Frankenstein Quotes

'my hideous progeny' p.10

Shelley introduces themes of parenting and nurture in introduction. The novel itself is linked as a form of creation, a novel from a highly disturbed mind. Context- Shelley's family issues

'Speak to the mysterious fears of our nature'

Psychological novel that deals with human conditions.

Horror from subconscious desires- dreams

Context: Concerns of science, contemporary fears

'curdle the blood and quicken the beatings of the heart'

Horror novel- Shelley wanted to scare the reader and provoke horror/terror

Concerns of science were realistic and plausible. Religious interpretation of creature as Satan evokes fear from religious values.

"Did I request thee, Maker from my clay/To mould Me man?/Did I solicit thee/From darkness to promote me"

Epigraphy from Paradise Lost, which dealt with the fall of Satan and the creation of sin. Shows the novel as dealing with consequences of transgression. Links to Modern Prometheus.

'domestic affection' p.12

Percy Shelley suggests the influence of the growing cult of domesticity in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century which idealised family life

Walton expresses a desire for personal 'glory' and to confer some 'inestimable benefit... on all mankind' p.16/17

Walton's ambitions anticipate and foreshadow Victor Frankenstein- consider the drive for their actions: altruism or personal ambition?

Highly hyperbolic language- heightens perceived importance of his journey.

'What may not be expected in a country of eternal light?' p.15

Light and dark theme introduced by Walton, power of nature, the romantic view of the sublime- connotations with discovery and knowledge. Does the light lead to darkness? Romantic language- sense of delight, curiosity.

'One man's life or death were but a small price to pay'

Walton incredibly self-centred. Knowledge is more important than life-established critique of transgression.

'I bitterly feel the want of a friend'

'Bitterly'- mirrors cold landscape, shows how the environment is reflective of emotional state. Parallel with creature

'Wide ocean'

sublime landscape. Links Arctic as a place of isolation- key gothic sublime. Walton moves him further from society and domestic world- like Victor!

'A youth passed in solitude... under your gentle and feminine fosterage'

Established preconceived role of women. Links with Victor's idyllic childhood.

Context: Shelley's mother

Altruism or ambition

Darkness and light

Key themes in V1, Letter 1

Alienation, Friendship

Key themes in V1, Letter 2

intertextual reference to Coleridge's 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner'.

'I shall shoot no Albatross'

Letter II

The Mariner's act of shooting the albatross is a crime against nature, separating man from nature so the mariner remains alienated, shunned by his community and outsider.

'Proceed over the untamed yet obedient element'

Nature described as an object to be tamed by man. Emphasises relationship with the natural world. Walton as Byronic Hero- desire to transgress nature. Gothic double with Victor

'I desire the company of a man who could sympathise with me; whose eyes would reply to mine.' 'I bitterly feel the want of a friend.' pg 19

Connects Walton to the monster who longs for love and companionship, friendship

Domesticity- Margeret provides our first and last image of domesticity.

Key theme in V1, Letter 3

Eloquence

Dangerous Knowledge

Key themes in V1, Letter 4

'savage inhabitant of some undiscovered isle' 'A being with the shape of a man... of gigantic structure' pg 26

'european' and 'cultivated' p26,29

Walton's first description of the monster and Frankenstein, establishing a contrast though the primitive and natural and the civilised and cultured. 'Being'- otherness of the creature, sense of suspense and mystery. Brief glimpse generates interest.

'a slave of passion'

'slave' links to Gothic theme of entrapment. Victor is trapped by his own ambition- transgression/obssession

'divine wanderer' pg 30

has a voice whose 'varied intonations are soul-subduing music' pg 30

Quotes that show Walton's admiration and affection of Victor, companionship. Subtle religious reference- attempt to transgress God. mysterious aura

'What can stop the determined heart?'

A romantic and ambitious statement. Shows Walton's ignorance over nature. Rhetorical- foreshadowing.

