Alphonse and Caroline,
take in yet another orphan, Justine Moritz, who becomes William's
nanny.
Weeks before he leaves for the
University of Ingolstadt in Germany, his mother dies of scarlet
fever; Victor buries himself in his experiments to deal with the
grief. At the university, he excels at chemistry and other sciences,
soon developing a secret technique to impart life to non-living
matter. Eventually, he undertakes the creation of a humanoid, but due
to the difficulty in replicating the minute parts of the human body,
Victor makes the Creature tall, about 8 feet (2.4 m) in height and
proportionally large. Despite Victor's selecting its features as
beautiful, upon animation the creature is instead hideous, with
watery white eyes and yellow skin that barely conceals the muscles
and blood vessels underneath. Repulsed by his work, Victor flees when
it awakens. While wandering the streets, he meets his childhood
friend, Henry Clerval, and takes Henry back to his apartment, fearful
of Henry's reaction if he sees the monster. However, the Creature has
escaped.
Victor falls ill from the experience
and is nursed back to health by Henry. After a four-month recovery,
he receives a letter from his father notifying him of the murder of
his brother William. Upon arriving in Geneva, Victor sees the
Creature near the crime scene and climbing a mountain, leading him to
believe his creation is responsible. Justine Moritz, William's nanny,
is convicted of the crime after William's locket, which had contained
a miniature portrait of Caroline, is found in her pocket. Victor
fears the consequences to himself of clearing Justine's name, and she
is hanged.
Ravaged by grief and guilt, Victor
retreats into the mountains. The Creature finds him and pleads for
Victor to hear his tale.
The Creature's narrative
Intelligent and articulate, the
Creature relates his first days of life, living alone in the
wilderness and finding that people were afraid of and hated him due
to his appearance, which led him to fear and hide from them. While
living in an abandoned structure connected to a cottage, he grew fond
of the poor family living there, and discreetly collected firewood
for them. Secretly living among the family for months, the Creature
learned to speak by listening to them and he taught himself to read
after discovering a lost satchel of books in the woods. When he saw
his reflection in a pool, he realized his physical appearance was
hideous, and it terrified him as it terrified normal humans.
Nevertheless, he approached the family in hopes of becoming their
friend. Initially he was able to befriend the blind father figure of
the family, but the rest of them were frightened and they all fled
their home, resulting in the Creature leaving, disappointed. He
traveled to Victor's family estate using details from Victor's
journal, murdered William, and framed Justine.
The Creature demands that Victor create
a female companion like himself. He argues that as a living being, he
has a right to happiness. The Creature promises that he and his mate
will vanish into the South American wilderness, never to reappear, if
Victor grants his request. Should Victor refuse his request, the
Creature also threatens to kill Victor's remaining friends and loved
ones and not stop until he completely ruins him.
Fearing for his family, Victor
reluctantly agrees. The Creature says he will watch over Victor's
progress.
Victor Frankenstein's narrative
resumes
Clerval accompanies him to England, but
they separate at Victor's insistence at Perth, Scotland. Victor
suspects that the Creature is following him. Working on the female
creature on the Orkney Islands, he is plagued by premonitions of
disaster, such as the female hating the Creature or becoming more
evil than him, but more particularly the two creatures might lead to
the breeding of a race that could plague mankind. He tears apart the
unfinished female creature after he sees the Creature, who had indeed
followed Victor, watching through a window. The Creature later
confronts and tries to threaten Victor into working again, but Victor
is convinced that the Creature is evil and that its mate would be
evil as well, and the pair would threaten all humanity. Victor
destroys his work and the Creature threatens him by saying "I
will be with you on your wedding night." Victor interprets
this as a threat upon his life, believing that the Creature will kill
him after he finally becomes happy. Victor sails out to sea to
dispose of his instruments, falls asleep in the boat, is unable to
return to shore because of changes in the winds, and ends up being
blown to the Irish coast. When Victor lands in Ireland, he is soon
imprisoned for Clerval's murder, as the Creature had strangled
Clerval to death and left the corpse to be found where his creator
had arrived, causing the latter to suffer another mental breakdown in
prison. After being released, Victor returns home with his father,
who has restored to Elizabeth some of her father's fortune.
In Geneva, Victor is about to marry
Elizabeth and prepares to fight the Creature to the death, arming
himself with pistols and a dagger. The night following their wedding,
Victor asks Elizabeth to stay in her room while he looks for "the
fiend". While Victor searches the house and grounds, the
Creature strangles Elizabeth to death. From the window, Victor sees
the Creature, who tauntingly points at Elizabeth's corpse; Victor
tries to shoot him, but the Creature escapes. After Victor gets back
to Geneva, Victor's father, weakened by age and by the death of his
precious Elizabeth, dies a few days later. Seeking revenge, Victor
pursues the Creature to the North Pole, but collapses from exhaustion
and hypothermia before he can find his quarry.
