Playing God Believers in god believe that you should never sin or turn against him. By creating another being, are you turning against god? Are you seen as evil through gods eyes? Throughout the book, Mary Shelley shows the use of indirect characterization, direct characterization, symbolism, uses of comparisons, and allegory to produce many examples of how playing god has valuable meaning and dangerous meaning.
To start off, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein reveals indirect characterization in order to provide the readers with information about the troubles of playing god. This statement is true when the readers learn about Victors thoughts. Victor was sitting in his lab and a train of reflection surpassed his mind about his new creation and
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As the monster approached Victor he was upset of how Victor characterized him. As victor states "Devil, do you dare approach me" (Shelley 88). In this line, the monster understands how Victor characterizes him and he relies with "I expected this reception; all men hate the retched" (Shelley 88). The monster felt as if he was misinterpreted about the being the devil while he was under the impression of being Adam (Follower of God). The monster replies, "I ought to be thy Adam; but rather the fallen angel" (Shelley 89). In this line, Mary Shelley reveals the comparisons between the devil and Adam as they show opposing sides of good versus …show more content…
Through the process of making the monster, Victor had gathered information from past scientists that gave Victor ideas for making a corps monster. Victor continued, " I had retrod the steps of knowledge along the paths of time, and exchanged the discoveries of recent enquiries for the dreams of forgotten alchymists" (Shelley 45-46). The words above explain how Victor was thinking through the whole process of making his dream come true and how his knowledge from previous scientists help guide his dream into the right
This story uses ethos to highlight the idea that a person has the ability to decide to be a monster. Shelley uses this form of rhetoric to make the reader almost feel bad for the Creation. When the Creation says “I ought to be thy Adam; but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed” (Shelley 14), he makes the point that Victor is responsible for the way he looks. He is the creator and chose the way he wanted to build the Creation. Shelley also brings up the
Due to his mistakes in creating his character of God, Shelley personified Victor Frankenstein as a cold creator to provide a commentary on the harshness of Milton’s God.
In the infamous novel, Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus, by Mary Shelley, there have been a variety of recurring themes throughout the book, one of them being good versus evil. Good versus evil is a popular theme that appears in several movies, TV shows, as well as literature itself. According to Wikipedia.com, it means: “[...] the battle between ideologies, with one side Good, and the other Evil. Another variation is the inner struggle in characters (and by extension, humans in reality) between good and evil.” This theme is specifically crucial to the plot because it ultimately asks the readers what it means to be “human.” Shelley supports her representation by manipulating society’s behavior, questioning the limits of humans, and
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein has several literary devices- such as structure, imagery, and many intricate details. She perfectly places words and puts them in such a way that the passage has a dual tone. Shelley begins with establishing the monster’s nature as being peaceful, because he wanted to reason with Victor. Him wanting to reason shows the importance of his decision to meet with Victor and shows that even though he has been through a great deal, he is still respectable to others. The audience gets to see the creature’s humble nature and makes the audience feel sympathetic towards him. This creates a peaceful tone to the passage. The monster wants to be loved by “any being and if they showed benevolence to me, I would return them hundred an hundred fold” (Shelley 148). The creature’s begging makes it sound like Victor will answer his plea. Using a broad term like “being”, demonstrates the monster’s need to be loved, putting him in a position with the audience again feeling empathetic towards him. Eventually, Victor’s compassion begins to fluctuate. The desperation the creature has looks like the desperation a human might have. This only gives the readers another reason to relate to him which leads to the other tone, impossible. Victor’s unreasonableness heightens this shared discontent as not only has the build up of the creature’s wistful nature made him an utmost identifiable character, but our views are adjusted in such as way that Frankenstein is seen
In the novel, Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, the character Victor Frankenstein can not be identified as purely evil or purely good. An interest in science leads Victor to create an evil monster, however midway through the book Victor develops sentimental feelings for the monster, even though he has committed many acts of pure evil. Victor abandons the monster which contributes to the overall theme, regarding nurture vs. nature. Throughout the novel, Victor is faced with challenges and hardships as a child that causes his character to become morally ambiguous.
