ipl-logo

Examples Of Allusions In Frankenstein

705 Words3 Pages

Cathy Chen
Mrs. Weber
AP Lit
11 February 2023
Revision

In Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, allusions, a symbol of illness, and his story told to Waltom are used to demonstrate how Victor's gift was both a curse and an advantage to him. Victor is an extremely intelligent man; he was able to create and have studies that others cannot accomplish, but in the end, it caused him pain and regret, which developed his knowledge of danger.
The author uses allusions in the story to show how Voctor's knowledge has become both an advantage and a problem. In the novel, Victor was compared to Prometheus, who was a semi-god who obtained fire and gave it to humans but ended with only the punishment of getting eaten by a bird every day. The author used this …show more content…

Victor gets ill every time a family member dies or something tragic happens. The illness sums up his guilt, as the tragedy that has happened was his cause. The illness shows his knowledge as a burden because the creature he has created has damaged his family to the point where it can never be fixed because they have all died. As a result of his obsession with discovering how to create life and his selfish desire to create with his knowledge, he is never satisfied and leads his studies down a dangerous path. This shows how knowledge can be a very dangerous gift to have when you cannot handle it …show more content…

She then uses illness symbolism to show his guilt for what he has caused. He has fallen ill every time a family member died because of his creation. Finally, she uses the dialogue between Victor and Walton, showing the different choices of using knowledge where Victor's selfish pursuit has caused him pain and sorrow in the end, but Walton ending his journey of wanting to know more of the world could have been what changed his future to be different from Victor, ultimately these literary devices had helped develop the theme, danger of knowledge, the knowledge that may have led to pain death, and dangerous situations when not pursuit

Show More
Related

Frankenstein Ap Lit Analysis Essay

773 Words | 4 Pages

Frankenstein Lit Analysis Rough Draft Since the beginning of time, Man has always pursued knowledge, but this pursuit is always kept within certain boundaries, especially while searching for the truths behind the creation and origin of life. As this quest for knowledge continues, men can become consumed with the perilous thoughts and ponderings required to attain this wisdom. In her novel, Frankenstein, Mary Shelley explains how the pursuit of forbidden knowledge can become dangerous through symbolism, allusion, and foreshadowing proving each effectively to the reader. Employing symbolism as her first technique, Shelley uses this in the way many other enlightenment authors do. The strongest use of symbolism is prevalent while Victor is contemplating

Read More

This Is What It Means To Say Phoenix, Arizona

1223 Words | 5 Pages

Victor's journey isn't just a physical one, but a spiritual one as well. His journey of self-exploration and cultural reconnection acts as the key central idea, allowing him to better understand his place in the world, recognizing his dire need to move forward and find a sense of belonging in the

Read More

Examples Of Misery In Frankenstein

1003 Words | 5 Pages

He became so consumed by obtaining knowledge of creating life, his creation gains authority over him, and his desire for revenge takes over his life. In the beginning of the novel life was going well for Victor. He was a very imaginative boy always wanting to learn. One evening he witnessed a horrific thunderstorm when lightning struck down a tree in his yard.

Read More

Opposition And Degradation In Frankenstein Essay

1042 Words | 5 Pages

Victor is tormented by the creatures ambition and this leaves Victor a void of his former self, subject to anything he puts his mind to and it is this form of himself that leads him ever so closer to the end of his days. Left a hollowed out version of himself, Victor is unable to cope with the loss of all of his friends and family through the hands of his own creation and seeks to right all of his

Read More

Frankenstein Power Quotes

956 Words | 4 Pages

In chapter 4, Victor warns Walton about the dangers of acquiring knowledge. This serves as a sign of the events that will unfold throughout the novel. Victor remarks to Walton, “Learn from me… how dangerous is 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” (39). Victor tries to warn Walton about the dangers of trying to know beyond one’s limits. He realizes that it brings misfortune and consequences instead of joy and happiness.

Read More

Examples Of Loss Of Innocence In Frankenstein

1266 Words | 6 Pages

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley is a thematically engrossing novel that follows the treacherous narrative of protagonist Victor Frankenstein as he submits himself entirely to passion and the fervent desire to acquire natural knowledge and the resulting consequences that follow. The outcome of his ardent frenzy of discovery is a monstrous creation that he instantly regrets creating upon first sight. Throughout the Frankenstein novel, Victor and the monster engage in an everlasting mutual war that sets them at ends with each other through their personal pinings for the things that set them apart. It can be proven that throughout the novel the two protagonists come off as both intriguingly similar upon in-depth analysis and strikingly different on

Read More

Allusions In Frankenstein

1639 Words | 7 Pages

Frankenstein and its Biblical References Charles Darwin. Most people have heard of him either in their required biology classes in high school. However, a hundred years ago, most people only knew one theory about how humanity has transpired to where it is today: God. The Scopes Monkey Trial in 1925 was a war between knowledge, or the theories of evolution, and God. This defiance of the so-called “natural order” by scientists has lead to serious consequences, particularly the Butler Act of 1925, in which the teaching of evolution was banned throughout the entire state of Tennessee, or even the outcast of scientists who discovered these theories.

