Frankenstein Myths Of Scientific And Medical Knowledge Analysis

Knowledge plays an incredibly large part of Mary Shelly’s novel, Frankenstein. I think that Victor’s obsessive and unhealthy search for knowledge is the true cause of his suffering. Not only does he neglect his friends and family while working to create the monster he puts his own health in danger. “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 of rest and health.” In this quote we see that Victor stops at nothing to find if he would be successful with his creation. Victor has made this project such a main priority that once it is completed and the creature comes to life he does not know what to do. Since Victor has met his goals and done what he said he wanted to do he does not want to deal with the being he just created so this becomes a problem for him. We see that Victor was very troubled by this whole experience when he says, “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.”

This quote shows how obsessed Victor Frankenstein was with his work. Ambition makes people work hard and focus on their goals, while obsession takes up that person’s whole life. Frankenstein centered his whole life around this project, to the point where he disregarded his own health and safety. When someone starts letting go of their own health in order to gain something, it can lead them to blind obsession. This is what happened to Victor, if he had

In the book Frankenstein by Mary Shelly, we discover that the search for now knowledge has a good and a bad side. Suffering is something we all go through at some point. We try to avoid it but our search for knowledge will always lead to suffering. In Frankenstein Victor had set out on a search for knowledge, he was relentless. His search consumed all his time, destroyed relationships, and lead to the death of not only himself but his friends and family. All of those negative effects originated from the monster Victor had created on his search for knowledge. Although Victor may have achieved his end goal, at what cost did this come to? Victor’s search

Victor created his monster in attempt to play God. Claiming that his creation would be for the betterment of humanity, he used the body parts of the previously deceased, bringing a creature to life against its own will. “The structure of the brain is far beyond my power to replicate, so I implanted tissue from the brains of several unborn children, bathed in certain internally secreted chemicals that appear to stimulate growth, and grafted this to a fully developed brain stem. Thus the creature will be born with an infant mind, but the mind should mature at a greatly accelerated rate. As to the nature of its thoughts and feelings – they may be like yours or mine, or they may be something entirely new.”

Throughout Frankenstein, Victor proves to be quite an egotistical person. Victor’s actions will sometimes be selfish and not as noble as he would like others to believe. He creates the monster with a desire to obtain awe and fame and to make sure that his name will be remembered throughout history. “… a light so brilliant and wondrous… that I alone should be reserved to discover so astonishing a secret” (Shelley 37). While this discovery of Victor’s may be groundbreaking, he fails to think of the negative consequences, only thinking of himself and what this could potentially

Victor’s creation of a monster is an internal conflict that deals with the corruption of the creature that was created. Victor accepts responsibility for the occurring deaths and he has a fear of his creation’s pursuit of revenge. Sadly, Victor’s mental state leads him to obsession with the death of the evil creature that he has created.

Victor Frankenstein was and had always been a curious boy and intelligent boy. His childhood consisted of revealing and investigating facts about the world that he lives in. This undoubtedly led to his desire to explore and take part in adventures including his journey to the North Pole later on in his life. The quote itself however, has several interpretations. The first part explains that the world had so much to uncover, to reveal about itself. To Victor, he thought that it was a secret land that was yet to be discovered and possessed so many secrets that were left to be unveiled to the public eye. At birth, his curiosity lingered throughout not just childhood but also carried into his adult life. His curiosity was his excuse that he created to take the blame for his actions. He was curious about nature, and also about the fact that his father insisted on him not pursuing a career in chemistry. His insistence to find the truth soon led to the demise of many of his loved ones through the creation of Frankenstein, the monster he created because he was inclined to know about nature and chemistry. On the other hand, Elizabeth was not curious. She viewed the world as a vacant, blank canvas that people sought to fill with the imaginations and rather, aspirations of others as well as her. This shows the extreme

Victor uses his knowledge not for the benefit of society, but for his own purpose of experimentation which ends up turning out the opposite way that he imagines. Knowing his own vanity, Victor says "lean from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous 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" (Shelley 38). After creating the monster and all the hardships Victor had to go through, he realizes that a person should be happy with the world around him/her and not try to change it. He admits that trying to become a man greater than who he could be drove him mad and his knowledge went in tow with it. From