Captain Walton's conclusion
At the end of Victor's narrative,
Captain Walton resumes the telling of the story, closing the frame
around Victor's recounting. A few days after the Creature vanished,
the ship becomes trapped in pack ice, and several crewmen die in the
cold before the rest of Walton's crew insists on returning south once
it is freed. Upon hearing and becoming angered by the crew's pleas to
their captain, Victor lectures them with a powerful speech: it is
hardship, not comfort and easiness, that defines a glorious
undertaking such as theirs; he urges them to be men, not cowards. The
ship is freed and Walton, owing it to the will of his unchanged men,
albeit regretfully, decides to return South. Victor, even though in a
very weak condition, states that he will go on by himself. He is
adamant that the creature dies.
Victor dies shortly thereafter, telling
Walton, with his last words, to seek "happiness in
tranquility and avoid ambition". Walton discovers the
Creature on his ship, mourning over Victor's body. The Creature tells
Walton that Victor's death has not brought him peace; rather, his
crimes have left him completely alone. The Creature vows to kill
himself so that no others will ever know of his existence. Walton
watches as the Creature drifts away on an ice raft that is soon "lost
in darkness and distance", never to be seen again.
Characters
Victor Frankenstein – Protagonist and
narrator of most of the story. Creates the monster.
The creature (Frankenstein's monster) –
The hideous creature created by Victor Frankenstein.
Captain Robert Walton – Captain of
the boat which picked up Victor. Brother of Mrs. Margaret Saville,
and writer of letters addressed to her.
Mrs. Margaret Saville – Resident of
England. Sister of Robert Walton. Addressee of letters written by
him.
Beaufort – A Merchant. Caroline
Beaufort's father. One of the most intimate friends of Victor's
father.
Caroline Beaufort – Beaufort's
daughter, Victor's mother.
Ernest – Victor's brother. Seven
years younger than Victor.
Henry Clerval – Victor's best friend
from childhood. The son of a merchant of Geneva.
Justine Moritz – Daughter of Madame
Moritz. Moved in with the Frankenstein family at age of 12, and
hanged for the murder of William.
Elizabeth Lavenza – Victor's fiancée
and adopted sister, sometimes referred to as his cousin.
William – Victor's youngest brother.
M. Krempe – professor of natural
philosophy at university of Ingolstadt. He was an uncouth man, but
deeply imbued in the secrets of his science. Influenced Victor.
M. Waldman – A professor, at
Ingolstadt. Influenced Victor.
De Lacey – Blind old man descended
from a good family in France. Father of Agatha and Felix. His family
was observed by the monster, and unbeknownst to them, taught him to
speak and read.
Agatha – Daughter of De Lacey.
Felix – Son of De Lacey.
Safie – Daughter of a Turkish
Merchant and a Christian Arab. Felix's girlfriend.
Mr. Kirwin – A magistrate.
Daniel Nugent – A witness against
Victor in his murder trial.
Author's background
Mary Shelley had a tragic life from the
beginning. Shelley's mother, Mary Wollstonecraft, died from infection
shortly after giving birth to her. Shelley grew a close attachment to
her father having never known her mother. Her father, William Godwin,
hired a nurse briefly to care for her and her half sister before he
ended up remarrying. Shelley's stepmother did not like the close bond
she had with her father, which caused friction and Godwin to then
favour his other two daughters and sons.
Her father was a famous author of the
time and her education was of great importance, though not formal.
Shelley grew up surrounded by her father's friends, writers and
persons of political importance, who gathered often at the family
home. This inspired her authorship at an early age. Shelley met Percy
Bysshe Shelley, who later became her husband, at the age of sixteen
while he was visiting her father. Godwin did not agree with the
relationship of his daughter to an older, married but separated man,
so they fled to France along with her stepsister, Claire Clairmont.
Later, Shelley gave birth and lost their first child on 22 February
1815, when she gave birth two months prematurely; the baby died two
weeks later. Percy, uncaring about the situation, left with Mary's
stepsister Claire for an affair. Over eight years she endured a
similar pattern of pregnancy and loss, one hemorrhaging occurring
until Percy placed her upon ice to cease the bleeding.
Mary and Percy's trip with Claire to
visit Claire's lover Lord Byron, in Geneva during the summer of 1816,
began the friendship amongst the two couples in which Byron suggested
they have a competition of writing the best ghost story to pass time
stuck indoors. Historians suggest an affair occurred too, even that
paternity of one Shelley child may have been a Byron.
Mary was eighteen years old when she
won the contest with her creation of Frankenstein.
