Mutability By Percy Bysshe Shelley

567 Words3 Pages
Mutability by Percy Bysshe Shelley uses vivid imagery and contrast to presents the critical idea of human’s inability to acknowledge their fleetingly short and insignificant lives. Shelley uses simile to shine light on mankind’s all too changeable and fragile world view, putting it under critical scrutiny, in what can come across as an ironic and mocking manner. Mary Shelley’s use of this poem in her novel Frankenstein not only emphasises Percy Shelley’s influence on Mary Shelley, but also draws parallels to Victor’s motivations, and the effect that the creation of his monster had on him. From the beginning of the first stanza, Shelley immediately highlights who he is addressing, and thus who he is including in his criticisms later on: