Frankenstein: the Connection Between Victor Frankenstein and Percy Shelley
Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein, is about one man’s desire to create life, and how it later becomes his demise. Parallels can be drawn between Shelley’s life and her novel. One distinct connection between Shelley’s life and Frankenstein is the resemblance of Shelley’s husband, Percy Shelley, and Victor Frankenstein. While the connection between Victor and Percy has been previously made by literary scholars, this essay will further explore the idea. To begin with, Victor Frankenstein had a passion for natural philosophy, but he also believed in controversial ideas about the subject. When asked by his professor about his studies in the field, Victor replied with
…show more content…
Victor described his friendship with Clerval in novel by stating, “[Clerval] exerted himself to amuse me, [...] his conversation was full of imagination; and very often, in imitation of the persian and arabic writers, he invented tales of wonderful passion. At other times he repeated my favorite poems, or drew me into arguments (Shelley 45).” The friendship between Percy and Lord Byron is much similar to that of Victor and Clerval’s relationship. In the “Author’s Introduction” written by Mary Shelley in the novel, Frankenstein, Shelley details how Lord Byron and his guests spent their time: “Some volumes of ghost stories, translated from the German into French, fell into our hands (vi)”, and she later wrote, “Many and long were the conversations between Lord Byron and [Percy] Shelley (viii).” In other words, just as Victor and Clerval spent their time reading and participating in discussions, so did Percy and Lord Byron. In addition to the similarities between the men and their friendships, the source of the friends’ amusement was also similar. As previously stated, Clerval created stories similar to those of persian writers, while Percy and Byron read German ghost stories. Along with reading the stories, Byron proposed to create their own german ghost stories (Shelley vii). To further explain, Prussia included Germany, so both men spent their time creating stories of German