Literary influences
Shelley was heavily influenced by both
of her parents' works. Her father was famous for Enquiry Concerning
Political Justice and her mother famous for A Vindication of the
Rights of Woman. Her father's novels also influenced her writing of
Frankenstein. These novels included Things as They Are; or, The
Adventures of Caleb Williams, St. Leon, and Fleetwood. All of these
books were set in Switzerland, similar to the setting in
Frankenstein. Some major themes of social affections and the renewal
of life that appear in Shelley's novel stem from these works she had
in her possession. Other literary influences that appear in
Frankenstein are Pygmalion et Galatée by Mme de Genlis and Ovid with
the use of an individual lacking intelligence and those individuals
identifying the problems with society. Ovid also inspires the use of
Prometheus in Shelley's title.
Percy and Byron's discussion on life
and death surrounded many scientific geniuses of the time. They
discussed ideas from Erasmus Darwin and the experiments from Luigi
Galvani. Mary joined these conversations and the ideas of Darwin and
Galvani were both present in her novel. The horrors of not being able
to write a story for the contest and her hard life also influenced
the themes within Frankenstein. The themes of loss, guilt, and the
consequences of defying nature present in the novel all developed
from Mary Shelley's own life. The loss of her mother, the
relationship with her father, and the death of her first child
created the monster and his separation from parental guidance. In a
1965 issue of The Journal of Religion and Health a psychologist
proposed that the theme of guilt stemmed from her not feeling good
enough for Percy because of the loss of their child.
Composition
Draft of Frankenstein: ("It
was on a dreary night of November that I beheld my man completed
...")
How I, then a young girl, came to
think of, and to dilate upon, so very hideous an idea?— Mary
Shelley
During the rainy summer of 1816, the
"Year Without a Summer", the world was locked in a
long cold volcanic winter caused by the eruption of Mount Tambora in
1815. Mary Shelley, aged 18, and her lover (and later husband) Percy
Bysshe Shelley visited Lord Byron at the Villa Diodati by Lake Geneva
in Switzerland. The weather was consistently too cold and dreary that
summer to enjoy the outdoor holiday activities they had planned, so
the group retired indoors until dawn.
Sitting around a log fire at Byron's
villa, the company amused themselves by reading German ghost stories
translated into French from the book Fantasmagoriana, then Byron
proposed that they "each write a ghost story".
Unable to think of a story, young Mary became anxious: "Have
you thought of a story? I was asked each morning, and each morning I
was forced to reply with a mortifying negative." During one
evening in the middle of summer, the discussions turned to the nature
of the principle of life. "Perhaps a corpse would be
re-animated", Mary noted, "galvanism had given token of
such things". It was after midnight before they retired,
and unable to sleep, she became possessed by her imagination as she
beheld the "grim terrors" of her "waking
dream".
I saw the pale student of unhallowed
arts kneeling beside the thing he had put together. I saw the hideous
phantasm of a man stretched out, and then, on the working of some
powerful engine, show signs of life, and stir with an uneasy, half
vital motion. Frightful must it be; for supremely frightful would be
the effect of any human endeavor to mock the stupendous mechanism of
the Creator of the world.
In September 2011, astronomer Donald
Olson, after a visit to the Lake Geneva villa the previous year and
inspecting data about the motion of the moon and stars, concluded
that her "waking dream" took place "between
2 a.m. and 3 a.m." on 16 June 1816, several days after the
initial idea by Lord Byron that they each write a ghost story.
She began writing what she assumed
would be a short story. With Percy Shelley's encouragement, she
expanded the tale into a full-fledged novel. She later described
that summer in Switzerland as the moment "when I first
stepped out from childhood into life". Shelley wrote the
first four chapters in the weeks following the suicide of her
half-sister Fanny. This was one of many personal tragedies that
impacted Shelley's work. Shelley's first child died in infancy, and
when she began composing Frankenstein in 1816, she was likely nursing
her second child, who was also dead by the time of Frankenstein's
publication.
Byron managed to write just a fragment
based on the vampire legends he heard while traveling the Balkans,
and from this John Polidori created The Vampyre (1819), the
progenitor of the romantic vampire literary genre. Thus two seminal
horror tales originated from the conclave.
The group talked about Enlightenment
and Counter-Enlightenment ideas as well. Shelley believed the
Enlightenment idea that society could progress and grow if political
leaders used their powers responsibly; however, she also believed the
Romantic ideal that misused power could destroy society.
Shelley wrote much of the book while
residing in a lodging house in the center of Bath in 1816.
Shelley's manuscripts for the first
three-volume edition in 1818 (written 1816–1817), as well as the
fair copy for her publisher, are now housed in the Bodleian Library
in Oxford. The Bodleian acquired the papers in 2004, and they belong
now to the Abinger Collection. In 2008, the Bodleian published a new
edition of Frankenstein, edited by Charles E. Robinson, that contains
comparisons of Mary Shelley's original text with Percy Shelley's
additions and interventions alongside.
Publication
Mary Shelley by Richard Rothwell
(1840–41)
Shelley completed her writing in
April/May 1817, and Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus was
published on 1 January 1818 by the small London publishing house
Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones. It was issued
anonymously, with a preface written for Mary by Percy Bysshe Shelley
and with a dedication to philosopher William Godwin, her father. It
was published in an edition of just 500 copies in three volumes, the
standard "triple-decker" format for 19th-century
first editions.
