Thesis I: The Monster's Body Is A Cultural Body

In this essay I will be discussing who really is portrayed as the monster in her gothic horror novel, Frankenstein or “The Modern Prometheus”. Frankenstein was written in 1816, (thought by many to be the first real science fiction novel) during the age of Romanticism and it tells the story of a selfish man, Victor Frankenstein, whose ambition conducts him to seek for supernatural powers and leads him to death. He is a young scientist, eager to discover something new, the key to life, help to make scientific advances and let other scientists get a better idea of how the body works and who after studying chemical processes and the decay of living beings, gains an insight into the creation of like, leading him to create a monster that becomes

Why does a text exist? It would seem that this is the essential question which all readers attempt to solve. However, how can you possibly attempt to find meaning in a work written in the past when we are subject to the influences of today and all of the events that have transpired since then? To really get a grasp on text, we must attempt to put ourselves into the thoughts of one of the time, which in it of itself is impossible as we do not have access to every bit of information, especially that of the “losers” of events. Like Stephen Greenblatt, father of New Historicism, once put it in his book Renaissance Self-Fashioning: From More to Shakespeare, “We simply do not know what was thought in silence” (35). To counteract this problem, Greenblatt culminated ideas of Historicism, Marxism, and Cultural Criticism into a single body, and in this, he understood that not only can we understand texts by the times and perspectives of those from which they are written but we can also learn more about the time period from the ideas presented in the text and at least comprehend one perspective. One excellent example of this dual relationship is that of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. In this early 19th century masterpiece, the author conveys important views and criticism from her British, educated situation in a narrative of the French Revolution with her descriptions of science, class structure, and justice.

When one looks in the mirror, they see many things about themselves; the color of their eyes, the way their pupils dilate when exposed to varying intensities of light, the curve of their mouth contrasting against the flatness of the surrounding walls. They look into the mirror and form a judgement about themselves, their appearance, their behaviors, who they are and what they are to become. But the question no one seems to ask themselves when they look in the mirror is what exactly makes that person they see human? And while this may not be a question that most people ask about themselves on a personal level, it is a topic that is widely discussed alongside Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein. Many debates have surfaced discussing if

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.

Monster by Sanyika Shakur yields a firsthand insight on gang warfare, prison, and redemption. “There are no gang experts except participants (xiii)” says Kody Scott aka. Monster. Monster vicariously explains the roots of the epidemic of South Central Los Angeles between the Crips and the Bloods that the world eventually witnessed on April 29, 1992. As readers we learn to not necessarily give gangs grace but do achieve a better understanding of their disposition to their distinct perception in life.

Frankenstein is a classic horror novel, but with a twist of many other genres. Written by Mary Shelley, it was a novel which mixed many exciting elements, such as horror, drama and romance. The story follows a young doctor named Victor Frankenstein, who has an obsession to reincarnate the dead, but his attempts at this fail horribly, and Victor finds himself in deep peril, as the monster stalks him throughout the world. I aim to investigate the issue, however, of who is the true monster in Frankenstein. The monster or Frankenstein himself?

In Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, Victor Frankenstein creates a creature, stronger and better than humans in every way except his looks. After Frankenstein abandons him, the Creature meets the De Lacey’s, a nice little family that indirectly teach him how to read and write. In truth, the Creature only becomes a monster after the hatred that Felix, one of the De Lacey’s, shows him. Before, he had done nothing wrong, but afterwards, all he did was fall down a slippery slope.

The most famous monster in the modern days should be Godzilla. Introduced by a Japan author in the 90s. A monster born to bring destruction to earth. The original story of Godzilla states that Godzilla took shape from an nuclear explosion. The radiation shapes his body into an unbreakable fortress. This giant monster crushes every single mile of human land at

Emerging from its years of slumber within its frozen sarcophagus, Honda was able to depict Godzilla as a representation of traditional Japan. When first introduced to Godzilla, the imagery of it breaking out of a iceberg can draw similarities to an ancient creatures that was frozen in ice during the Ice Age. Utilizing this scene, Honda showed how Godzilla was a creature frozen from the past. While this does not accurately represent the age of Godzilla, the parallelism between the prehistoric nature of Godzilla and the traditional customs that were upheld for generations, can be clearly connected. Similarly, when observing Godzilla’s destruction of Japan’s most recent technological advancements, such as a military base as well as the bullet

The movie "Gojira" in 1954 reflects monstrosity in the history of mid 20 century. The appearance of the dinosaur age animal in Japan bring different perspective view through psychoanalysis to different groups of people. This film also read as a national allegory for Japanese, war trauma and the revenge of nature.

In his Chapter one called “Monster Culture” of Monster Theory: Reading Culture, Jeffrey Cohen describes seven theses which enlighten the reader to know how a monster is created, what its origins are and how people react to it. To begin, the first thesis is explaining what is a monster made of, and the answer is ‘pure culture’ (Cohen 4). The monster is a creatures that embodies the emotions of the culture that creates it; he creates a category on its own because he is the place where people throw what is different or not normal to their society. The monster is a human creation to warn the community of what is deviant and improper.

Godzilla, Gojira in Japanese, is a monster we are all familiar with, but its context in Japan is frequently overlooked. Godzilla is thought of as a cheezy, poorly made dinosaur movie that ripped off King Kong. But in reality, Godzilla is a symbol of how Japan dealt with the aftermath of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, and the Castle Bravo bomb in 1954. Breathing nuclear radiation instead of fire, created by the radiation of nuclear bombing, Godzilla shows the world how monstrous the American bombs were through a lens that everyone can relate to: film.

Godzilla: King of the Monsters had great potential, or as much potential a movie about a giant lizard can have, but it was just that, potential. The script was very redundant and the set design was horrible. While trying to portray a message of the many dangers of nuclear warfare, the viewer leaves confused and frustrated that they have just wasted time and money.

The 1956 movie about a huge reptile, Godzilla looks like a dinosaur and breathes fire like a dragon. He comes up out of the ocean after an atomic bomb wakes him up. Godzilla can melt steel with his atomic breath and is big enough to knock down huge buildings. In the original film he destroys the city of Tokyo and he gets killed at the end.

In Ishirō Honda 's original movie, “Godzilla: King of the Monsters”, destruction of major cities represents how humans should exercise caution with great power. Ishirō Honda develops this theme with a narrator’s dramatic tone and heinous mood. Godzilla existed as a remnant of the cretaceous era, a theropod known as a Godzillasaurus. An infamous kaiju who rises from the Pacific and levels buildings (sometimes battling other gigantic mammoths),