Mary Shelley references Samuel Mason Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner many times in her novel Frankenstein. Other than the obvious mentioning of Coleridge’s poem, Shelley also mirrors the characteristics and includes the weather as a foreboding symbol. Shelley also alludes to the story of Prometheus, showing how both Frankenstein and Prometheus brought something new to mankind. Shelley’s characters imitate Coleridge’s in that they have similar traits. The creature in Frankenstein was created without his consent and did not know how to function correctly in society, but was still blamed for his bending his “mind towards injury and death” (Shelley 137). Coleridge’s Albatross is also shown this way, by it minding it’s own business until it got shot down for no reason by the mariner. The bird’s ending was just like that of the creature’s beginning, it happened by someone else. The birth and death of these characters also reveal the similarities between Victor Frankenstein and the mariner. They both played God and because of that, there were consequences. For the mariner, his crew …show more content…
In Frankenstein, lightning was the inspiration Frankenstein had to create the monster “for the acquirement of knowledge” (Shelley 23). The Rime of the Ancient Mariner also had weather as a large impact on the poem. The change in weather was good at times, but it mostly brought bad news for the seamen. For example, after killing the albatross, the other crew members were almost willing to kill the mariner for bringing a bad omen on them and killing “the bird/That made the breeze to blow” (Coleridge 749). Soon after however, they rejoiced him for killing the bird because there was now no more fog. Later on in the poem, the weather signified the Mariner’s purgatory-like boat ride, since he spent a long period of time sitting in the ocean without
The Christian belief is that no matter what you do wrong or to what extent, you are always able to be forgiven. As long as you are able to realize and admit to what you've done wrong and are willing to pay for your sins and repent, you will always be forgiven in the eyes of God. In "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner", by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the mariner is willing to repent. After committing his sins against nature, he comes to realize that it is not to be taken for granted. By realizing and expressing the beauty that nature is, the mariner is granted his forgiveness in return for penance; his telling of this story.
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.
Chapter 9 of Foster’s book is all about the weather and how it affects the story. Foster claims that “weather is never just weather” (Foster, 70). As he says this, he also explains how rain carries a deeper meaning when it is presented in a setting, and that is the same for fog, lightning, and sunshine. In Frankenstein, weather promotes a deeper meaning when Victor’s brother dies. Victor exclaims, “William, dear angel! This is thy funeral, this thy dirge...a flash of lightning illuminated the object, and discovered its shape plainly to me: its gigantic stature, and the deformity of its aspect, more hideous than belongs to humanity,” (Shelley, 77). This quote shows how a scary scene is accompanied by lightning to add to the spookiness. This
Mary Shelley alludes to literary text, intellectual history, and her personal life in order to deliver the theme with literary style, to develop the characters’ background, and to emphasize the universality of the story. Literary texts such as Paradise Lost, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, and the myth of Prometheus induces a sense of how commonplace the story of Frankenstein could be. Intellectual history adds to that effect by emphasizing the story with logic. Similarities to her personal life such as her childhood and marriage exemplifies her point. The external references in the novel serve to represent the Gothic and Romantic Movements and to encourage the readers to relate the situation to their own lives.
The poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge is a truly imaginative work utilizing the familiar yet timeless themes of good fortune, the power of Mother Nature, and adventurous voyages over the sea. The Mariner relates the bone-chilling tale of his adventure to a guest at a wedding in his native country. Although the guest succumbs to the Mariner’s tale, he is eager to get to the wedding, which is about to start. Coleridge chose this occasion for the poem as a form of irony, by providing a stark contrast between the two atmospheres and situations in his poem. The moods of weddings are usually joyful and jubilant, emphasizing love and the union between
Frankenstein is Mary Shelley’s famous, fictional work in which a man unravels the secret to creating life. The main character in this story is Victor Frankenstein. Throughout the novel he grows from a young, innocent boy into a vindictive, vengeful man. He oversteps the bounds of science by becoming the creator of a being that never should have lived. In the poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, written by Samuel Coleridge, a man, much like Victor, takes the role of the main character. The ancient mariner, by killing the albatross, violates the laws of nature and has to repent for his crime. These two characters are very similar but they also vary in several key ways.
In 1818 Frankenstein was written by Mary Shelley. In Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein brings a creature to life. The creature kills William, Henry Clerval, and Elizabeth. Victor had promised to make a female creature for the creature, but he did not fulfill his promise. This makes the creature enraged. The creature runs away and Victor follows him. Victor gets on a boat with Walton. Victor dies and the creature comes and is very sad that his creator has died. The creature says that he must end his suffering and he jumps into the ocean. In the novel Frankenstein, Shelley uses the theme of nature to show how it is like the characters of the story and how it affects the characters.