A variety of different editions
The second (English) edition of
Frankenstein was published on 11 August 1823 in two volumes (by G.
and W. B. Whittaker) following the success of the stage play
Presumption; or, the Fate of Frankenstein by Richard Brinsley Peake.
This edition credited Mary Shelley as the book's author on its title
page.
On 31 October 1831, the first "popular"
edition in one volume appeared, published by Henry Colburn &
Richard Bentley. This edition was heavily revised by Mary Shelley,
partially to make the story less radical. It included a lengthy new
preface by the author, presenting a somewhat embellished version of
the genesis of the story. This edition is the one most widely
published and read now, although a few editions follow the 1818 text.
Some scholars prefer the original version, arguing that it preserves
the spirit of Mary Shelley's vision (see Anne K. Mellor's "Choosing
a Text of Frankenstein to Teach" in the W. W. Norton
Critical edition).
Frankenstein and the Monster
The Creature
Part of Frankenstein's rejection of his
creation is the fact that he does not give it a name, which causes a
lack of identity. Instead it is referred to by words such as
"wretch", "monster", "creature",
"demon", "devil", "fiend", and
"it". When Frankenstein converses with the creature
in Chapter 10, he addresses it as "vile insect",
"abhorred monster", "fiend", "wretched
devil", and "abhorred devil".
During a telling of Frankenstein,
Shelley referred to the creature as "Adam".
Shelley was referring to the first man in the Garden of Eden, as in
her epigraph:
Did I request thee, Maker, from my
clay
To mould Me man? Did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote me?
John Milton, Paradise Lost (X.
743–45)
Although the creature was described in
later works as a composite of whole body parts grafted together from
cadavers and reanimated by the use of electricity, this description
is not consistent with Shelley's work; both the use of electricity
and the cobbled-together image of Frankenstein's monster were more
the result of James Whale's popular 1931 film adaptation of the
story, and other early motion-picture works based upon the creature.
In Shelley's original work, Victor Frankenstein discovers a
previously unknown but elemental principle of life, and that insight
allows him to develop a method to imbue vitality into inanimate
matter, though the exact nature of the process is left largely
ambiguous. After a great deal of hesitation in exercising this power,
Frankenstein spends two years painstakingly constructing the
creature's proportionally large body (one anatomical feature at a
time, from raw materials supplied by "the dissecting room and
the slaughter-house"), which he then brings to life using
his unspecified process.
The creature has often been mistakenly
called "Frankenstein". In 1908 one author said "It
is strange to note how well-nigh universally the term "Frankenstein"
is misused, even by intelligent people, as describing some hideous
monster". Edith Wharton's The Reef (1916) describes an
unruly child as an "infant Frankenstein." David
Lindsay's "The Bridal Ornament", published in The
Rover, 12 June 1844, mentioned "the maker of poor
Frankenstein". After the release of Whale's cinematic
Frankenstein, the public at large began speaking of the creature
itself as "Frankenstein". This also occurs in
Frankenstein films, including Bride of Frankenstein (1935) and
several subsequent films, as well as in film titles such as Abbott
and Costello Meet Frankenstein. Furthermore, the 1939 film Son of
Frankenstein introduced an evil laboratory assistant, Ygor (Bela
Lugosi), who never existed in the original narrative.
Origin of Victor Frankenstein's name
Mary Shelley maintained that she
derived the name Frankenstein from a dream-vision. This claim has
since been disputed and debated by scholars that have suggested
alternative sources for Shelley's inspiration. The German name
Frankenstein means "stone of the Franks", and is
associated with various places in Germany, including Frankenstein
Castle (Burg Frankenstein) in Darmstadt, Hesse, and Frankenstein
Castle in Frankenstein, a town in the Palatinate. There is also a
castle called Frankenstein in Bad Salzungen, Thuringia, and a
municipality called Frankenstein in Saxony. Until 1945, Ząbkowice
Śląskie, now a city in Lower Silesian Voivodeship, Poland, was
mainly populated by Germans and was the site of a scandal involving
gravediggers in 1606, which has been suggested as an inspiration to
the author. Finally, the name is borne by the aristocratic House of
Franckenstein from Franconia.
Radu Florescu argued that Mary and
Percy Shelley visited Frankenstein Castle near Darmstadt in 1814,
where alchemist Johann Konrad Dippel had experimented with human
bodies, and reasoned that Mary suppressed mention of her visit in
order to maintain her public claim of originality. A literary essay
by A. J. Day supports Florescu's position that Mary Shelley knew of,
and visited Frankenstein Castle before writing her debut novel. Day
includes details of an alleged description of the Frankenstein castle
in Mary Shelley's 'lost' journals, however, according to Jörg
Heléne, the 'lost journals', as well as Florescu's claims, cannot be
verified.