'Hear me- let me reveal my tale, and you will dash the cup from your lips'

Sets the stage for Frankenstein's story

Fits with the idea that each narrator has a purpose in telling their tale

Suggests ambition or desire for knowledge as a poison

Family and the Home- an immediate opposition set up between the public and private worlds

the idealisation of women

Key themes in V1, Chapter 1

Victor's parents displayed a 'deep consciousness of what they owed towards the being to which they had given life' and a 'benevolent disposition' pg.35

How is the importance of nurture/parenting introduced

'guardian angel to the afflicted' pg36

Caroline as angelic- women, gender roles

'He strove to shelter her, as a fair exotic is sheltered by the gardener' p.35

Alphonse as protector- men, gender roles

Amongst the 'dark-eyed, hardy little vagrants' p.36, she is chosen based on the 'crown of distinction on her head'

How is the importance of physical beauty emphasised in Elizabeth's story, appearance

his childhood was guided by a 'silken cord' p35

Victor suggests the stifling nature of the domestic world. Some tension between the softness and ease of silk and tightness and restraint of cord

'celestial' and 'heaven sent' pg 36

Religious imagery related to Elizabeth

'a pretty present' pg 37

'a possession of my own' p37

'mine- mine to protect, love and cherish' p37`

Elizabeth presented as an object, gender roles

'The saintly soul of Elizabeth shone like a shrine-dedicated lamp in our peaceful home' pg 39

Victor on Elizabeth- women, gender roles

he has a 'fervent longing to penetrate the secrets of nature' p41

How does the reader begin to recognise that Frankenstein is an overreacher, or the 'modern Prometheus'- ambition

FIND: SIMILE OF MOUNTAIN RIVER COMPARED TO VICTOR'S PASSION FOR KNOWLEDGE. V1, C2

Gradually gains force until it becomes a torrent that sweeps away everything in its path, all of Victor's 'hopes and joys'

Krempe: 'gruff voice' and 'repulsive countenance' pg 47

Waldman: 'an aspect expressive of the greatest benevolence' and a voice 'the sweetest I had ever heard' pg 48

Krempe and Waldman's presentations and how this suggests the general emphasis of beauty and eloquence. Appearances are assumed to reflect interior states.

first paragraph has reference to an 'omen' pg 44

'thus ended a memorable day for me. It decided my future destiny' p50

'chance' p47 leads Victor to Krempe, whilst 'fate' pg49 leads him to Waldman.

Fate and Destiny present in V1, Chapter 3

Victor imagines producing a 'new species' that would bless him 'as its creator and source'. Many 'happy and excellent natures would owe their being to me'. pg55- ironic?

How is Victor shown to usurp the roles of both God and women in V1, Chapter 4

'workshop of filthy creation' p55

'labours' pg57

Images of birth in V1, Chapter 4- usurping the role of women

Victor's 'secret toil' pg 55- shameful and unnatural

He shuns the company of others as if he were 'guilty of crime' pg57.

How is guilt and paranoia demonstrate in V1, Chapter 4

Victor speaks of breaking the bounds of life and death and pouring a 'torrent of light into our dark world' pg 55

His discovery of the secret of life: 'in the midst of this darkness a sudden light broke in upon me' pg53

How is the theme of light and dark continued in V1, Chapter 4

'I thought I held the corpse of my dead mother in my arms' pg59

Victors dream, suggests that Victor has bypassed the normal methods of creation (woman), equates sexuality and death and offers an example of Shelley's use of horror rather than terror

Find quotes pg 59

The first time Victor sees the monster by moonlight

'the demoniacal corpse to which I had so miserably given life' pg59

Victor on the newly made monster:

links to the breakdown of boundaries between life and death

suggests the importance of physical beauty and how Victor makes assumptions about the connection between appearances and inner worth

'It was a dreary night of November' pg 58

Shelley setting the scene for catastrophe in V1, Chapter 5

'by the dim and yellow light of the moon' pg59

Introduces a motif linked to the monster, V1CH5

'I thought I saw the dreaded spectre glide into the room' pg62

Links the language of the supernatural to disturbed psychological states, V1, Chapter 5 victor

Offers a different perspective on family life- suggestions of incestuous desires from father and abuse of mother.

