Why Is Frankenstein Be Banned

Kerri Domena

Mrs. Hauser

Banned/Censored Book Author Study

March 24, 2023

Frankenstein: a green monster, held together by stitches with bolts in its neck, a ubiquitous symbol of Halloween. Despite what popular culture implies, Frankenstein is not the name of this monster, but rather of its creator, Doctor Victor Frankenstein; a genius whose obsession with mortality led him to create life of his own accord. A man playing God, an archetypical story as old as stories themselves; a source of inspiration for many passed-down legends, some so common that no one is quite sure exactly where they originated from. This legend, called “the first myth of modern times,” by Hitchhock, however, is unique in that it can be directly traced back to

Following the American and French Revolutions, the people’s trust in authority lessened, this, combined with England’s Industrial Revolution, which increased the socioeconomic gap between the upper and lower class, many writers to use their works to pose questions society desperately needed to answer. These questions ranged from the topics of democracy to freedom and education, all of which can be seen in Godwin and Wollenstonecraft’s works. This is the world Mary Shelley grew up in, and the world in which Frankenstein was written. Following her elopement with Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley lost contact with William Godwin, which is when she “rejected her utopian and radical heritage and opted for a more conservative and pessimistic view of the world” (Sterrenberg). This can be shown in Frankenstein, where the protagonist, Victor Frankenstein, is shown to be both repulsed and astounded by his “monster.” The differing views on the monster echo political debates at the time, adapted in a way that fits the nature of the novel. Many have noted the similarities between Dr. Frankenstein’s self-centered “utopian aspirations” (Sterrenberg) of defying death, and William Godwin’s hopes for the future of humanity. The subversion of tropes is a crucial part of the inimitability of Frankenstein, which is subtitled The Modern Prometheus. Prometheus comes from a Greek myth, of a titan who stole fire from Olympus and gave it to humanity, allowing it to flourish and thrive. However, this angered the Gods of Olympus, and Prometheus was chained to a rock as punishment, with a bird eternally gnawing on his liver. Prometheus never regretted his actions, though Victor Frankenstein did. His regret can be paralleled to many novels of the 1790’s, in which a radical protagonist sees the error in his ways. The use of