A possible interpretation of the name
Victor is derived from Paradise Lost by John Milton, a great
influence on Shelley (a quotation from Paradise Lost is on the
opening page of Frankenstein, and Shelley writes that the monster
reads it in the novel). Milton frequently refers to God as "the
victor" in Paradise Lost, and Shelley refers to Victor as
playing God by creating life. In addition, Shelley's portrayal of the
monster owes much to the character of Satan in Paradise Lost; and,
the monster says in the story, after reading the epic poem, that he
empathizes with Satan's role.
Parallels between Victor Frankenstein
and Mary's husband Percy Shelley have also been drawn. There are many
similarities from his usage of Victor as a pen name in the collection
of poetry he wrote with his sister Elizabeth, Original Poetry by
Victor and Cazire, to Percy's days at Eton where he had "experimented
with electricity and magnetism as well as with gunpowder and numerous
chemical reactions", and whose rooms at Oxford were filled with
scientific equipment.
Percy Shelley was also the first-born
son of a wealthy country squire with strong political connections and
a descendant of Sir Bysshe Shelley, 1st Baronet of Castle Goring, and
Richard Fitzalan, 10th Earl of Arundel. While Victor's family is one
of the most distinguished of that republic and his ancestors were
counselors and syndics. Percy had a sister named Elizabeth; Victor
had an adopted sister named Elizabeth.
Modern Prometheus
The Modern Prometheus is the novel's
subtitle (though modern editions now drop it, only mentioning it in
introduction). Prometheus, in versions of Greek mythology, was the
Titan who created mankind in the image of the gods that could have a
spirit breathed into it at the behest of Zeus. Prometheus then
taught man to hunt, but after he tricked Zeus into accepting
"poor-quality offerings" from humans, Zeus kept fire
from mankind. Prometheus took back the fire from Zeus to give to man.
When Zeus discovered this, he sentenced Prometheus to be eternally
punished by fixing him to a rock of Caucasus, where each day an eagle
pecked out his liver, only for the liver to regrow the next day
because of his immortality as a god.
As a Pythagorean, or believer in An
Essay on Abstinence from Animal Food, as a Moral Duty by Joseph
Ritson, Mary Shelley saw Prometheus not as a hero but rather as
something of a devil, and blamed him for bringing fire to man and
thereby seducing the human race to the vice of eating meat. Percy
wrote several essays on what became known as vegetarianism including
A Vindication of Natural Diet.
In 1910, Edison Studios released the
first motion-picture adaptation of Shelley's story.
The Titan in the Greek mythology of
Prometheus parallels Victor Frankenstein. Victor's work by creating
man by new means reflects the same innovative work of the Titan in
creating humans.
Byron was particularly attached to the
play Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus, and Percy Shelley soon wrote his
own Prometheus Unbound (1820). The term "Modern Prometheus"
was derived from Immanuel Kant who described Benjamin Franklin as the
"Prometheus of modern times" in reference to his
experiments with electricity.
In the novel, the monster is identified
by words such as "creature", "monster",
"daemon", "wretch", "abortion", "fiend"
and "it", and is also called an "Image".
Frankenstein and the monster separately compare themselves with the
"fallen" angel, although without naming him. Speaking to
Frankenstein, the monster says "I ought to be thy Adam, but I
am rather the fallen angel". That angel would be Lucifer
(meaning "light-bringer") in Milton's Paradise Lost,
which the monster has read; this relates to the disobedience of
Prometheus in the book's subtitle.
Shelley's inspirations
Shelley incorporated a number of
different themes, the influence of John Milton's Paradise Lost, and
Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, are
clearly evident within the novel. In The Frankenstein of the French
Revolution author Julia Douthwaite posits Shelley likely acquired
some ideas for Frankenstein's character from Humphry Davy's book
Elements of Chemical Philosophy, in which he had written that
"science has ... bestowed upon man powers which may be called
creative; which have enabled him to change and modify the beings
around him ...". References to the French Revolution run
through the novel; a possible source may lie in François-Félix
Nogaret [fr]'s Le Miroir des événemens actuels, ou la Belle au plus
offrant (1790): a political parable about scientific progress
featuring an inventor named Frankésteïn who creates a life-sized
automaton.
Percy Shelley's 1816 poem "Mutability"
is quoted, its theme of the role of the subconscious is discussed in
prose and the monster quotes a passage from the poem. Percy Shelley's
name never appeared as the author of the poem, although the novel
credits other quoted poets by name. Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem
"The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" (1798) is
associated with the theme of guilt and William Wordsworth's "Tintern
Abbey" (1798) with that of innocence.
Many writers and historians have
attempted to associate several then popular natural philosophers (now
called physical scientists) with Shelley's work on account of several
notable similarities. Two of the most noted natural philosophers
among Shelley's contemporaries were Giovanni Aldini, who made many
public attempts at human reanimation through bio-electric Galvanism
in London and Johann Konrad Dippel, who was supposed to have
developed chemical means to extend the life span of humans. While
Shelley was aware of both these men and their activities, she makes
no mention of or reference to them or their experiments in any of her
published or released notes.