Very tight connections between Caroline and Elizabeth- idealised, passive women are set against the extreme examples of masculine egotism

Volume 1, Chapter 6: The role of Justine

'restored' by 'serene sky and verdant fields' and 'sensations' p71 sense of the natural world blossoming creates tension. He returns to a 'happy creature'.

after the death of William, pg 76

after the death of Justine, pg 94

Therapeutic Nature- the idea of natures as restorative is important in Romantic Poetry.

Key moments where Victor turns for to nature for comfort

The landscape expresses a sense of duality and reflects the emergence of a darker side. As he nears home- 'the picture appeared a vast and dim scene of evil'. pg76

Pathetic fallacy and also in Gothic terms anticipates the monster

The idea that the monster may be Victor's double is introduced in V1, Chapter 7- the landscape

FIND QUOTE ABOUT LIGHTNING FOR MONSTER

The metaphor of lightning reveals the figure of the monster, it illuminates the darker side of Victor. light

'The filthy daemon' pg 77

the 'devil' pg78

monster's 'delight was in carnage and misery' p.78

'the idea was an irresistible proof of the fact' p.78

How is Victor shown to judge and define the monster as 'other', to fix a boundary between the human and the demonic.

'I bore a hell within me' pg 89

Echoed when the monster burns down the DeLacey Home, p.89

Both echo Satan in Milton's Paradise Lost

Shelley suggests that true horror often lies within, in the mental agonies and darker desires we repress. This is different to earlier gothic fictions where evil was located in an external source- such as ghosts or demons.

the 'tortures of the accused did not equal mine' pg86

'I cannot pretend to describe what I then felt' pg87- a common convention in the Gothic to indicate the inadequacy of language to describe inner experience

Victor's egotism and self-absorption are revealed during Justine's trial

'I will melt the stony hearts of your enemies by my tears and prayers' pg 88

Justine is persuaded to lie by her confessor, 'he threatened and menaced, until I almost began to think I was the monster that he said I was' pg 88

The power of language in V1, Chapter 8

Language seems to only have power when combined with other qualities such as social position

-relate to Handmaid's

His knowledge is 'unspeakable'

He considers suicide, only refrains in the fear of leaving his family exposed 'to the malice of the fiend'. pg 94

Alienation in Volume 2, Chapter 1

Victor's inability to his knowledge is part of his isolation from friends and family- formerly produced by his obsessive desire to create, now caused by what he has created

'maternal nature bade me weep no more' pg 98

Romantic notion of 'Mother Nature' in V2, Chapter 1

Justine saw injustice as a thing of the past, of 'ancient days' but now 'misery has come home, and men appear to me as monsters thirsting for each other's blood' pg 95

Men and monsters in V2, Chapter 1

Shows injustice in the current, familiar world to its first readers, with polar expeditions, galvanism etc

Echoes the wider social level of doubling of Victor and the monster.

'the only unquiet thing that wandered restless in a scene so beautiful and heavenly' pg 94

Victor presented as similar to the monster

Victor cries 'Begone! relieve me from the sight of your detested form'. The monster places his hands before Victor's eyes. 'Hear my tale.' pg104

Reader cannot see the monster, therefore more willing

How does Shelley challenge the earlier concept of monstrosity (visual- violation of nature, ill-assorted parts- the griffin, the hydra) appearance, language

'I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel.' pg 103

The Monster's language is calm an reasoned, biblically solemn and dignified- an elegant rhetorician. Uses devices such as oxymoron and antithesis.

'if you will comply with my conditions, I leave them and you at peace; if you refuse, I will glut the maw of death, until it be satiated with the blood of your remaining friends'. p102

The monster uses parallelism to produce, in contrast to the terrible violence threatened, a harmonious arrangement of words, suggestive of balance and reasoning. Power of language

'Begone, vile insect! pg102

Victor is undermined by the monster through a contrast in their language, he is melodramatic, full of exclamations and theatrical.