This quote shows The Mariner 's outlook on nature in the beginning of the poem. The Mariner refers to the creatures of the sea as "slimy things," which obviously has a negative connotation. However, once Coleridge teaches his character the lesson of the inherent beauty in nature, the Mariner learns that all creatures are beautiful. In Shelley 's piece, which also has this theme, it seems that Frankenstein really never learns this lesson, while the creature does seem to grasp this concept.
In the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, it has similarities to Frankenstein with structure. In Frankenstein, through careful reading, it is shown how The Rime of the Ancient Mariner has influenced Mary Shelley’s novel. The structure of both the novel and the poem are situated similarly. As well as the end of the novel is similar to the poem. The structure of Frankenstein is laid out to follow The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Also the poem has significance to each character in the novel, Walton his love for exploration and voyaging. For Victor it is his ambitions and wisdom. For the Creature, it is his wisdom as well and telling of his tale. The poem gives the reader a better understanding of the creature and allows the reader to see where the
Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” are similar pieces of works because they both emphasize the consequences of defying laws of nature. Both of the stories are told in a third person point of view and in a series of flashbacks. In Frankenstein, Robert Walton tells the majority of the story and in “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” it is told by the wedding-guest. The protagonist of both stories challenge nature and get punished for their mistake. Shelley and Coleridge both do a masterful job incorporating romanticism and Gothicism s into their works.
The poem “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” written by Coleridge and the book “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelly have a deeper connection then many may think. Both stories have many differences and similarities through the setting, theme, and characters. In these reads, both touch the same theme in a poetic way. In “Frankenstein” and “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” links to romanticism, the supernatural that merges the relationship between nature and human beings with no normal events that occur.
Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein, references many other works of literature in her renowned book. To name a few of the referenced works there were John Milton’s Paradise Lost, the Greek “Prometheus myth”, and the widely known poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”. Each of these allusions gave a new meaning to Shelley’s story, affecting how each of the readers interpreted her words.
Indeed, Shelley’s several allusions to Coleridge’s poem and the parallel plots that Frankenstein’s tragedy shares with the mariner’s tale are intentional references meant to expose her warning purpose. The mariner’s tale is a mirror image of Frankenstein’s—identical yet backwards. The mariner is punished for killing a Christ figure, Frankenstein is punished for vitalizing a demon—both offenses concern the illegitimate use of a godly prerogative and a disregard for the sanctity of life. Captain Walton—the warned—of course, is also a mariner; however, he sails north and the Ancient Mariner—the warner—sailed south. Walton himself is the first to allude directly to the rime saying that he goes “to the land of mist and snow,” yet he swears that he shall “kill no albatross” nor, says he, shall he return “as worn and woeful as the ‘Ancient Mariner’” (33). His vows are ironic, however, because he is saved from that ancient fate only by listening to Frankenstein’s tale which warns him against his hubristic quest for knowledge. Toward the end of the book, Captain Walton weighs his chance for discovery and glory against the lives of his men noting, “It is terrible to reflect that the lives of all these men are endangered through me. If we are lost, my mad schemes are the cause” (181). Happily, Frankenstein’s mariner-like caution proves effective for the captain who heeds the warning and turns back. The second-person
Possibly the most significant trait that connects Victor Frankenstein and Robert Walton is the desire to have knowledge of the forbidden, a theme that is echoed throughout Shelley 's book. During Shelley 's time, industrialization and science began advancing at unfathomable rates and Shelley feared that these innovations were in some ways inhuman and that boundaries should exist of what man truly requires knowing. Thus, she created two parallel characters to illustrate the different paths the search of forbidden knowledge produces, whether it is a science that resembles sorcery, or uncharted territories covered with impenetrable ice. Victor will stop at nothing to pursuit this forbidden knowledge and explains, "Curiosity, earnest research to learn the hidden laws of nature, gladness akin to rapture, as they were unfolded to me, are among the earliest sensations I can remember." However, his endless search to create life ironically triggers the destruction of lives, including his and the monster 's. He even symbolically hunts the creature, the product of his own doing, to stop the destruction he has spawned. He explains:
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, as a product of its culturally inscribed author, presents a confused Unitarian world view consistent with that of the Romantic Movement of its time. It attempts to exemplify this view within an unpredictable and often mysterious universe, and by rebuking the hegemonic ideologies held by the text’s cultural antagonists, seeks to grant the awareness of an often unreasonable world populated by its reader’s passionate persona.