Reception
Frankenstein has been both well
received and disregarded since its anonymous publication in 1818.
Critical reviews of that time demonstrate these two views, along with
confused speculation as to the identity of the author. Walter Scott,
writing in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, congratulated "the
author's original genius and happy power of expression",
although he is less convinced about the way in which the monster
gains knowledge about the world and language. La Belle Assemblée
described the novel as "very bold fiction" and the
Edinburgh Magazine and Literary Miscellany hoped to see "more
productions ... from this author". On the other hand, John
Wilson Croker, writing anonymously in the Quarterly Review, although
conceding that "the author has powers, both of conception and
language", described the book as "a tissue of
horrible and disgusting absurdity".
In two other reviews where the author
is known as the daughter of William Godwin, the criticism of the
novel makes reference to the feminine nature of Mary Shelley. The
British Critic attacks the novel's flaws as the fault of the author:
"The writer of it is, we understand, a female; this is an
aggravation of that which is the prevailing fault of the novel; but
if our authoress can forget the gentleness of her sex, it is no
reason why we should; and we shall therefore dismiss the novel
without further comment". The Literary Panorama and
National Register attacks the novel as a "feeble imitation of
Mr. Godwin's novels" produced by the "daughter of a
celebrated living novelist". Despite the reviews,
Frankenstein achieved an almost immediate popular success. It became
widely known especially through melodramatic theatrical
adaptations—Mary Shelley saw a production of Presumption; or The
Fate of Frankenstein, a play by Richard Brinsley Peake, in 1823. A
French translation appeared as early as 1821 (Frankenstein: ou le
Prométhée Moderne, translated by Jules Saladin).
Critical reception of Frankenstein has
been largely positive since the mid-20th century. Major critics such
as M. A. Goldberg and Harold Bloom have praised the "aesthetic
and moral" relevance of the novel, although there are also
critics such as Germaine Greer, who criticized the novel as terrible
due to technical and narrative defects (such as it featuring three
narrators who speak in the same way). In more recent years the novel
has become a popular subject for psychoanalytic and feminist
criticism: Lawrence Lipking states: "[E]ven the Lacanian
subgroup of psychoanalytic criticism, for instance, has produced at
least half a dozen discrete readings of the novel".
Frankenstein is one of the most recommended books on Five Books,
with literary scholars, psychologists, novelists, and historians
citing it as an influential text. The novel today is generally
considered to be a landmark work of romantic and Gothic literature,
as well as science fiction.
Film director Guillermo del Toro
describes Frankenstein as "the quintessential teenage book",
adding "You don't belong. You were brought to this world
by people that don't care for you and you are thrown into a world of
pain and suffering, and tears and hunger. It's an amazing book
written by a teenage girl. It's mind-blowing." Professor of
philosophy Patricia MacCormack says the creature, brought to life by
Victor Frankenstein, addresses the most fundamental human questions:
"It's the idea of asking your maker what your purpose is. Why
are we here, what can we do?"
On November 5, 2019, the BBC News
listed Frankenstein on its list of the 100 most influential novels.
Derivative works
There are numerous novels retelling or
continuing the story of Frankenstein and his monster.
Films, plays, and television
Frankenstein (1910).
1823: Richard Brinsley Peake's
adaptation, Presumption; or, the Fate of Frankenstein, was seen by
Mary Shelley and her father William Godwin at the English Opera
House.
1826: Henry M. Milner's adaptation, The
Man and The Monster; or The Fate of Frankenstein opened on 3 July at
the Royal Coburg Theatre, London.
1887: Frankenstein, or The Vampire's
Victim was a musical burlesque written by Richard Henry (a pseudonym
of Richard Butler and Henry Chance Newton).
1910: Edison Studios produced the first
Frankenstein film, directed by J. Searle Dawley.
1915: Life Without Soul, the second
film adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel, was released. No known print
of the film has survived.
1920: The Monster of Frankenstein,
directed by Eugenio Testa, starring Luciano Albertini and Umberto
Guarracino.
1931: Universal Studios' Frankenstein,
directed by James Whale, starring Colin Clive, Mae Clarke, John
Boles, Edward Van Sloan, Dwight Frye, and Boris Karloff as the
Monster.
1935: James Whale directed the sequel
to the 1931 film, Bride of Frankenstein, starring Colin Clive as
Frankenstein, and Boris Karloff as the Monster once more. This
incorporated the novel's plot motif of Frankenstein creating a bride
for the Monster omitted from Whale's earlier film. There were two
more sequels, prior to the Universal "monster rally"
films combining multiple monsters from various movie series or film
franchises.