Shelley applies the tabula rasa, blank state theory in describing the education of the monster. The individual is shaped by experiences

The monster is presented as a child in Volume 2, Chapter 3. Education

The monster finds pleasure in the bright moon, the 'radiant form' pg 106

The symbol of the moon is continued, here showing the maternal connection. nature

'the monster that I am' pg116

When the monster sees himself in Volume 2, Chapter 3, he internalises the view and judgement of society and accepts that definition of his self.

with a 'gentle demeanor and conciliating words' pg 118 he could connect with the De Laceys. He commits to learning 'the art of language' pg 118.

The monster hopes that language can compensate for his image.

Find quote about the social institution of family and personal relationships through the DeLaceys. V2, Chapter 4

The DeLacey's devotion to each other makes the monster more aware of his isolation- especially when the mother figure is absent for Safie and the DeLaceys- there is no excuse for Victor!

Having learned of his isolation and indifference, the monster watches nature with 'anticipations of joy' pg.118

The monster can be compared to Victor in his response to nature

In his reading, the monster identifies with those lacking 'high an unsullied descent united with riches' p123

During the French Revolution, the mob was frequently represented as a monster.

How can one argue that the monster represents the oppressed classes, and the novel is a commentary on class struggle?

His education mean he learns how he is different, 'a blot on the earth.' pg 123. He asks 'What was I?' and wishes he had never left his natural state.

How does the monster demonstrate that knowledge is dangerous and can lead to isolation

'Ans what was I? Of my creation and creator I was absolutely ignorant, but I knew that I possessed no money, no friends, no kind of property.' pg123

Shows how the question of identity becomes central to the creature

Demonstrates what the creature has taught himself of what is important: wealth and connections

'creation and creator' relates to Paradise Lost, his view of himself as 'Adam'

Provides Shelley with another opportunity to comment of the corruption of society and establish that the DeLaceys are like the moster- exiles and aliens.

What is the purpose of Safie's story?

The passivity and helplessness of Elizabeth is neither positive or inevitable, as the portrayal of Safie combines masculine and feminine traits.

How does Shelley criticise the other women in the novel?

The monster longs for a mate with whom he can live 'in the interchange of those sympathies necessary for my being' p.147

How does Walton's want for a friend echo the monster later on in the novel? companionship

The Sorrows of Werter expand his sensibilities, he feels more isolated.

From Goethe he learns 'despondency and gloom' pg 131 and from Plutarch he learns 'high thoughts', raised above the misery of his condition. His admiration for virtue is increased.

How does the monster's reading of the three books shape the monster's character? knowledge. education

Of his feelings of revenge and hatred, he says 'I did not strive to control them', 'but allowing myself to be borne away by the stream, I bent my mind towards injury and death'. pg 140

The idea of the monster as the embodiment of the revolutionary mob violence out of control is highlighted

The weather reflects the monster's feelings with fierce winds evoking a sense of insanity. Both monster and creator are driven and consumed by revenge.

How is the monster once again shown to be like Victor through his relationship with nature, in Volume 2, Chapter 8?

The monster sees a 'beautiful child, who came running to the recess I had chosen, with all the sportiveness of infancy' p144.

Both William and the monster are presented as children, but both lose the innocence associated with this in their encounter. William is judgemental, the monster murderous . appearance/ education

'My food is not that of man: I do not destroy the lamb and the kid to glut my appetite' pg148

How is the monster shown to be above humans? Adam and Eve did not eat meat in Eden.

Victor calls the monster 'the filthy mass that moved and talked' p.149 and 'wrinkled into contortions too horrible for human eyes to behold' p.148

Victor reduces the monster to unhuman, appearance

'the human senses are insurmountable barriers to our union'. p 148

The monster has learned he is condemned to isolation because of his appearance.