Read More

Frankenstein Isolation Essay

769 Words | 4 Pages

In the novel, Shelley uses Victor and the monster to exemplify the effects that knowledge has on an individual's mental health. This ruthless desire for knowledge portrays how perilous it can be, while “exploring themes of risk, responsibility and accountability,” as Victor’s act of creation ultimately leads to the demise of everyone close to him while the monster’s act of learning results in him despising himself and all of humanity (Hammond). Throughout the novel, Victor Frankenstein encounters a great amount of psychological suffering in the early years of his adult life due to his ambition to seek forbidden knowledge and create a living being. Even more, his mental health begins to decline as a result of the artificial being he created and his heedless pursuit for knowledge, which ultimately leads to the demise of everyone close to him. Ironically, Victor loses the people he truly cared for in the process of his research into "the hidden laws of nature" (Shelley 18).

Read More

Frankenstein Isolation Essay

925 Words | 4 Pages

Victor figuratively and literally destroys his loved ones through a long and strenuous self-imposed isolation, as not only do they become unimportant to him, but the separation genuinely creates the murderer of his loved ones (Schmid). This seclusion has a negative influence on him, as after being alone for so long he finds himself mentally unstable, saying he had “a nervous fever which confined me for several months” (Shelley 53). Victor is mentally and physically depleted as a result of his isolation, directly contrasting with the emotions of joy and prosperity he felt as a young boy surrounded by his loved ones. Victor’s solitariness has caused him to become disconnected from his sense of community and familiarity (Schmid), and the extremely negative effects of the isolation prove the necessity of companionship in his

Read More

Allusions In Frankenstein

1256 Words | 6 Pages

Reanimating the dead has been a plot point in various horror movies and shows. Zombies and the undead are spectacles in such media, but the original horror story is Frankenstein, whose gothic nature set the standard for other horror novels to come, and called into question many moral ideas. In the novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelly emphasizes the ironic nature of Victor’s love of his science and making the creature in contrast to his disdain for the creature in order to demonstrate that man’s pursuit of knowledge is not innately good. This is apparent through Frankenstein’s detailed description of the creature, his symbolic dream, and an allusion to another work of fiction. The imagery of the creature through Victor’s perspective serves to illustrate

Read More

Lack Of Knowledge In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein '

454 Words | 2 Pages

The search of knowledge can help take away the doubt, but it can affect the ones around you. Victor doubts and knowledge cause the death of his wife, best friend, and his brother. Victor should have known that bringing something back to life would had consequences. His relentless search of knowledge did brought him suffering because he involved his family and didn't thought about the consequences. Victor’s passion about learning new things brought him to the creation of an ugly monster.

Read More

Mental Illness In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

1056 Words | 5 Pages

Throughout the book the death of Victor's family has taken a toll on his mental state and he starts showing signs of mental illness. Much like Mary Shelley had mental illness because of the horrors that happened in her life. The illnesses that Victor starts showing signs of depression, paranoid schizophrenia, and anxiety. Depression is something that

Read More

Misuse Of Knowledge In Frankenstein

389 Words | 2 Pages

The misuse of knowlege he gains is trying to create life. Victor should not interefere with nature. Creating life from Victor leads to a tragedy, due to the abomination le let choose on the world. Interefering with nature always tries to create balance, in this case Victor's creation led to the fall of lis family. Victor's knowledge was dangerous because the outcome led to mejor destructions.

Read More

The State Of Mind In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

1633 Words | 7 Pages

The death of his mother leads Victor into denial. As a result of his mother 's death, Victor’s emotions falsely lead him to believe that he could have some control over the fate of peoples lives. Thus, Victor’s beliefs soon equated to a set of rules that he himself must follow. Consequently,

Read More

Frankenstein Literary Analysis

2701 Words | 11 Pages

Additionally, two of the most impressive aspects in Frankenstein are the foreshadowing of events and the adverse use of intertextuality. Shelley by using words such as ‘fate’ and ‘omen’ sets up the course of the book in an intriguing manner. Notably though, events such as Victor referring to his genius as “the fatal impulse that lead to my ruin” (24) establishes a firm ground for foreshadowing and prepares the reader for what evil is yet to come. As previously

Read More

More about Examples Of Allusions In Frankenstein

Related Topics

Open Document