1939: Son of Frankenstein was another
Universal monster movie with Boris Karloff as the Creature. Also in
the film were Basil Rathbone as the title character and Bela Lugosi
as the sinister assistant Ygor. This is Karloff's final appearance as
Frankenstein's monster.
1942: The Ghost of Frankenstein
featured brain transplanting and a new Monster, played by Lon Chaney
Jr. The film also starred Evelyn Ankers and Bela Lugosi as Ygor.
1942–1948: Universal did "monster
rally" films featuring Frankenstein's Monster, the Wolf Man
and Dracula. Included were Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, The House
of Frankenstein, House of Dracula and Abbott and Costello Meet
Frankenstein. The last three films introduced Glenn Strange as
Frankenstein's Monster.
1957–1974: Hammer Films in England
did a string of Frankenstein films starring Peter Cushing, including
The Curse of Frankenstein, The Revenge of Frankenstein and
Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed. Co-starring in these films were
Christopher Lee, Hazel Court, Veronica Carlson and Simon Ward.
Another Hammer film, The Horror of Frankenstein, starred Ralph Bates
as the main character, Baron Victor Frankenstein.
1965: Toho Studios released the film
Frankenstein vs. Baragon, followed by the sequel The War of the
Gargantuas in 1966.
1968: An episode of Mystery and
Imagination, a British television anthology series of classic horror,
adapted Frankenstein, starring Ian Holm in dual roles as both Victor
Frankenstein and his creation, named in the credits as "the
Being."
1972: A comedic stage adaptation,
Frankenstein's Monster, was written by Sally Netzel and produced by
the Dallas Theater Center.
1973: The two-part TV film
Frankenstein: The True Story appeared on NBC. The movie starred
Leonard Whiting, Michael Sarrazin, James Mason, and Jane Seymour.
1981: A Broadway adaptation by Victor
Gialanella played for one performance (after 29 previews) and was
considered the most expensive flop ever produced to that date.
1984: The flop Broadway production
yielded a TV film starring Robert Powell, Carrie Fisher, David
Warner, and John Gielgud.
1992: Frankenstein became a Turner
Network Television film directed by David Wickes, starring Patrick
Bergin and Randy Quaid. John Mills played the blind man.
1994: Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
appeared in theaters, directed by and starring Kenneth Branagh, with
Robert De Niro and Helena Bonham Carter. Its all-star cast also
included John Cleese, Ian Holm, and Tom Hulce.
2004: Frankenstein, a two-episode
miniseries starring Alec Newman, with Luke Goss and Donald
Sutherland.
2006: Frankenstein - A New Musical,
composed by Mark Baron, book by Jeffrey Jackson, and based on an
adaptation by Gary P. Cohen.
2007: Frankenstein, an award-winning
musical adaptation by Jonathan Christenson with set, lighting, and
costume design by Bretta Gerecke for Catalyst Theatre in Edmonton,
Alberta.
2011: In March, BBC3 broadcast Colin
Teague's live production from Kirkstall Abbey, Leeds, billed as
Frankenstein's Wedding, Live in Leeds. About the same time, the
National Theatre, London presented a stage version of Frankenstein,
which ran until 2 May 2011. The play was written by Nick Dear and
directed by Danny Boyle. Jonny Lee Miller and Benedict Cumberbatch
alternated the roles of Frankenstein and the Creature. The National
Theatre broadcast live performances of the play worldwide on 17
March.
2012: An interactive ebook app created
by Inkle and Profile Books that retells the story with added
interactive elements.
2014: Penny Dreadful is a horror TV
series that airs on Showtime, that features Victor Frankenstein as
well as his Creature.
2015: Frankenstein, a modern-day
adaptation written and directed by Bernard Rose.
2015: Victor Frankenstein is an
American film directed by Paul McGuigan.
2016: Frankenstein, a full-length
ballet production by Liam Scarlett. Some performances were also live
simulcasts worldwide.
Loose adaptations
1967: I'm Sorry the Bridge Is Out,
You'll Have to Spend the Night and its sequel Frankenstein Unbound
(Another Monster Musical) are a pair of musical comedies written by
Bobby Pickett and Sheldon Allman. The casts of both feature several
classic horror characters including Dr. Frankenstein and his monster.
1971: Lady Frankenstein is an Italian
horror film directed by Mel Welles and written by Edward di Lorenzo.
The story begins when Dr. Frankenstein is killed by the monster he
created; his daughter and his lab assistant Marshall then continue
with his experiments.
1973: The Rocky Horror Show, is a
British horror comedy stage musical written by Richard O'Brian in
which Dr. Frank N. Furter has created a creature (Rocky), to satisfy
his (pro)creative drives. The plot elements are similar to I'm Sorry
the Bridge Is Out, You'll Have to Spend the Night.
1973: Flesh for Frankenstein. Usually,
Frankenstein is a man whose dedication to science takes him too far,
but here his interest is to rule the world by creating a new species
that will obey him and do his bidding.
