The Nature of the Creature"Once I falsely hoped to meet with beings, who, pardoning my outward form, would love me for the excellent qualities which I was capable of unfolding. . . . But now crime has degraded me beneath the meanest animal. No guilt, no mischief, no malignity, no misery, can be found comparable to mine. . . . The fallen angel becomes a malignant devil."

-Frankenstein, the final letter

The Creature’s Namelessness

The Namelessness of the Creature

• Popular misconception: Frankenstein is the creature’s name– Monster does not actually have a name

• Namelessness encapsulates problem the creature poses to Victor and reader– Nameless = soulless?– Person, or thing?

• Frankenstein decides it to be a ‘thing’.

• Namelessness symbolises lack of social identity– Inability to fit into society, among people

The Power of a Name

• There is symbolism/ceremony in a name– Adam naming all animals in Creation made

him a partner in creation with God– Furthermore, the gaining of authority over the

named– Naming also implies belonging

• Without a name, the Creature does not belong– Already ambiguous nature made more

ambiguous• Ambiguous: Creature is a mix of animal and human

parts

The Dark Mirror of Humanity

• There is a sense the Creature cannot be rejected by Society– It encompasses all Humanity

• Creature as a dark mirror of humanity– Imperfections and perversions mixed in with

beauty and purity of heart

• It not only directly reflects humanity– Also forces others to behave in a way that

showcases their inner monstrosities– Questions the right of humanity to judge

‘monstrosity’

Knowledge and Aberration

The Horror of Knowing• The sting of social rejection made more intense to

Creature, with gaining of knowledge• Intelligent monster is more horrifying/aberrant

than a mere monster– Gaining of knowledge only serves to make Creature

more grotesque• To Victor, and to himself

• Reader no longer able to disown Creature like Victor did– With form, sentience and intelligence, Creature is alive

and human like them– Horror in the reader lies in being forced to accept

Creature as someone like himself

The Complicity of the Reader• Mary Shelley forces reader to join in the

rejection of Creature– Reader refers to Creature by whatever name Victor

chooses to call it• Uncertain status

• Involves all readers with Victor and the Creature– To sympathise with Creature is to identify self with

Creature’s namelessness

– To sympathise with Victor is to identify self with his madness

A Quotation from Genesis

And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

Genesis 3:2-5

Victor’s Fear of an Equal• Horror felt by Victor (and thus the reader) has roots in

this– Victor saw himself as a new God

– Biblical fear of creation becoming as the Creator

– ‘Ye shall become as gods’

• Fear comes true as Creature begins using knowledge to usurp Victor’s ascendancy– ‘Remember that I have power; you believe yourself

miserable, but I can make you so wretched that the light of day will be hateful to you. You are my creator, but I am your master; obey!’ (III.iii)

• Symbolised in the narrative, as Creature and Victor vie to be the protagonist/narrator – And also relegate the other to an antagonistic role

The Creature and the Monster in Frankenstein

Who is the Frankenstein Monster?

• Victor disgusted by Creature because of its knowledge– Perverse use of its knowledge– Usurpation of his position as Master and God

• Lucifer: ‘I will ascend into Heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God…I will be like the Most High.’ (Isaiah 14: 13-14)

• Creature: You are my creator, but I am your master; obey!’

– A sense that Creature appears Satanic to Victor for that reason

• Yet Victor no different from Creature– Also gains knowledge, and uses it to usurp place of God

and womanhood– Supplanting natural reproduction, stealing the ‘fire’ of

creation

The Monster: Everyone?

• Creature and Humanity no different from one another– They have imperfections– They fear the unknown

• Even Victor fears his own creation

• Creature was made to be humanly perfect– ‘His limbs were perfect, and I had selected his features

as beautiful’– Made in Victor’s own image– Grotesque twisting of the Genesis creation of Man

• To call Creature a monster would be to call oneself a monster

The Monster: No One?

• Intentions of all characters began good– Victor: to unlock the secret of life, for

knowledge and to take away death– Monster: to make friends, to find family, and

belong

• Only the results came out awry– Victor: as result of own tragic flaw

(megalomania)– Monster: as result of society’s and Victor’s

rejection

• No ‘monster’ per se, as none started evil

The Monster: Victor Frankenstein?

• Tried to take the powers of God without accepting its responsibilities– Abandoned his own child to the world and

rejected it

– Denied it love

• Destroyed the Creature’s only avenue of hope for acceptance and love– Condemned a once-sinless innocent

– Corrupted it into the monster it eventually became

The Monster: Victor Frankenstein?

