“Dad, you are not an anchor to hold us back, nor a sail to take us there, but a guiding light whose love shows us the way” (Jane Lindsay). Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” is a piece of literature that explores the pent-up resentment in a maternal-like relationship between a shamefaced creator, Victor Frankenstein and his neglected creation, the “monster”. The central plot and main characters revolve around the taboo theme of desertion and shame. Characteristic behaviors and emotions found in the story reflect back to Mary’s own inner dark struggles and memorable moments, in the sense that they are coordinated in a haunting family-like dynamic. Uncoincidentally both the author and multiple written characters share qualities and encounters similar
Psychopathic tendencies in an individual can destroy the lives of many, beginning with those closest to them. The question of psychopathy arises when events of recurring offenses of anti-social behavior are exhibited by a subject. These tendencies, while unusual and alarming, do not always have to be a case of violence. In the case of Victor Frankenstein, an argument can be made on his relation to psychopathy and the non-violent tendencies that come with it. Throughout the novel written by Mary Shelley, the reader witnesses a boy growing into a rich family with an unusual desire for knowledge.
A satirical effect of parental neglect can be seen in the timeless tragedy Frankenstein, where the eponymous creator abandons his poor creation. The creation can be viewed as a young child because of his lack of understanding of the real world, naivety, thirst for basic knowledge and childlike temper.
Parents need to love their children and show them right from wrong. Without care from a parent, children may feel lost or lonely like the monster did in Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein. Shelley analyzes the psychology of parenting through Victor Frankenstein and his creation, the monster, by comparing their behavioral and psychological development as a result of the parenting they receive in their childhood. Because Victor was loved and had a great childhood, he was able to grow as a person, psychologically and emotionally. As though Victor had a good childhood,
Family has played a crucial role in society throughout history. Parents are expected to instill morals, guide children through the early stages of life, and support their children in any expressed interests. Unfortunately, some parents neglect these expectations, affecting many children’s lives forever. In Mary Shelley’s Gothic novel Frankenstein, Shelley examines paternal conflicts, particularly father-son relationships, between both the Frankenstein family and between Victor Frankenstein and the creature to illustrate the negative effects living with a distant and uninvolved parent can have. How the Frankenstein’s raise their children drives Victor's god-like desires and arrogance.
While his creator lives in extreme comfort, the creature suffers extensively which it blames on its maker. When at an all time low, the creature discovers a family that fills his underdeveloped mind with the idea that he might still have hope of accommodating with the world it found itself in and attempts to acquire the traits that might enable this adaptation with a familiar environment. The creature immensely strived to be accepted by the one that made it that it would subject itself to immense self loathing and strenuous mental development. This portrays the torture Frankenstein subjected his poor underling to due to his imperfections. With this, Shelley criticizes the weakness of the faulty chemist.
In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the tale of a mad scientist is told who surpasses the limits of science and what is typically considered to be possible for man to achieve. One of the many underlying stories, though, can be seen in the monster who is created and then brought to life at the beginning of the novel. The monster’s development throughout the novel begins with initially being rejected and neglected by his creator Victor Frankenstein. The monster turns aggressive soon after and seeks revenge on Frankenstein’s family, killing off each one, one at a time. These actions are obviously very unlike that of an average human child, but when you look at his horrendous acts as being in response to negligence by a parental figure,
In life there are many evils that will try to defeat a person but the key to living a happy, fulfilling life is learning to have empathy for others who are facing their own evils. Empathy is hard to have if a person has not endured any real struggles in their life. Being able to know firsthand how it feels to go through difficulties helps create a level of empathy that leads to compassion for one another. Victor Frankenstein is a prime example of someone who has faced evils in their own life but in the end did not find compassion for others, instead he found his own hell. In the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, Victor’s lack of empathy opens the door into his world of selfishness, cruelty, and unhappiness.
Interestingly enough, the novel resembles Shelley’s own life and can be interpreted as a reflection of her perception of families. Shelley shares many of the same characteristics with most of her characters. As the main character in the novel, Frankenstein’s creature is depicted as “a motherless orphan” who had an “unnatural birth” (Griffith). This correlates with Shelley’s own childhood as she was raised without a mother and her birth was in some ways “unnatural” as mothers are not naturally made to die during childbirth.
Mary Shelley uses her novel Frankenstein to analyze the idea of parenting. She compares the two main character's, Victor Frankenstein and his creature, social, mental, and emotional development throughout their childhood. Victor Frankenstein was raised in what he described as
Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, is one of the most important and popular novels in the Romantic genre to this day. The novel was originally controversial because it touched on many fragile subjects such as the human anatomy and the development of science. The structure of Frankenstein begins as an epistolary, narrative story told by Robert Walton to his sister in England. Walton’s letters tell us that he is exploring, searching for what lies beyond the North Pole, and he eventually connects with Frankenstein. Shelley creates the protagonist, Dr. Victor Frankenstein, who has a fascination with life and death.
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein examines how the presence of a mother, negatively or positively, affects the development of a child. Victor’s mother, Caroline Frankenstein, dies while Victor is still a young man (he is about 17 years old), breaking their relationship between mother and son. Because Victor loses his bond with his mother, he is unable to act as a mother would when he creates his creature. Caroline Frankenstein’s absence in Victor’s life creates a disunion between the mother and child bond, which is evident in Victor’s creation and his fragmented relationship with the creature. Caroline Frankenstein, Victor’s mother, portrayed a traditional mother in the Frankenstein household, until her death.
The gothic fiction novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley centralizes on humanity and the qualifications that make someone human. The content of the novel Frankenstein depicts a monster displaying human traits that his creator Victor does not possess: empathy, a need for companionship, and a will to learn and fit in. Throughout the novel Shelley emphasizes empathy as a critical humanistic trait. The monster displays his ability to empathize with people even though they are strangers. On the other hand Victor, fails to show empathy throughout the novel even when it relates to his own family and friends.
In the novel “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley, the main character Victor Frankenstein is portrayed as a pathological narcissist throughout the entire story, he has this personality trait because of a traumatizing event that occurred in his youth changing his ideology to pursue a way to be better than death itself and play as a god. What a pathological narcissist is, is a “Personality Disorder is a disorder that is characterized by a long-standing pattern of grandiosity (either in fantasy or actual behavior), an overwhelming need for admiration, and usually a complete lack of empathy toward others. People with this disorder often believe they are of primary importance in everybody’s life or to anyone they meet” according to an article written by Dr. Steve Bressert. These are the base traits of a pathological narcissist, but in order to see how this affects Frankenstein in his life, a closer look needs to be taken to see how his actions reflected on his personality.
When I was a child, my family would tell me stories about my grandmother. I would hear how she raced down nineteen flights of stairs because my sister, who was a child at the time, accidently entered the elevator and went down by herself. If my family was going through difficult times, she was there to make sure everyone got out unharmed. My grandmother was an immortal woman, who could do anything and survive anything thrown her way. That was, until the last test came her way, when she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