'The picture I present to you is peaceful and human.' p.149

How does the monster describe his desires for a life with a female companion? women, companionship Volume 2, Chapter 9

'The idea of an immediate union with my Elizabeth was one of horror and dismay' p.157

Victor shows an aversion to marriage and sexual relationships. Using union rather than Alphonse's 'marriage'. 'Union' seems more formal, a contract however it could also convey physical joining, sexual union. Victor prefers creating on his own.

Whilst he choose Ingolstadt for the creation of the male- connected to intellectual persuits, the 'place fitted for such a work' of a female is a 'desolate and appalling landscape' pg 168. Also a reflection of his state of mind!

How is Victor's choice of location important in his creation of the monster?

The trip down the Rhine with Clerval pg160-162

Victor's journey through the valley of Chamounix pg97-98

Landscapes that reflect the ideals of Romanticism

these act upon and affect the observer

The Orkneys pages 168-169. A sense of dread and entrapment, combined with brooding paranoia and the threat of violence.

A landscape that reflects the Gothic

these seem affected by the observer, a reflection of the internal state

'I felt as if I had committed some great crime, the consciousness of which haunted me' pg 167

demonstrates Victor's guilt and paranoia.

A 'ghastly grin' p.171- Vicotr misinterprets the monster's intentions. While some may assume it is of delight, what Victor sees is an expression of 'malice and treachery'. p171

The second time Victor sees the monster by moonlight

'I shall be with you on your wedding-night!' p173

The monster's threat of revenge over killing the female

In terms of Gothic horror, we think of the werewolf- change, the emergence of another self, more bestial, more primitive.

The other metaphor for the moon!- not feminine. nature, the monster

'I am the most miserable of mortals. Persecuted and tortured as I am and have been, can death be any evil to me?' p183.

Victor's account of his time in prison is, like the monster's account of his experiences with society, a narrative of persecution, constantly representing themselves as victims.

Victor confesses fault for the murders- 'Have my murderous machinations...' p181

'I felt the fiend's grasp in my neck; and could not free myself from it; groans and cries rang in my ears'. p188

Metaphorically, Volume Three, Chapter 4 shows the boundary between Victor and the monster completely breaking down.

'But, as if possessed of magic powers, the monster had blinded me to his real intentions' pg195

Contrasts with our image of Victor as a scientist, demonstrates him losing his grasp on reality.

Victor 'embraced her with ardour: but the deadly languor and coldness of the limbs told me, that what I now held in my arms had ceased to be Elizabeth whom I had loved and cherished.' p199

The death of Elizabeth echoes the dream Victor has on the night of creation

Within one paragraph, night falls and the wind rises 'with great violence' and there is a 'heavy storm of rain' p198.

Pathetic fallacy in Volume 3, Chapter 6

He thinks the spirits of the departed hover around him- this is a secular work, and so demonstrates Victor's delusions. He hears the 'fiendish laugh' of the monster. pg206

Victor's insanity is demonstrated during his journey over Europe, Russia and the Arctic.

All three narratives come together, Walton describes Victor, 'like a volcano bursting forth, his face would suddenly change to an expression of the wildest rage' p212.

'I wandered like an evil spirit, for I had committed deeds of mischief beyond description horrible.'

'I had begun life with benevolent intentions... Now all was blasted.'

In Volume 3, Chapter 7, Victor and his monster become almost indistinguishable.

Earlier in the novel: While fire is associated with life- 'vital fire or fiery life', ice represents repression and death.

Walton's dream of eternal sunshine in the North pole

Victor's dream to use a spark to animate dead matter.

The monster plans to 'consume to ashes' his 'miserable frame'. p224 'torturing flames' p225

Fire and Ice in Volume 3, Chapter 7 nature

All quests end in failure, there is numerous deaths. The ending is marked by ambiguity. The boundaries of the text are 'lost in darkness and distance' pg225- like Handmaid's!

How does Shelley challenge conventional gothic endings?

Victor describes himself to Walton 'like the archangel who inspired omnipotence, I am chained to an eternal hell' p214

Victor links himself to Milton's Satan, as does the monster- bringing them closer to each other

Continues the motif of the Romantic satanic hero- Prometheus.

Suggests that hell is something eternal.