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Frankenstein Gender Roles Essay

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Mary Shelley's classic novel, Frankenstein, tells the story of a young scientist named Victor Frankenstein, who creates a creature from bits and pieces of body parts which were once lifeless in this unorthodox scientific experiment. Throughout this novel many themes were introduced some including; science, family, and revenge. But the one that interested me most were the gender roles integrated within the story itself. Taking this classic novel from a feminist point of view, it is apparent many signs of entitlement and superiority coming from the male character’s. And regarding the female gender roles within the novel it is apparent there is a sense of submission and inferiority within the character presented in the story. Through the eyes of …show more content…

This is something the women are excluded from due to their roles as passive tools in the representation of the male characters. The women are instead confined to their houses or villages while character like Victor, Henry, the monster, and the crew on the ship which saved Victor, all have this privilege of traveling. This is another gender role that was prevalent during the 19th century. Women during this time were confined to their houses to take care of the home and also the children. While the males were free to be adventures and travel the world, whether it be looking for new trade routes for recognition (just as the crew was doing that saved Victor) or just to travel for the experience and camaraderie of a friend (just as Victor and Henry did as they explored different parts of Europe, during the time in which Victor was supposed to make the monster a wife). Many of these roles seen in the book can also be traced to 19th century Europe where women were confined and the men were free to do as they

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Women were supposed to submit to their husbands. Since running away from their husband was seen as a crime, any woman captured could be punished by law. A woman’s only purposes was to bare children, and take care of the family. For most women, they spent their entire lives trapped inside a house. Though women had most of the family responsibility, they still

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In the novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley utilizes the gender roles in society to express the differences between men and women through the characters analyzed in the feminist lens. The monster and Victor are flawed in some way. The women, however, are viewed as perfect. Victor is in love with Elizabeth in the novel, but he thought of her as an object, calling her a “pretty present” (Shelley 20).

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Duality is shown in Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein, a gothic tale of a scientist whom looks to advance the life-giving qualities of mother nature. Through this novel, Shelley proves that good and evil in human nature is not always simple to define, and that everyone has both of these qualities within them. The duality of human nature is shown through the characters of Victor Frankenstein and his monster, who are both heroes in the novel while simultaneously displaying anti-hero qualities. Shelley forces the reader to sympathize with them both but also creates gruesome ideas of the two. Frankenstein’s creature places himself in a submissive position when he begs his creator to have mercy on him and asking the creator to “create a female for [him] with whom [he] can live in the interchange of those sympathies necessary for [his] being.”

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They were also not allowed to go to war and fight with the men. Despite women’s changing roles, men continued to hold the power in a marriage. In the Victorian Era, women were made to feel that it was necessary to get married to survive in the world. Women were supposed to stay at home and cook and clean. They were not allowed to a get education or receive knowledge outside their household.

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Frankenstein and Feminism In her 1818 novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley portrays the victimization of women as passive objects in a patriarchal society, proving her flagship novel a groundbreaking feminist work of her time. In the story, Justine finds herself charged with the murder of William Frankenstein without the ability to change her outcome. The author used this scenario to depict the victimization of women without any means of voicing their opinions or defending themselves.

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The presentation of women in Frankenstein Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein”, first published in 1818, was written in a time period where society’s general opinion was that a woman’s role was predominately to be a loving, caring mother and a faithful, docile companion to her husband. This attitude is reflected in Shelley’s portrays of women in her novel as passive, self- sacrificing, loyal, and completely dependent on men. They are a means by which emotions are invoked within male characters and serve only as companions and beautiful possessions. Caroline Beaufort, mother of the protagonist Victor Frankenstein, is an example of the embodiment of this ideal. She is the wife of Alphonse Frankenstein and within the novel plays the role of a perfect daughter, wife, and mother.

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