Parenting in Frankenstein

In the novel of Frankenstein by Mary Shelly, parenting is definitely one of the themes and it is shown a lot through out the book. Mary Shelly uses the characters in the novel to bring up the idea of what it means to parent and how parenting effects people’s lives. The protagonist, Victor Frankenstein, grows at a place where he is able to be educated and well-brought up. His family is very wealthy and even adopts children to their family which is Elizabeth. Clearly Elizabeth is in a different class then Victor but she learns to adopt the ways of Victor’s family and become part of the family. Mary Shelly tries to tell the readers that a family should be accepting and create a safe environment for a child to grow and most importantly educate. Mary Shelly shows that because Victor Frankenstein’s family was able to educate Victor, he is able to do what he wishes to do which is to become involved with sciences. Mary Shelly proves that in order to educate others one has to have a great knowledge and influence skills in order to inspire their children. Another example of a different kind of parenting is the family of a cottage. The monster is almost like a baby, doesn’t know how to speak and he is beginning to learn about life. When he finds a cottage, he decides to secretly live on their property and the monster gradually learns literacy. The monster learns only by looking and listening to the cottagers and it is truly an astonishing moment. I think that Mary Shelly is trying to evoke the idea that human can learn faster and easily by listening and watching others. And also by not getting any help and processing it through oneself can make one learn more effectively then someone simply telling what to do and that self teaching is important when parenting (figuring out things by oneself without help). Mary Shelly also brings up the subject of other literatures in the book which explains that literature is an important factor of education and a simple novel can educate more then a person teaching a matter. Thus, Mary Shelly demonstrates the idea of a good parenting or strategies to parenting and she expands on the idea of education and how one should be educated or parented.

Frankenstein and Romanticism Art

The quotes I chose mostly evokes the emotion of a character. The emotion of rage and anger is portrayed the most in my selection of quotes. In the beginning, the mood of the book is joyful and pleasant but as the novel countinues, it gets darker and darker. Chapter 1 to Chapter 6, it is very uplifted and the mood is very settle and light. The idea of nature is shown in these chapters and it brings the feeling of happiness and relaxation. But from chapter 7, the mood drastically and it turns into dark revenge, hate, and destruction. One could say that chapter 7 is the turning point in the novel and the mood completely changes. I chose the paintings of the romanticism because it was when many artists evoked the idea of emotions and the feelings of human beings that never was existing. It fit very well with my quotations because it demostrated the same emotions I was trying to show from my quotes. The use of nature in the quotes such as, mountains of ice, sun and clouds matched very well with the romanticism paintings and most of them have a very similar emotions. The emotions one gets when looking at the painting is similar to the feeling one gets when one reads the quotation or read the chapter. Thus, the romanticism art strongly shawdows the idea of emotions in the novel of Frankenstein by Mary Shelley and the use of nature qualities and the human emotional feeling that the novel and art brings is the main similarity of the two.

Chapter 24

"I cannot guess how many days have passed since then, but I have endured misery which nothing but the eternal sentiment of a just retribution burning within my heart could have enabled me to support. Immense and rugged mountains of ice often barred up my passage, and I often heard the thunder of the ground sea, which threatened my destruction. But again the frost came and made the paths of the sea secure."

Chapter 23

"Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change. The sun might shine or the clouds might lower, but nothing could appear to me as it had done the day before. A fiend had snatched from me every hope of future happiness; no creature had ever been so miserable as I was; so frightful an event is single in the history of man."

Chapter 22

"This letter revived in my memory what I had before forgotten, the threat of the fiend—"*I will be with you on your wedding-night!*" Such was my sentence, and on that night would the daemon employ every art to destroy me and tear me from the glimpse of happiness which promised partly to console my sufferings. On that night he had determined to consummate his crimes by my death. Well, be it so; a deadly struggle would then assuredly take place, in which if he were victorious I should be at peace and his power over me be at an end. If he were vanquished, I should be a free man. Alas! What freedom? Such as the peasant enjoys when his family have been massacred before his eyes, his cottage burnt, his lands laid waste, and he is turned adrift, homeless, penniless, and alone, but free."

Chapter 21

"A fever succeeded to this. I lay for two months on the point of death; my ravings, as I afterwards heard, were frightful; I called myself the murderer of William, of Justine, and of Clerval. Sometimes I entreated my attendants to assist me in the destruction of the fiend by whom I was tormented; and at others I felt the fingers of the monster already grasping my neck, and screamed aloud with agony and terror."

Chapter 20

"I trembled and my heart failed within me, when, on looking up, I saw by the light of the moon the daemon at the casement. A ghastly grin wrinkled his lips as he gazed on me, where I sat fulfilling the task which he had allotted to me. Yes, he had followed me in my travels; he had loitered in forests, hid himself in caves, or taken refuge in wide and desert heaths; and he now came to mark my progress and claim the fulfillment of my promise."