Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein Analysis Essay Example

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein greatly depicts the modern problems mankind is undergoing every day. With most scientists trying to find new ways to be able to sustain life more and create replacements for body parts and machines that can take care of personal needs, they do not see that the point of life is to try to have a good and happy life. Victor Frankenstein, a scientist, is no different. His goal was to receive appreciation from society for all the accomplishments he has done. He wants recognition. One of them was that he became god-like and used his god-like intellect and power to create a living human being, referred to as the creature. Because of the monstrosity he has seen from the creature, he tried to abandon his own creation. The creature is left without anyone to go to help. His own creator left to protect himself. Unlike Victor Frankenstein, God created everyone through his image and likeness and never abandons his creation. Therefore, everyone can be dependent on God. Mary Shelley believes Victor desires to be a Prometheus due to him rejecting Nature and its limits, and creating a creature outside of Nature, therefore causing the creature to be the abolition of a Natural man.

Victor desires to be a Prometheus, a god. Prometheus is a Titan who gave fire to mankind so mankind would be able to develop technological advancements to further their seemingly perfect lives but also cause destruction throughout. He seems like a good person to give mankind the advancements they need to succeed in life. “The only imaginary being resembling in any degree Prometheus is Satan; and Prometheus is, in my judgement, a more poetical character than Satan, because, in addition to courage, and majesty, and firm and patient opposition to omnipotent force, he is susceptible of being described as exempt from the taints of ambition, envy, revenge, and a desire for personal aggrandizement” (The Satanic and Byronic Hero; Percy Shelley). According to Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley’s husband, Prometheus, a god-like Titan, drives for power to give mankind fire because of his ambition for humanity to live and sustain life. Zeus was a tyrant to Prometheus. He rebelled against Zeus in order for mankind to have fire to live a better life.  His pride, however, does not allow him to see the destruction humanity has created due to the fire and does not allow him to believe the destruction of mankind is his fault. Zeus does not want mankind to have fire because he knew what consequences would arise, such as man thinking they were on the same level as gods. Compared to Prometheus, Victor’s drive to find secrets of the world was his ambition. “The world was to me a secret which I desired to divine. Curiosity, earnest research to learn the hidden laws of nature, gladness akin to rapture, as they were unfolded to me, are among the earliest sensations I can remember” (Frankenstein). Victor’s ambition to unnatural science is what started everything. Victor’s ambition to find the secrets of the world has led him to be very prideful in himself due to the belief of having the secrets of the world. This greatly cost him, as his pride started to take over and make him believe he could reanimate a non-living organism. “It was a divine spring; and the season contributed greatly to my convalescence” (Frankenstein). Victor tried to persuade a sailor that the creation of the creature was not his fault. His pride led him to believe what he was doing was right all along, where it was the opposite. “As the memory of past misfortunes pressed upon me, I began to reflect upon their cause—the monster whom I had created, the miserable daemon whom I had sent abroad into the world” (Frankenstein). Victor blamed the creature he created for the murders of three of his family members, his brother William, mother Caroline, and his wife Elizabeth, and his best friend Clerval. This is not right because he was the one who took it upon himself to become a god-like man and create a creature that was capable of murder. In any case, his pride and status did not allow him to cough up the truth and allow people to take the hit for him for his safety. Victor becomes a Prometheus by rejecting Nature and its limits.

Victor rejected Nature and its limits. “Life and death appeared to me ideal bounds, which I should break through, and pour a torrent of light into our dark world. A new species would bless me as its creator and source, many happy and excellent natures would own their being to me” (Frankenstein). Victor wants to become a god for the new species by using science to create what he claims an ideal being from scratch. In doing so, however, he tries to defy Nature by becoming like Nature, defying God’s creation, implying that mankind is a defective race. “We lay waste our powers; -Little we see in Nature that is ours” (The World Is Too Much For Us; Wordsworth). Wordsworth believes that the isolation of being in a part of society alone will cause mankind to steer away from the tranquility of Nature. Victor isolates himself from society to create the creature, which steers him away from the tranquility of Nature. Victor’s loss for nature is his isolation, for all he wants to do is focus on his unnatural work that is deemed to go beyond the limits of science.  “The many men, so beautiful! And they all dead did lie: And a thousand thousand slimy things Lived on; and so did I” (The Rime of the Ancient Mariner). The implications of “slimy things” or slimy snakes in the ocean suggest the mariner believe God’s creation of the “slimy things” is hideous, which causes Nature to fight back and retaliate to maintain order. With Victor, he created a creature that defies Nature, which Nature then retaliates to maintain balance. “Its gigantic stature, and the deformity of its aspects, more hideous than belongs to humanity, instantly informed that it was the wretch, the filthy demon to whom I had given life” (Frankenstein). Victor now realizes the flaws and imperfections of not only the creature but himself as well. The mind of man cannot replicate a mind of God’s Mind. God’s Mind has no limitations as to how to create anyone. The mind of man has limits upon itself from God. The rejection of Nature and its limitations allows Victor to create a creature outside of Nature.

Victor creates a creature outside of Nature. Victor attained the knowledge to build a creature he wanted to perfect, wanting a perfect race of beings through his own selfish image and likeness. “I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart” (Frankenstein). God does not need work or as much work as Victor to create man through his image and likeness. Victor can infuse life into a physical body, but what about the creature’s emotions.