Theme Of Nature In Frankenstein

Shelley creates suspense in the book by using techniques, throughout the book to catch the reader’s attention. She uses very dramatic words, for the reader to sympathize more against the monster. A technique she used all the way through the book is ‘Pathetic Fallacy’. This is when the writer uses the weather to describe the mood of the current scene. An example of this is in chapter 5 when Frankenstein is gathering the parts for his monster and he quotes ‘It was one in the morning, the rain pattering dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out’.

Weather plays an important role in the overall tone and mood of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. It helps to set the tone for the horror and tradgedy of the story. In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the weather plays a significant part all through out the novel, but particularly during the scenes taking place on Walton’s ship and the scenes where Victor interacts with his creation.

     There are many different themes expressed in Mary Shelly's Frankenstein. They vary with each reader but basically never change. These themes deal with the education that each character posses, the relationships formed or not formed in the novel, and the responsibility for ones own actions. This novel even with the age still has ideas that can be reasoned with even today.

As I stood at the door, on a sudden I beheld a stream of fire issue from an old and beautiful oak”4 The following day, Victor inquires about the “origins of thunder and lightning” to which his father replies with, “Electricity.” One cannot help but associate this with Victor’s passion for harboring electricity of scientific use. This one resonant moment, caused by nature, sears itself into Victor’s mind. This foreshadowing of Victor’s future endeavors to conquer nature is highly contradictory to Shelley’s attempts to represent the power of nature, which is quite fascinating. Furthermore, what can almost be described as a medicinal quality of nature is represented when Victor returns to Belrive. “I remained two days at Lousanne, in this painful state of mind. I contemplated the lake: the water were placid; all around was calm, and the snowy mountains, ‘the palaces of nature,’ were not changed. By degrees the calm and heavenly scene restored me.”5 This interpretation of nature’s healing abilities certainly connects the Romantic’s viewpoint on nature, which helps validate Shelley’s representation.

Shelley depicts the romantic’s love for nature and the desire to understand and acquire nature’s power. Frankenstein finds comfort when he is at his lowest, but at the same time, he is horrified by his creation and its quest for revenge.

In the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, man tries to tamper with nature. This is an enormous mistake, because his experiences prove that man should respect the omnipotent power of nature so man can be happy. Man should respect nature because if man goes beyond his limits, then nature lets man creates all types of consequences for himself which proves Shelley’s point to respect nature’s powers.When people look at nature, they are automatically healed just by its looks. This is a much more powerful force than anything man is capable of doing, thus nature is all powerful. Nature is constant, unlike man who is constantly changing, which shows that nature is always in control.

Many of Mary Shelley’s ideas came from nature. A storm similar to this one was seen by victor. She uses this storm to describe how Victor sees the creature. Victor thinks the creature is violent at times and beautiful at others. In addition, the creature causes destruction like an avalanche. Shelley writes,

Shelley’s uses of romantic and gothic elements also enhance the negative portrayal of science and its potential destruction. Her writing conveys gloomy settings of Frankenstein as well as the appreciation of nature. Dark ambiance is evident in the description of Frankenstein’s laboratory: “In a solitary chamber, or rather cell, at the top of my house, and separated from all the other apartments by a gallery and staircase, I kept my workshop of filthy creation...the dissecting room and the slaughterhouse furnished many of my materials”. This description invokes a repulsive reaction in the reader and therefore a tainted opinion of science. One of the important scenes that reflected Mary Shelley’s attitudes towards science is the portrayal of Frankenstein’s awe when he sees the lightening strike the tree, showing his curiosity towards science-“As I stood at the door, on a sudden I beheld a stream of fire issue from an old and beautiful oak...and no soon as the sizzling light vanished, the oak disappeared, and nothing was left but a blasted stump”. In this quote the power and beauty of nature is apparent and

