The Context of Frankenstein

Alison Aitken, 2012

Mary Shelley

• Born 1797• Died 1851• Wrote Frankenstein 1816• Published 1818

Image source: http://alextrenoweth.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/mary-shelley1.jpg

Mary Shelley’s Parents

• Mary Shelley described (accurately) that she was the “daughter of two persons of distinguished literary celebrity”

• Two of the most radical writers/thinkers of the previous generation

• Mother: Mary Wollestonecraft• Father: William Godwin

Shelley’s mother Mary Wollstonecraft

• Wrote The Vindication of the Rights of Women

• Early feminist piece• “I do not wish [women] to have

power over men; but over themselves.”

• “Make women rational creatures, and free citizens, and they will quickly become good wives; — that is, if men do not neglect the duties of husbands and fathers.”

• Died 11 days after Mary Shelley’s birth.

• Had an illegitimate child• Believed in sexual freedom of women

Image source: http://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/resources/images/1071170/?type=display

Mary Shelley’s Father William Godwin

• Wrote An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793)

• A leader in radical intellectual circles

• Believed in human perfectibility and enlightenment

• Believed that governments, marriage, property monopoly and monarchy restrained the progress of humankind

Image source: http://www.utilitarian.net/godwin.jpg

William Godwin – cont’d

• After Mary Wollstonecraft’s death, Godwin raised Mary Shelley and her half-sister.

• Despite his alleged coldness, he surrounded his children with:

• Extensive library• Intellectual conversations• Creative intellectuals

The Enlightenment – The Age of Reason

• Human perfectibility• “The proper employment of reason will

result in the full achievement of human potential."

• Progress• Scientific and mathematical discoveries • The innate goodness of man –

“benevolent heart”• Logic• Reason• Research and science over God and

church

The Enlightenment – The Age of Reason

• Scientific method• Rationality • Discovery• Astronomy• Darwin’s Theory of Evolution• Order• Concern for peace• Beginnings of

Industrialisation• Measurement

• Interest in the past, antiquity• World was expanding –

geographical discoveries (EG. Australia!)

• Growth of international trade• Imperialism• Colonisation• Published media = • Masses interested in science,

alchemy, philosophy, natural history…

Romanticism • Began in 18th century• Response to the “reason” of The

Enlightenment. • A movement in literature and other arts• Art (not science or reason) as way to

inner truths of life, one’s soul• Nature as “sublime”• Hatred of industrialisation • Response to rationalism of the

Enlightenment • Strong emotion as authentic source of

aesthetic experience• Intuition, imagination, feeling

• Listen: Tintern Abbey - http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/arts/romantics/audio/mp3/wordsworth_tintern_abbey.mp3

Galvanism• Luigi Galvani• Italian physicist/physician• Late 18th century• Discovered that an electrical

current applied to a dead frog’s leg caused it to twitch

• Caused others to theorise that enough current (either by electrical current or chemical reaction) to the brain might “re-animate” a human corpse

Image sourced 19/01/12 at http://bg.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A4%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%BB:Luigi_galvani.jpg

Shelley Surrounded by Creative Intellectuals of the Time

• William Wordsworth & Samuel Taylor Coleridge (Poets who began the Romantic movement)

• William Hazlitt (Major Essayist in English Literature)

• Mary Shelley heard their conversations!

Images sourced from: 1) http://www.searchbeat.com/bookshop/index.php?psps_search=William+Wordsworth2) http://www.english.ucla.edu/faculty/fburwick/bibweb.html 3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:William_Hazlitt_self-portrait_(1802).jpg

The French Revolution• Radical social and political

upheaval• Aim: end to aristocracy and

monarchy• Liberty, Fraternity, Equality!• At first - English and others

looked to the French model for inspiration, but later, as the horror took shape, became fearful of similar chaos

Gothic Fiction• Popular art form – Late 18th century• Settings: castles, dungeons, secret

passages• Omens, phenomena, portents,

dreams, visions• Supernatural elements – ghosts,

hauntings• High emotions – often overwrought• Mystery, doom, gloomy, foreboding• Metonymy (something standing for

something else) of horror – wind, rain

• Panic, threatening atmosphere, terror,

• Sentimental narration• Breathless, heart pounding• Female heroine, without male

protector – oppressed or lonely• Heroine often threatened by

powerful, impulsive, tyrannical male to do something they don’t want to (reflects patriarchal context, women without power)

• Footsteps approaching, groaning, maniacal laughter, thunder, lightning, ruins, howling winds etc..

Info sourced on 19/01/12 from http://www.virtualsalt.com/gothic.htm

To read The Castle of Otronto, the “first” Gothic novel, click here.