Most critics have received the novel as an amalgamation of the gothic novel with elements of the Romantic Movement. A lot has also been written on the subject of Frankenstein from a Freudian psychoanalytic perspective because of the complexity of the characters and the thought processes that drive their actions. This essay attempts to analyze the Freudian element present in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and draws a parallel between the Freudian psychoanalytic approach and motives in the novel. Sigmund Freud was one of the most renowned psychologists of all time and introduced the concept of psychoanalysis to the world. There has always been a lot of debate regarding his theories and their validity.
He is nervous yet scared and disgusted at the out come of his long toil. The author shows this with the quote “with an anxiety that almost amounted to agony”, again this really brings out the gothic image using pain and suffering to make sure the reader realises the full extent of the horror that Frankenstein has unleashed on the quite country around him. When the creature is finally brought to life Frankenstein’s
Chen 1 Shanye Chen Dr. Melinda Luisa de Jesús SSHIS 200-03: The Monsters We Make October 24th. 2013 Frankenstein and Prometheus, Knowledge and Wisdom Frankenstein，a novel written by Mary Shelley in the nineteenth century, is about Victor Frankenstein, a scientist, who creates a humanlike creature and abandons the creature immediately. The creature studies by himself and tries to find his identity, but he is not accepted by society because he’s ugly and horrible looking. Then the creature kills all the people, who Victor loves, for revenge. Frankenstein was the first science fiction and Gothic novel, a remarkable work showing a profoundness and criticism of science, which still has influence today.
Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein, which was published in 1818 on the basis of a dare to write a horror story, introduces many controversial issues; issues that were controversial in her time as they meddle with life and creation and question whether or not people are born as evil beings. This was a time when society, disrupted by the French revolution 20 years earlier, looked to science for certainty. Victor Frankenstein, a determined scientist, a man with a good childhood, in pursuit of his selfish desires; brought about his own downfall. These issues still resonate in the present time. Victor Frankenstein was very interested in the creation of life from a young age, and worked hard to find an answer.
In the beginning of the book, right after the creation of the monster, Victor fled his home to get away from the creature, only to return and find that it had escaped. While in the mountains Victor is approached by the monster who begs for understanding from Victor, that it's killing of Victor's younger brother William Frankenstein was out of confusion and it was only intending to hurt Victor, as he saw him as his cruel creator. The monster then asks Victor to create him a female monster, equally grotesque to be his soul mate. If Victor was so passionate about his work you would think he'd keep his monster locked up or under some kind of control, but since victor left his monster free to roam, it left Victor not knowing any better. It is Frankenstein’s responsibility to teach the monster and see it as a friend.
This creates conflict between the monster and Victor as the monster soon begins to hate him for abandoning him. Furthermore, in chapter 16 we see conflict between the creator and the created again: “you belong to my enemy—to him I have sworn eternal revenge; you shall be my first victim”. The monster’s anger towards his creator is channelled into revenge as he kills his brother. Shelley uses the language device direct address to depict this. The pronoun “you” is repeated, this makes the reader
You are an ogre. Let me go, or I will tell my papa." (Shelley 127) When the creature approaches William he screams and runs away in terror. This makes the monster feel very alone and he becomes enraged and eventually ends up strangling William to death. He then takes a picture of Caroline Frankenstein that the boy has been holding and places it in the folds of the dress of a girl sleeping in a barn—Justine Moritz, who is later executed for William’s murder.
The role of the monster is deprived in a variety of different ways throughout gothic fiction and images of the monster can be found in writings by the prophetic historian and social commentator Thomas Carlyle, 1795-1881, both in The French Revolution, 1837, and in his many comments on the growing strength and articulation of the mass of industrial workers and their increasing political demands. The novelist Charles Dickens, 1812-1870, inherited from his reading of Carlyle a strong sense that society was becoming mechanized so that people were beginning to be transformed into a robotic state. In Mary Shelley’s book Frankenstein, 1818, creates a phenomenal creature which makes the reader question humanity and the way people are treated. The monster although uneducated becomes eloquent and brave but is still seen as an outcast due to his grotesque appearance and the fact he has had no parenting. The French Revolution, which began in 1789, resulted in the overthrow of the French monarchy and ultimately helped Napoleon Bonaparte to seize control in 1799.
Readers feel uneasy and in terror after reading the novel. That type of book is for people who like gothic reading. Gothic novels focus on mysterious and supernatural and that’s what Victor wanted to create, a human out of parts of dead bodies for scientific experimentation. To show he can create a human. Victor lived in a gothic area, Europe – Switzerland and Germany with old buildings, dungeons, towers, dark laboratories.
Frankenstein was not a good creator, he was actually trying desperately to kill his monster he made. Frankenstein said, “I devote myself, either in my life or death, to his destruction” (Shelley 191). In a movie version of this story, the monster asks, “Did you ever consider the consequences of your actions? You made me, and you left me to die” (Frankenstein). Here the creature shows his feelings about his creator.