Chains of Necessity

"'Of what a strange nature is knowledge! It clings to the mind, when it has
once seized it, like a lichen on the rock" (120).
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1818, 1831)

Points for Reflection

M. Shelley's Frankenstein (1818, 1831), chps. 11-16 (pp.102-44)

1. when Victor spotted the creature in a storm, two years after he had last seen him, he quickly concluded that his creation was responsible for William’s death, and thought of him “in the light of my own vampire, my own spirit let loose from the grave, and forced to destroy all that was dear to me” (77).  Could it be argued that the creature is in some way Frankenstein’s corrupt double, his doppelganger?  Are they similar, that is, in any essential ways?
2. does the order in which the creature learns things make sense given his mental tabula rasa (blank slate)?
3. it could be argued that the creature’s first teacher is Nature (102-105).  What does he learn from his experiences in the woods?
4. which events are most crucial in forming the creature’s emotional makeup?
5. are the creature’s developing views on morality a product of environmental and situational factors, or does free will have a role to play?
6. does his isolation prevent the creature from developing the social skills and emotional pliability necessary to interact well with others?
7. consider the books the creature encounters, both through listening to Felix teach Safie the French language, and from reading himself.  Does his literacy prove more of a blessing or a curse?
8. in what various ways does the creature use the words “beauty” and “lovely” when describing others?  Does he limit these words to the physical contours of a person’s face and body?
9. the creature considers the cottagers, Safie, and William to all be “beautiful.”  What do you think? Does he consider anyone with a “normal” body and face to be beautiful, or does he just happen to run into classically beautiful people whose features provide his own body with the starkest, sharpest contrast possible?
10. does the novel implicitly interrogate or uphold that physiognomic prejudice which finds virtue in the physically beautiful, and depravity in the deformed and “ugly”?
11. why is the father of Safie, a merchant from Turkey, arrested in Paris and sentenced to death?  Is he a good and honorable man?
    

M. Shelley's Frankenstein (1818, 1831), chps. 17-21 (pp.144-84)

1. the creature contends that his criminal behavior is a direct product of isolation, implying that one must be connected relationally to other living beings in order to respect their lives as much as one’s own.  Is his argument sound?
2. why does Frankenstein agree to the creature’s request?
3. why might Frankenstein needs to complete additional research before he can fulfill the creature’s request?
4. is Nature’s influence powerful enough to overcome the “devouring blackness” that now hangs over Frankenstein (150)?
5. what drives Clerval’s interest in India?
6. is Victor justified in his concerns about what the creature and/or his spouse might accomplish if left to their own devices, or irrationally paranoid (165-66)?
7. Victor claims that he endued his creation, that “monstrous Image,” with “the mockery of a soul still more monstrous” (183). Does this claim seem accurate?  Does the creature appear to lack a soul?
8. Mary Shelley was a seasoned sightseer quite successful at turning her travel journals into published works.  Her earliest work was History of a Six Weeks' Tour (1817), the description of a trip to Geneva in 1816 which she co-published with Percy Bysshe Shelley; Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843 (1844) constituted her final, full-length book.  What limitations does this experienced traveler place upon the joys of trekking through Europe?
9. does Clerval’s and Victor’s travel through Europe and into England, then Scotland, make either tourist long for home back in Geneva, Switzerland?
10. are the new vistas and scenes which open up before these two travelers categorized by their discerning eyes as examples of the picturesque or sublime?
11. is Clerval a realistic, relatable character, or does Victor’s high encomium (high praise) of his friend flatten Clerval into two dimensions?
12. does the novel suggest suicide is an appropriate response to overwhelming sorrow?
13. is the notion of fate/destiny tied up irrevocably with death and destruction in this novel?  Does everything appear to be spiraling inevitably downwards?
14. do you think Victor deserves what he suffers, or that he is being unjustly oppressed by that Fate which he references so often?
15. why might the creature choose to revisit Victor on his wedding night (168)?  Why choose this particular day for their next encounter?
16. what measures does Victor’s mind take to protect him from trauma?

M. Shelley's Frankenstein (1818, 1831), chps. 22-24 (pp.184-223)

1. has Victor Frankenstein lost his ability to truly connect with others by this point in the novel?
2. consider the newly married couple’s wedding journey by boat: does their experience of Nature accord better with the picturesque or the sublime?
3. in the letter relaying William’s murder earlier in the novel, Frankenstein Sr. asked Victor to return, “not brooding thoughts of vengeance, against the assassin, but with feelings of peace and gentleness, that will heal, instead of festering, the wounds of our minds” (73 top).  When did vengeance squelch Victor’s native gentleness?
4. when Robert first met Victor, the scientist’s eyes contained “an expression of wildness, and even madness,” and he appeared “generally melancholy and despairing”; occasionally, however, the slightest kindness from someone else would light up Frankenstein’s face which then radiated “a beam of benevolence and sweetness that I never saw equalled [sic]” (25).  Does Victor’s tale explain this odd emotional mixture?
5. do Victor’s recollections of recent tragedy and suffering effectively immobilize him, or spur him to action?
6. do dreams ever provide Victor a needed refuge from his troubles?
7. the magistrate who hears Victor’s tale listens “with that half kind of belief that is given to a tale of spirits and supernatural events” (199).  Does this novel itself support the existence of the supernatural, or does it merely toss about the possibility with a “half kind of belief"?
8. Victor’s pledge to pursue vengeance invokes what array of entities (202)?
9. does the novel appear to affirm, question, or deny the existence of an afterlife?
10. at what points has Victor Frankenstein drawn attention to his own storytelling process? Why might Mary Shelley allow her narrator to interrupt the flow of his tale in this way?
11. Victor relates his tale to a magistrate in hopes of launching a manhunt.  He observes, “‘[i]t is indeed a tale so strange, that I should fear you would not credit it, were there not something to truth which, however wonderful, forces conviction. The story is too connected to be mistaken for a dream, and I have no motive for falsehood’” (199 mid).  Could something similar be said of this novel?  Does it deliver important insights even while dressed in fantastical and melodramatic narrative clothing?
12. consider Victor’s closing reflections (211, 217).  Does he blame himself for what has happened—either directly or indirectly?
13. why do you think Shelley provided such a detailed mapping of Robert Walton’s character at the novel’s opening, given that he’s not a central figure in the novel?
14. does the creature ultimately take responsibility for his criminal actions, or not?
15. early in the book, Frankenstein decided to relay his own tale to Victor that he “[might] deduce an apt moral” from it (30).  What, precisely, is this moral?
16. following the death of William and then the unjust execution of Justine, Victor blamed his “thrice-accursed hands” for the tragedy surrounding his family (89).  Was he right to place blame squarely on himself?

The Shepherd's Dream (1793)
Henry Fuseli

Dr. Paul Marchbanks
pmarchba@calpoly.edu