What It Means To Be Human Frankenstein

What does it mean to be human? In the novel Frankenstein, written by Mary Shelly, she shows through the similar characteristics of Victor Frankenstien and his wretched monster, that the idea of being human is the nature of curiosity and knowledge of our emotions, and how we require a relationship with society. The creation of a motley unnatural life by Victor Frankenstein with his monstrous creature who intern isn't that much different from Frankenstien himself. With complex emotions, high intelligence, and the need for socialization, the monster's existence questions the idea of what being human means. First, Mary Shelly shows the human experience through the monster and is describing the intense human emotions that he experiences, and

This is showing how the monster is similar to Victor, his life is to question the reality of things and the hunger for this knowledge damns them both. Curiosity is one of the few distinct traits of human nature that separates humans from animals. In the beginning of the monster's awareness to himself and his surroundings, he is almost childlike not understanding who he is but is curious with the state of life he was given. Shelly wrote, “My person was hideous and my stature gigantic. What did this mean? Who was I? Whence did I come? What was my destination? These questions continually recurred, but I was unable to solve them” (91). The wretched creature soon began to learn to speak, write, and learn of humanity which in result gave him a conflicting feeling of where he places in human society “Some time elapsed before i learned the history of my friend. It was one which could not fail to impress itself deeply on my mind, unfolding as it did a number of circumstances, each interesting and wonderful to one so utterly inexperienced as

I did not yet entirely know the fatal effects of this miserable deformity”(80). The monster is desperate for society connection, he's desperate for the love and warmth of people and when he experiences the trauma of rejection countless times he becomes vengeful and shows his hatred towards the world of men. For instance when the monster grows love for the people he watched in the cottage, he attempts to make friends with the blind father, who, in the monster's advantage, cant see his ugliness rather just to hear his kind words of plead for acceptance. Shelly wrote, “I formed in my imagination a thousand pictures of presenting myself to them, and their reception of me. I imagined that they would be disgusted, until, by my gentle demeanor and conciliating words”(81). Only to be faced with the harsh reality of rejection when the seeing family came home and witnessed the monster's wretchedness, “He dashed me to the ground and struck me violently with a stick. I could have torn him limb from limb, as the lion rends the antelope. But my heart sunk within me as with bitter sickness”(97). On the other hand, Frankenstein who fits in the society of humans, outcasts himself more