1974: Young Frankenstein. Directed by
Mel Brooks, this sequel-spoof has been listed as one of the best
movie comedies of any comedy genre ever made, even prompting an
American film preservation program to include it on its listings. It
reuses many props from James Whale's 1931 Frankenstein and is shot in
black-and-white with 1930s-style credits. Gene Wilder portrayed the
descendant of Dr. Frankenstein (who insists on pronouncing it
"Fronkonschteen"), with Peter Boyle as the Monster.
1975: The Rocky Horror Picture Show is
the 1975 film adaptation of the British rock stage musical, The Rocky
Horror Show (1973), written by Richard O'Brien.
1984: Frankenweenie is a parody short
film directed by Tim Burton, starring Barrett Oliver, Shelley Duvall
and Daniel Stern.
1985: The Bride starring Sting as Baron
Charles Frankenstein and Jennifer Beals as Eva, a woman he creates in
the same fashion as his infamous Monster.
1986: Gothic, directed by Ken Russell,
is the story of the night that Mary Shelley gave birth to
Frankenstein. Starring Gabriel Byrne, Julian Sands, Natasha
Richardson.
1988: Frankenstein (フランケンシュタイン)
is a manga adaptation of Shelley's novel by Junji Ito.
1989: Frankenstein the Panto. A
pantomime script by David Swan, combining elements of Frankenstein,
Dracula, and traditional British pantomime.
1990: Frankenstein Unbound. Combines a
time-travel story with the story of Shelley's novel. Scientist Joe
Buchanan accidentally creates a time-rift which takes him back to the
events of the novel. Filmed as a low-budget independent film by Roger
Corman in 1990, based on a novel published in 1973 by Brian Aldiss.
This novel bears no relation to the 1967 stage musical with the same
name listed above.
1991: Khatra is a Hindi movie of
Bollywood made by director H. N. Singh loosely based on the story of
Frankenstein.
1995: Monster Mash is a film adaptation
of I'm Sorry the Bridge Is Out, You'll Have to Spend the Night
starring Bobby "Boris" Pickett as Dr. Frankenstein.
The film also features Candace Cameron Bure, Anthony Crivello and
Mink Stole.
1998: Billy Frankenstein is a very
loose adaptation about a boy who moves into a mansion with his family
and brings the Frankenstein Monster to life. The film was directed by
Fred Olen Ray.
2004: Frankenstein is a made-for-TV
film based on Dean Koontz's Frankenstein.
2005: Frankenstein vs. the Creature
from Blood Cove, a 90-minute feature film homage of classic monsters
and Atomic Age creature features, shot in black and white, and
directed by William Winckler. The Frankenstein Monster design and
make-up was based on the character descriptions in Mary
Wollstonecraft Shelley's novel.
2009: Frankenhood, a feature film
comedy where a corpse is brought back to life by a mad scientist to
help morgue employees win a street basketball tournament.
2009: The Diary of Anne Frankenstein, a
short film from Chillerama.
2011: Frankenstein: Day of the Beast is
an independent horror film based loosely on the original book.
2011: Victor Frankenstein appears in
the ABC show Once Upon a Time, a fantasy series on ABC that features
multiple characters from fairy tales and classic literature trapped
in the real world.
2012: Frankenweenie, Tim Burton's
feature film remake of his 1984 short film of the same name.
2012: In the Adventure Time episode
"Princess Monster Wife", the Ice King removes body parts
from all the princesses that rejected him and creates a jigsaw wife
to love him.
2012: A Nightmare on Lime Street, Fred
Lawless's comedy play starring David Gest staged at the Royal Court
Theatre, Liverpool.
2014: I, Frankenstein is a 2014 fantasy
action film. The film stars Aaron Eckhart as Adam Frankenstein and
Bill Nighy. The film is based on the graphic novel.
2014: Frankenstein, MD, a web show by
Pemberly Digital starring Victoria, a female adaptation of Victor.
2015: The Supernatural season 10
episodes "Book of the Damned", "Dark Dynasty"
and "The Prisoner" feature the Styne Family
which member Eldon Styne identifies as the descendants of the house
of Frankenstein. According to Eldon, Mary Shelley had learned their
secrets while on a visit to Castle Frankenstein and wrote a book
based on her experiences, forcing the Frankensteins underground as
the Stynes. The Stynes, through bio-engineering and surgical
enhancements, feature many of the superhuman attributes of the
Frankenstein Monster.
2015: The Frankenstein Chronicles is a
British television drama series, starring Sean Bean as John Marlott
and Anna Maxwell Martin as Mary Shelley.
2016: Second Chance, a TV series known
at one point as Frankenstein, was inspired by the classic.
2020: "The Haunting of Villa
Diodati", an episode of Doctor Who, is based on the period
in 1816 where Shelley was at Villa Diodati, providing an alternative
basis, within the Doctor Who universe, of the origin of the
Frankenstein monster as a half-converted Cyberman.