Frankenstein had many choices, one better than others, and ones that could have saved his family. Yet, Frankenstein made a choice that one may consider incredibly heroic or undeniably foolish, he was worried that The Monster and his female companion would create a ‘race of devils’. This worry is understandable, but instead of dumping the remains into the ocean knowing The Monster is watching, he could have went to more covert means because he knew what The Monster was capable of doing. Moreover, Victor Frankenstein was given multiple warnings to stop his studies, but he chose knowledge over the wise opinions from the people in his life. In one case M. Krempe tells Victor, “every instant that you have wasted on those books is utterly and entirely lost. You have burdened your memory with exploded systems and useless names. Good God!” (43). In this example, it can be seen that Victor was given warnings from M. Krempe, but one could also see the idea that these warnings represent foreshadowing. As a reader the end result of Victor’s knowledge is known, so one could conclude that if Victor had listened to the warnings his pursuit of knowledge would have ended positively. Lastly, Victor’s pursuit of knowledge held him back from visiting his family and focusing on what he cared most about; Elizabeth his only true happiness. In the novel Victor states, “The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature. I had worked hard for

Victor Frankenstein’s fixation on the understanding of life, shows the negative psychological and physical effects of obsession as his mind becomes more centered around this passion. As a child Victor has explicitly said that “The world was to [him] a secret which [Victor] desired to divine. Curiosity, earnest research to learn the hidden laws of nature, gladness akin to rapture, as [the secrets] were unfolded to [him], are among the earliest

Victor Frankenstein was obsessed with knowledge, and thought knowledge was the key to unlocking nature and become a pioneer in science and challenging God. “I have described myself as always having been imbued with a fervent longing to penetrate the secrets of nature” (Shelley, Frankenstein, 21). Victor always had to push boundaries, and his passion drove him closer to science and immorality and farther from his family and friends. Once Victor sees his abomination animated, his potential come alive, he wishes for nothing more than if it had never happened. He moves on to a new obsession – fleeing his past. It consumes him and his health.

Frankenstein removes himself from friends, family and society in order to absolve himself from responsibility of morals. Through efforts to maintain control and an acute fascination, Frankenstein alienates himself at an early age in the name of science. Victor is not entirely ignorant of the dangers of his self-satisfying obsession as he first regrettably reflects, “I was, to a great degree, self-taught with regard to my favorite studies. My father was not scientific, and I was left to struggle with a child’s blindness, added to a student’s thirst for knowledge” (Shelley 28). Rather than recognizing that his isolation is self-induced, Victor blames his alienation on his father’s ignorance. By controlling his relationships, he gains greater confidence in his own abilities, instead of relying on others’ companionship. Notably, evidence for Victor’s disregard toward “domestic affection” is reintroduced as he remarks, “I must absent myself from all I loved while thus employed. Once commenced, it would quickly be achieved, and I might be restored to my family in peace and happiness” (Shelley 138). With selfishness at the core, Victor controls his chaos by distancing himself temporarily, so that he might reunite with his family at a later date. He is being inundated by the common belief that glorious scientific achievement comes at the cost of moral and ethical sacrifice. Victor justifies his self-alienation by means of the creature; however readers

Victor and the monster hate each other and eventually seek revenge on one another (60). In the beginning, Victor was passionate about his creation of life, he thought it was a brilliant idea (79). However, he was unable to “endure the aspect of the being [he] had created” (84) after the completion of the creature. The monster appeared to be friendly as “a grin wrinkled his cheeks” (84) and tried to communicate with Victor (84). However, Victor tried to avoid him and did not want to associate himself with the monster at all (84). The monster was furious and “[swore] eternal revenge” (154) when his creator rejected him because of his appearance. Therefore, when the monster knew that William was related to Victor, he became enraged and killed him (154). As the monster continued to kill Victor’s family, Victor pledged that he will get revenge on the creature (60). The exchanges between these two individuals were an indication of Victor’s vengeful

The idea of pursuing knowledge clouded Victor’s mind and when his creature is born he is shocked to discover that what he has created is far off his own expectations. Not only did the monster destroy his expectations of developing a creature that went beyond human knowledge, but it also affected his life, dignity, and fears. Victor himself admits to his own mistake when he says, “The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature...but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless honor and disgust filled my heart ” (36). Victor Frankenstein realizes what his obsession with pursuing an extensive amount of knowledge has brought him. His destiny to achieve the impossible with no regard for anyone or anything but himself shows that he is blinded by knowledge when creating the monster and is incapable to foresee the outcome of his creation. Victor’s goal was meant to improve and help humanity, but instead it leads to

While attempting to uncover the meaning of life and death, and though he believed his experiments would further the paths of science, Victor fails to see the potential consequences of “bestowing animation upon lifeless matter” (Shelley 37). This, in turn, creates a monster. After his “great” experiment, Victor spends his life in grief. Despite this, he manages to belittle his creation, and act superior to him, claiming that “I [Victor] will not hear you. There can be no community between you [the creature] and me; we are enemies” (Shelley 84). Even later on, when assured by the creature himself that Victor would be left alone if he creates a female counterpart, Victor cannot see past the shreds of pride he has left and refuses, causing the death of his family and loved ones. It’s Victor’s pride and his fear of the creature that clouds his judgement and in the end leads to his