• Victor regarding the Creature at his feet just before animation– ‘With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, I

collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet.’ (I.v)

• The Creature returning the favour just after animation– ‘I started from my sleep in horror…by the dim and yellow

light of the moon…I beheld the wretch…He held up the curtain of the bed; and his eyes…were fixed on me.’ (I.v)

• The final looking over– ‘I entered the cabin, where lay…my friend. Over him hung

a form…gigantic in stature, yet uncouth and distorted in its proportions. (Walton’s final letter)

• Victor Frankenstein has symbolically become the abhorrent, lifeless Monster he created

The Monster: The Creature?

• Similarity to Loki, Norse god of mischief– Also a giant

– Took pleasure in hurting

• Creature’s definition of ‘mischief’ identical to Loki’s– Framing Justine

– Baiting Victor and playing with him

• Inspires horror and revulsion among everyone he meets– Physically abhorrent

The Monster: The Creature?

• Despite fulfilling criteria of Gothic monster, the Creature departs from it in key ways– It has a conscience

• Even to the end, it does not take pleasure in what it does

• It is capable of remorse and repentance

– It began as an innocent, good-natured creature

The Creature: A Personality Analysis

A Creature with a Conscience

• The Creature is fundamentally good-hearted

• Sought the sublime– Revelling in the beauty of nature– Allowing beauty to soothe one’s own ugliness

• Contrast with his murder of William• Marring beauty with one’s own ugliness

• Regretted his actions at the end, hurting self as much as he hurt others– Walton’s final letter

• Title slide quotation

A Peace-Loving Vegetarian

• The Creature is never shown eating meat– Eats only berries and acorns when in nature

– Even in civilisation, only ate bread, cheese and milk

– In harmony with nature, but rejected by humanity• What does this say about humanity?

• Mankind the Unnatural? Is Mankind the true Monster?

• Sought a mate only for a peaceful family– The horror felt by the reader at this request is a result of

Victor’s revulsion and Creature’s frustration and pain colouring it

– In itself, the act is not something disgusting or horrifying

Fundamentally Good

• Does not hurt others on purpose– Stops stealing food after realising victims were

poor

– Even tries to help ease their lives by finding wood for them, etc

• Natural empathy for what he perceives as his fellow man and sufferer in the world

• Loves nature and rejoices in it– Retreats into nature to forget own abhorrence

Desirous of Social Acceptance

• The Creature desires to master language for communication– ‘This was indeed a godlike science, and I ardently

desired to become acquainted with it.’ (II.iv)

• Had hopes that with language, humankind would accept him as one of them– ‘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 demeanour and conciliating words, I should first win their favour, and afterwards their love.’ (II.iv)

Profoundly Alone• ‘Satan had his companions, fellow-devils, to admire and

encourage him; but I am solitary and abhorred.’

• Abandoned by all who know him because of his appearance– Victor Frankenstein– The de Laceys– Is even disgusted by his own appearance as reflected in

water• Grotesque twisting of the Narcissus myth

• The only one who befriends him did not know him– Old de Lacey was blind and could not see him

• Spends all the rest of his life away from humanity– Travels in wildernesses– Forces Victor to isolate himself to suffer with him

A Fallen Angel• Like Victor, the Creature goes down the path of

no return– Began with good intentions, corrupted slowly into evil

• The Creature begins his fall with his loss of innocence– A direct result of his learning of language

• Began killing unknowingly– Accidentally strangled William when trying to quieten

him– Only gained the fiendish delight of killing when he saw

William’s corpse

• Ended by killing to cause hurt– Outlet for venting frustration and hatred of Victor

The Role of the Creature

A Pandora Equivalent• Pandora sent by Zeus to punish Prometheus’

hubris through the suffering of his creation, Man– Unwittingly unleashing all manner of evils upon them

through her box of ‘gifts’

• Likewise Creature’s learning of language unwittingly unleashes all manner of evils– First, frustration at not being accepted even with

language– Second, hatred of Victor for creating, then abandoning

him to this fate– Third, his hounding of Victor and violent bloodshed

• The gift of language punishes Victor’s hubris through his creation

Warning of the Dangers of Science• "I think that the popular culture story of Frankenstein can

really be reduced to two simple sentences, "‘It’s alive’ and ‘It’s escaped.’ I think those are the two key features of the myth--you’ve created something, new life, but you cannot control it."

• Susan Lederer, Professor, History of Science, Yale

• The Creature as living criticism of science– Illustrates the consequences of hubris

• A demand for responsibility and ethics in science

• The Creature as something completely new, ‘alternate’, and unknown– Central characteristic of science-fiction

The End