In the novel, the readers learn that the main antagonist, Victor Frankenstein, is trying to reanimate life and create a “new generation” of advanced humans. Despite being successful in creating the monster, Victor would abandon his creation which forces it to have and conceive different identities and creates conflicting perspectives for the readers. This technique of giving the monster different identities is used by Shelley to portray the monster as a complex being. In the book, Victor abandons his creation because he is horribly terrified as he sees his creation is dreadful looking and says, “I beheld the wretch
Mary Shelley makes us question who really the “monster” is. Is it the creature or Victor? While the creature does commit murder, he does not understand the consequences of his actions. He is like an infant who is unfortunately left to learn about the workings of society, and his place in it, on his own. He has no companions and feels a great sense of loneliness and abandonment. The creature voices his frustration and anger and seems to try to project his feelings of guilt onto Victor, as if to show him that he is the ultimate cause of the creature’s misery while he is simply the victim of Victor’s manic impulse. Shelley utilizes words, phrases, and specific tones when the creature vents his misery to Victor and this evokes, amongst the
The lack of an origin causes the monster to exhibit characteristics of Satan. While talking to Victor the Monster states, “Remember that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel”(81). The monster demonstrates feelings of betrayal and abandonment as he is seen by Victor as a lesser being due to his “fallen angel”(81) status. A continuous reference to Adam demonstrates the Monsters desire to be loved by Victor for being a successful creation. However, the Monster faces reality in that he was abandoned, since Victor was “unable to endure the aspect of the being [he] had created”(44). The Monster’s expulsion from Victor’s life fuels his insecurities as he begins to “considered Satan as the fitter emblem of [his] condition”(110). Victor’s abandonment parallels to the story of Satan as he was cast out of heaven by God, similarly to how the Monster was cast out of Victor’s life. Not only, does the Monster take on the name of Satan, but also a few of the
In Mary Shelley's novel, Victor Frankenstein suffers an extreme psychological crisis following his violation of what is considered a fundamental biological principle. His creation of life undermines the role of women in his life and the role of sexuality, and allows existing misogynist and homosexual tendencies to surface. Victor represses what he has uncovered about himself, and it merges into a cohesive whole in his psyche that becomes projected on the instrument of revelation, the monster.
Was Victor Playing a Role of God in the Novel? (#22) The gothic horror classic Frankenstein can be interpreted as a host for Mary Shelly to explain her thoughts on how the world was. The most obvious topic that Mary Shelly conveyed in the novel was on science and her thoughts on scientists attempting to recreate life. Around the time Frankenstein was published, scientists were desperately attempting to find a way to recreate life.
In the Gothic novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley integrates the rhetorical devices figurative language, imagery, and tone to impart the concept that the desire to acquire knowledge and emulate God will ultimately result in chaos and havoc that exceeds the boundaries of human restraint.
In Frankenstein, written by Mary Shelley, the monster which is created by Victor Frankenstein acts as a mirror to reflect and bring out Victor’s hidden thoughts. In a particular study called Frankenstein – A Critical Study from a Freudian Perspective, it argues that Victor on the surface seems to be a “healthy man” (Johnson 1). In fact, he unconsciously has many dangerous thoughts, and the creation of the monster brings out those thoughts and finally leads to his failure (Johnson 2). In specific, present paper will analysis Victor’s characters by examining his intention and decisions toward the monster he creates, and the paper is intended
When the monster went outside to the open world people were scared of him. Although all people rejected him, Victor was proud of the creation he invented. In addition, the monster felt sad about everyone rejecting him so he asked Victor for a
Victor feels that his relentless search for more knowledge is the cause for all of his suffering. It is true that his knowledge is what created the creature, but what made things worse is that he never gave the creature what he needed, so the neglected creature set out to find it himself. Victor’s tragic fate was not the result of his knowledge but because he did not take care of his creature. 6. Foreshadowing is seen multiple times such as the night when Victor sees lightning strike down a tree and Victor is fascinated with how much power the lighting has. The monster also foreshadows his own death when saying, “But soon I shall die.. I shall ascend my funeral pile triumphantly and exult in the agony of the torturing flames..” 7. By not giving his creation a name, Victor didn’t give his creature an identity or a place in society. In society, a person’s name is who they are, people make their own judgment of people right away. The creature didn’t have a name and people judged him right away and identified him as monster and only that, rather than an actual being. 8. During the period in which Frankenstein was written, science was growing and it was seen as anything could be possible with the new research and
Scientist and Doctors over the decades have always pushed the limits and defying the odds in science and the medical field whether it is finding the cure for cancer,using robotic or prosthetic limbs for individuals with missing arms and legs etc. Usually we end up with information and cures that could help us in the future and gives us more insight on the scientific field, there are a few cases where science and medical experiments have gone majorly wrong, but let’s say hypothetically if something were to go wrong, where would we draw the line of too far when coming to experiments? Playing God has been much debated, but what do we really mean by the phrase playing god? According to CollinsDictionary.com the term ‘playing god’ refers