In the novella Frankenstein, Mary Shelley uses geography to further the plot, reveal the true intentions of characters and convey the novella’s theme of sublime nature. The theme of sublime nature is the idea that nature is comprised of a mixture of terror and beauty. One example of sublime nature supported by geography is the monster, which is truly a terror in appearance and spirit being born in Ingolstadt. Shelly contrasts this “terror” of Ingolstadt to the beauty of Geneva, Frankenstein’s birthplace. Once the fruit of Frankenstein’s labor comes to fruition and the horrific monster is born, even Frankenstein himself is “unable to endure the aspect of the being” and attempts to cast it away and forget it (Shelley 101). The apparent

Mary Shelly sets her novel up in an exotic atmosphere with the entire novel taking place in the foreign and scenic country of Switzerland. In the novel, Victor Frankenstein tells us about the scenery of Switzerland when Victor said “The road ran by the side of the lake which became narrower as I approached my native town. I discovered more distinctly the black sides of Jura, and the bright summit of Mont Blanc; I wept like a child: ‘Dear mountains! My own beautiful lake! How do you welcome your wanderer? Your summits are clear; the sky and lake are blue and placid. Is this to prognosticate peace, or to mock at my unhappiness? ' which shows the romantic side of Victor as he views nature. However, the exotic nature also reveals the misery of the monster whose condition deteriorates along with Victor when the beautiful nature is no longer tranquil to them. This is shown when the monster says “The labours I endured were no longer to be alleviated by the bright sun or the gentle breezes of spring”. The contrasting differences of misery even in exotic places prove that romanticism has the beliefs that imagination and devotion to beauty is inferior to reason.

In Mary Shelley’s novel, nature plays a vital role in the development of the plot. Nature is considered a female part because Mother Nature is the collective personification of life. Nature is life-bearing and nurturing, as females are to their offspring. In spite of nature being feminine, Victor

The environment has a lot to say in Marry Shelly's Frankenstein. It seems to reflect somewhat what is going on emotionally with Victor in the story. Victor finds solace in solitude with nature, and appears to use it as a coping mechanism to escape from the horrors of his life. Nature also ties into how the monster Victor has created feels, but in a much different way than it does for him.

“Here we find nature to be the circumstance which[…] judges like a god all men that come to her.” is one of the first statements by Ralph Waldo Emerson in his essay “Nature”, referring to nature’s role in romanticism. Nature, as well as science, are one of the main topics depicted in writings of the romantic period. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein can be attached to these writings. Her novel implies many natural and scientific characteristics that approach throughout the novel and finally clash by Victor Frankenstein’s creation of the monster. The following essay states the importance of nature and science in Frankenstein and argues that Frankenstein’s monster is a personalization of the danger involved in connecting both nature and science.

Given the deep ties to nature that Mary Shelley explores within Frankenstein, the principles and methodology of ecocriticism can be applied in many different ways. The interaction of humanity and nature is a concept explored throughout the novel, relating directly to a core tenet of ecocriticism, "directly relat[ing] who we are as human beings to the environment" (Bressler 231). Being as there is no "single, dominant methodology" (235) within ecocriticism, the extent to which we can use ecocriticism to interact with Frankenstein contains considerable depth. However, I will look to a few main methodologies of ecocriticism to look at Frankenstein in detail to uncover how the novel deals with the changing attitudes of humanity and nature in

The romantic period was characterized by a marked withdraw from the techniques of the literary period and ideas, that introduced more rational and scientific in nature. Romantic poetry and prose, by contrast, was intended to express a new and visionary relationship to the imagination (Fitch). The romantic poets were always seeking a way to capture and represent the sublime moment and experience (Fitch), the more personal experience, the better. In many romantic poems the authors and their writing are identical. This is one of the ways Shelly embraces the literary period and at the same time matches the specific romantic ideal. She takes Frankenstein and describes him not by her personal experience or in her own voice, but yet she still is still characterizing a single quest to achieve the sublime. Victor Frankenstein’s quest was to make a creature out of raw