Essay on Playing God in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

However, in Victor's role as God he is so enthralled with the thought of bringing life to a lifeless corpse that he ignores the moral affects that his creation will have on society. He wants so badly to understand, and potentially prevent, the mortality of man that he never thinks there may be a reason we can't create life or live forever. He thinks nothing to altering a system that has existed in the world since the inception of life. It is not until after he completes his experiment, he can only begin to understand some of the consequences. In discussing the shock of his creation Victor states, " how can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch whom with such infinite pain and care I had endeavoured to form?"(34). Much like with the current stem cell and genetics research ethical questions being raised, there are a lot of things to consider when one begins messing with the complexity of life. Life itself is complex beyond our understanding; relatively little is known today about its inner-workings. Therefore, it can be nothing better than irresponsible to create life from death, when you don't understand what is already alive. The admittance of his disappointment in his work causes one to question why he would create such a monstrous creature that would obviously not fit into society. The most obvious explanation would be that he is so overpowered with the possibility of his own death, that he hopes to gain the knowledge of

Victor Frankenstein in the book Frankenstein faces many terrible situations and has to face many consequences for trying to play God’s role in creating life. Victor seen and dealt with many situations as a young boy that will lead to his madness and obsession with science. Victor has always been intrigued with science and life ever since he was a boy. He studied natural science endlessly trying to master how to create a creature that could sustained life. When Victor finally creates his creature, he becomes disgusted with how it turns out. Victor runs from his creation failing to teach him any social or moral qualities. The creature haunts Victor killing many of his family and friends. Victor will try to run from the many problems he has caused. This causes Victor’s misery throughout the book. Victor becomes the true murderer in the book for trying to play God and create life with science.

In the beginning of the book, Frankenstein talks to his professor about his interests in science. The professor tells Frankenstein the wonders of science, and how it has affected the world. “The ancient

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

A multitude of signs illustrates similarities between the Frankenstein’s creature and Mary Shelley. These indications show that the novel may be an autobiography. However, the novel shows a lot of the characteristics of science fiction. The novel can be a real description or fiction narrative, but not both. An informed opinion about this controversy requires the evaluation of relevant critics. Sherry Ginn uses “Mary Shelley 's Frankenstein: Science, Science Fiction, or Autobiography?” to adequately argue that the novel Frankenstein is based on Shelley’s experiences and fears, that it is not an autobiography, and that it has all the characteristics of a science fiction narrative.

Throughout the novel, the creation begins to slowly murder the people closest to Victor until he is left in solitude as he is forced to bear the burden of this knowledge of the murderer in addition to his own accountability of the deaths since he is responsible for the creation.

     Romantic writer Mary Shelley’s gothic novel Frankenstein does indeed do a lot more than simply tell story, and in this case, horrify and frighten the reader. Through her careful and deliberate construction of characters as representations of certain dominant beliefs, Shelley supports a value system and way of life that challenges those that prevailed in the late eighteenth century during the ‘Age of Reason’. Thus the novel can be said to be challenging prevailant ideologies, of which the dominant society was constructed, and endorsing many of the alternative views and thoughts of the society. Shelley can be said to be influenced by her mothers early feminist views, her father’s

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley has a simple origin, compared to other stories. While stories such as It by Stephen king started a several year process of creation, Frankenstein began simply as a campfire story Mary Shelley shared with her writer friends one evening. Although the origins of this novel are fairly simple, it provides an in depth psychological perspective on the darker side of human psyche through the shifting first person perspective. Usually these darker aspects are associated with the character’s personal struggles, but one specific theme in all the characters. The theme of obsession has been consistent and the central focus of the three main characters Victor, the creature, and Robert. With this central theme in mind the author, Mary Shelley shows that obsession leads to the characters suffering negative psychological and physical effects, as well as impair their decision making. This is depicted through the decline of physical and mental health through Victor’s struggles with his obsessions with knowledge and justice.

Victor’s growth mindset can be observed throughout the entire novel, but it is initially witnessed when Victor is only thirteen years old. At this age Victor, begins to study the works of alchemist and is beginning to become intrigued by the natural sciences. Due to his recent interest in the natural sciences, Victor had developed a “longing to [discern] the secrets of nature” (37) . This longing enveloped Victor and

This need of power led Victor to create what he believed would be a beautiful human being. But he failed to see that combining the most beautiful human features does not necessarily create a beautiful human being. He was inspired by scientists who ...acquired new and almost limitless powers... (Shelley, Frankenstein, P. 47). Victor sought this unlimited power to the extent of taking the role of God. He not only penetrated nature, but also he assumed power of reproduction in a maniacal desire to harness these modes of reproduction in order to become acknowledged, respected, and obeyed as a father. While bringing his creation into the world he was himself alienated from society, and isolated himself from the community. Isolation and parental neglect cause viciousness within man. Because of his upbringing, Victor had no sense of empathy, and therefore could not realize the potential harm he was creating towards himself and his creation. The sole purpose of his project was an attempt to gain power, but instead of power Victor realized that a morally irresponsible scientific development could release a monster that can destroy human civilization.

During Frankenstein Victor’s mental state was altered after witnessing the power of nature firsthand when he saw lightning destroy a tree near his home in Geneva.This observation leads him to study philosophy at the University of Ingolstadt where he became obsessed with anatomy. Victor takes God’s power into his own hands, “When I found so astonishing a power placed within my hands, I hesitated a long time concerning the manner in which I should employ it.” (Shelly 32) He has the gruesome idea to create his own human from the remains of the dead. Victor sneaks into charnel-houses, digs into graves to collect limbs, disturbing the resting corpses, and studies uses them to find the answer how to make life come from death. During the process of creating his monster, Victor

Victor's story begins with a description of his childhood and the love that he shared with his friends and family. Up to this point the story has not embarked on his technological endeavors. In fact, it is still hard to imagine this story turning into anything remotely close to technology or horror.

In the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, she wrote the story of a Swiss who discovers the possibility of bringing lifeless matter to contain life. By stitching together different body parts, this creation then seeks revenge on his creator after being shunned by society. Where one man’s ambition to be God sets him up on a path of misery and destruction. Overall it is a well piece of work of which still excels in today’s time. The complexity of Mary Shelly’s style of writing has an elegant form of elaborating the Romanticism period of her time through her novel, subtle reference to patriarchy, and the showmanship of her understanding of the real world indirectly.

Questions of morality did not enter Victor's mind a single time before the creation of his "human being."  He did not ponder the effects of his creation.  Victor had a goal - to create life.  By doing so we would be "godlike" for just one instant.  He successfully

The novel Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, was a piece written in 1817 during a time when women weren’t considered to be adequate authors. Shelley’s work is both intriguing as it is thought provoking. She brings to light the true nature of society and life altogether when tested. She factors in how the outside world can influence our choices in writing. George Levine from “The Ambiguous Heritage of Frankenstein” and Benjamin Truitt from “Frankenstein Critical Analysis and Literary Criticism” both share their opinions about Shelley’s piece of written work.