Frankenstein's Monster

The 19th century reader of the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley was treated to a tale of fantastic proportions. A story of a monster that was created from parts of corpses and could be brought to life would have been an extremely scary story. They would not know if the creation of a monster in this way was really a scientific possibility. The 21st century audience however, now knows that this is not scientifically possible. The fear that was struck in the hearts of the 19th century reader by this monster is now gone. With this in mind the story of Frankenstein now has to be altered to conjure the same fear in our current society of that which existed in the hearts of the original audience. In Hollywood's remakes of the original

When people think of monsters, the first thing that pops into their head is Frankenstein, zombies, creatures of the night. Monsters are scary. Monsters in society reveal peoples fears and anxieties, their preconceived notions of normality, and represent the unknown.

On a more in depth scale, the Creature in the films was portrayed a “killing machine”, killing random people that were not connected with Victor’s life. James Whales does this in the famous scene of the little girl being thrown into the river in the 1931 film. Whales takes away the intelligence that the Creature posses in the novel, in my opinion, which makes him scarier than just this “mindless killer”. The Creature systematically targets people close to Victor Frankenstein in the novel where as in the movie he kills people who are not connected to Dr. Frankenstein. The complex and depth character was stripped from the movies and replaced with a popcorn movie monster. The theme of loneliness and abandonment toward the Creature that was in the novel was pushed aside. Instead the films choose to take sympathy on Victor for being “terrorized” by the Creature.

In many movie adaptations of a novel, the film doesn’t do the book justice in its story telling. Movie versions generally do not focus on the characters’ emotions or thoughts like the books do. They also do not develop the characters as well as the original story, giving the viewer little to no knowledge of a certain person. This is the case in Frankenstein. While there are some similarities between the original written version and the one on screen, the movie doesn’t delve into the lives of the main characters: Victor and the creature. The loss of characterization and focus on their lives takes away the audience’s take on consequences.

Monsters. They’re everywhere, from Sulley in Monsters Inc., to the iconic role of Dracula, to being key figures in literature and film.These creatures are recurring characters due to the reactions they invoke from the audience and other characters of the work. Despite (or due to) their gruesome nature and physical appearance, monsters are able to tap into the spiritual, social, and psychological aspect of people to capture their fascination.

Secondly, whatever the difference monsters have from a human, whether it be animal characteristics, made-up attributes, or a combination of human limbs and other traits, any discrepancy points out their difference from humanity. The monsters with human attributes backhandedly comment on human behaviors, such as Manticore, Medusa and Minotaur. Blake and Cooper note that Medusa is in a group of “over-sexual women… were combined with snakes in order to emphasize the supposed sinful nature of women and temptations of their bodies” (Blake and Cooper 4). In recent monster stories, humanoid monsters have become increasingly normal. Thirdly, despite their distortions, monsters reflect who we are as humankind. Their many differences in meaning and image reflect humanity’s diversity. “Gothic” fiction is a literary tradition that started a recent wave of monsters that consisted of novels from Dracula to The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. People began to write tales that tamed the supernatural

A little girl screams in fear for her parents as she envisions a green, three-eyed monster lurking under her bed, waiting to get her until she finally closes her eyes. A little boy scares fellow trick-or-treaters as he’s dressed as a vampire for Halloween brandishing his pointy teeth with blood dripping out of his mouth. Both of these examples of monsters focus on the physicality of a creature and undermine the weight which the word ‘monster’ actually carries. In Shakespeare’s play, The Tempest, and in Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein, there are characters that perfectly fit the description of a tangible monster. However, monsters are more than their somatic features. Monsters are created within based on circumstances, decisions that are

The monster notices that humans are afraid of him because of his appearance, he feels embarrassed of himself, as humans do when they don’t seem to be accepted. He admires the De Lacey Family that lives in the cottage, he also learns from them, and hopes to have companion as they do. The monster is like humans, as mentioned, in the way that he wants someone to listen and care about him. He is discovering the world and his capacities, he seeks knowledge and understand plenty aspects of life by learning how to speak and read. “The gentle manners and beauty of the cottagers greatly endeared them to me; when they were unhappy, I felt depressed; when they rejoiced, I sympathized in their joys” (Shelley 47). The monster developed feelings and emotions as humans. The creature is different from humans also, since he never got to grow up as a normal human, and

Frankenstein is a gothic horror novel that was written by Mary Shelly and was published in 1818, when gothic aesthetic, romanticism and science were beginning to spike in western culture. The novel follows the story of Victor Frankenstein in creating a monster which causes destruction around him, as Victor had ambition and thirst to reveal the secrets of nature. The novel could be viewed as a warning to the readers and audience about having a greed for knowledge and power. Mary Shelley explores the idea of having obtained too much knowledge and curiosity and playing god which involves consequences and dangers that come with it throughout the text. It also compares the human development of emotions and has

Victor Frankenstein worried about everyone else and playing God, rather than trying to do right, morally. Victor had to go through a lot of steps and difficulties to create the monster. After the creation of the monster, everyone including Victor abandoned him. Victor refused to create a girl creature to avoid a lot of problems, but he did not realize the hell the monster would end up causing him. Victor regrets trying to play God because his action would cause him great troubles and consequences.

Frankenstein follows Victor Frankenstein’s triumph as he reanimates a dead body, and then details his guilt for creating such a thing. When the creation realizes how he came to be, and is rejected by mankind, he seeks revenge on his creator’s loved ones. In the novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley portrays Victor Frankenstein as the true monster of the story through the use of literary devices revealing the characteristics that Frankensteins and monsters share, and shows how Frankenstein’s irresponsibility leads to his monstrous labeling.

It is vital that you know who the real monster in the Frankenstein book, Victor Frankenstein is the number one contender for this position. He creates a monster, but who knows if the actual monster he created is the true monster in this story. In later chapters the true monster is revealed, Victor Frankenstein takes fault for the deaths of Justine, William, and Henry even though he wasn’t the actual cause of their death. Although the monster was created by Victor, he is still horrid and disgusted by how his monsters look and abandons his creation because of his unpleasant demeanor. Victor didn’t accept the monster and decided to avoid coming into contact with the monster, woefully the monster later commits an evil act and kills Justine

“With great power comes great responsibility.” As cliché as this popular Hollywood quotation may sound, it is extremely fitting to describe the situation where Dr. Frankenstein finds himself. When one has the ability, knowledge and power to create another living, breathing and thinking piece of flesh, a burden is immediately presented to whomever holds this invaluable control. Will this power be used to create horrible monstrosities that will be a form of destruction on society? Or will this knowledge be used for the betterment of the populace? Vast knowledge is extremely dangerous, because if someone believes that they have immense power, but is unable to harness it, there is the possibility that events can

The Frankenstein monster is often portrayed in the movies as unemotional and violent: a barely functioning behemoth. However, these depictions are far from the canon storyline. In Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein, the creator of what shall be called the Creature, was actually rivaled in empathy and joie de vivre by his wretch. Throughout the story, the Creature showed more compassion and emotion than Frankenstein, but committed multiple monstrous things after facing neglect and trauma.

Human morality is a product of evolution by heritable variation and natural selection. It is fully part of the natural world but is none the worse for that – on the contrary. In the last sentence of On the Origin of Species, Darwin states that “there is grandeur in this view of life… on which endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved.” The beautiful and wonderful forms include true moral agents who respond to real moral facts and who form a natural moral community. Their existence contributes to the grandeur of Darwin’s evolutionary view of life.