The story of Frankenstein beholds elements such as secrecy, fears, ambitions, rejection, and thoughts of mere existence. The mixture of emotions and expressions which are quite close to human reality is a masterwork of Mary Shelley. The work had been written in the era of romanticism that made the acceptance of the work by Mary as controversial and much debated in the early years of the publishing. In this paper, we shall discuss evaluate the novel Frankenstein by broadly analyzing the characters of Victor Frankenstein. The minor character of Justine Moritz had been also done to understand the stylistics of Mary Shelly. The theme of prejudice had been extracted from the novel that leads to understanding the concept of education and upbringing.
Victor Frankenstein’s Portrayal
Mary Shelley is a writer of the era of romanticism had greatly bestowed her emotional experience by portraying Victor Frankenstein as an emotionally challenged character of the novel. The character of Victor had been illustrated as a person who had gone through loneliness in his life. The experience of Victor Frankenstein of being lonely is the dangerous aspect of his personality. Victor Frankenstein is a genius in his mind unlike other members of his family. In the beginning, Victor Frankenstein had been projected as a person who was more into poetry but later he became interested in knowing about the secrets of heaven and earth. Thus he engaged himself in learning scientific theories and transformed himself into a scientifically minded person. His approach to scientific experiments was actually to create living creatures. Victor stuck himself in the mere delusion of losing his close ones by actually giving birth to the living creature. The creature that he gave birth to buy scientific experiments turned inhuman and ferocious. The creature killed the Victors’ friends, wife, and brother (Shelley, Panshin, and Cook).
The intension of Victor by creating such a creature was to rule the race of another living species which actually turned out a very complicated scenario for him. The creature that he created was swiftly rejected by him. In the context of the novel, Victor gets to understand that giving birth to such a creature was his biggest mistake (Shelley, Panshin and Cook). Victor had also been projected as a person who was short tempered that actually cost him a great deal of loss for his life. His short temperedness could also be regarded as the dangerous fact about him in the novel.
Justine as a Minor Character
The character of Justine Moritz is not a highlight of the novel. The character has been introduced to a very little extent. Justine Moritz is a minor character of the novel with the traits of a servant girl to the family of Frankenstein family. Justine came to live with the Frankenstein family when her mother passed away. She came to live in Frankenstein family when she was young when Frankenstein’s mother liked her the most as being a lonely child. The character of Justine in the context of the novel is imperative but minor in length. The author had introduced Justine Moritz with the connection to Elizabeth. The character of Justine Moritz had been arrested in the context of the novel when William Frankenstein was murdered (Shelley, Panshin and Cook).
The reason behind arresting Justine Moritz for William Frankenstein’s murder was due to the fact that the locked that was given to William by Elizabeth was found in the pocket of Justine Moritz. When Justine was investigated, she affirms that the blame on her because she wanted to save the Frankenstein’s family. Late on, in the context of the novel, Justine realized that it was her mistake that she accepted the wrong accusation. In reality, the murder was done by the monster which was created by Victor Frankenstein. Victor being the person who knew the reality, kept quiet and did not reveals the fact that it was the monster that killed William Frankenstein (Shelley, Panshin and Cook). In the later part of the novel, the monster also kills Justine. Consequently, Victor Frankenstein curses the monster for committing such an act. Through the context of the character of Justine, the author tries to elaborate the theme of tolerance.
John Locke and Mary Shelley
The story by Mary Shelley also accompanies the theory written by John Locke. The concept of educating children and upbringing could be regarded as the basic phenomenon of the story. Due to the turmoil in the upbringing of Victor Frankenstein, it comes to our understanding that major events take place in the context of the novel. The story claims that Victor Frankenstein was left alone and lived a life of an introvert. If he would have been indulged in different social activities, the situation of creating a monster would not have happened ever. The concept of Tabula Raas could be referenced in the evaluation of the story by Mary Shelley. According to the theory Tabula Raas by John Locke, the living lifestyle and the behavior of one is completely dependant upon the upbringing of the child. Parenting plays a major role in shaping the character of an individual. The same theme had been selected by the author in the novel to define Victor’s personality (Spellman).
The author Mary Shelley can be considered as a disciple of John Locke. The view of John Locke is more liberalist as it affirms that individual bringing is free from aggression until or unless he or she is trained by effective parenting. Similar example had been greatly highlighted by Mary Shelley in her novel Frankenstein (Shelley et al., 2009).
Prejudice as a Profound Theme
Among different themes which had been enhanced in the novel by the author Mary Shelley, prejudice is the most broadly discussed theme in the novel. The other themes could be observed in an interrelated manner with the theme of prejudice (Shelley, Panshin and Cook). Prejudice is that word that had been assigned to that view of things or concepts which are self created and have no logic. In the context of the novel, the theme of prejudice had been discussed as a concept that had been evolved due to the fear of one’s mind. The misunderstood knowledge leads to the evolution of prejudice in all the aspects of living.
The story written by the author Mary Shelley displays a number of tragic events which have been shaped in terms of prejudice. The phenomenon of prejudice comes to light when certain events take place in the novel just because of the brutality of the monster created by Victor Frankenstein. The monster had been refused by its creator due to the despair of rejection and fear of prejudice. The fight had been placed by the author in a way that inspired prejudice (Spellman). The stance of rejection brings about the concept and understanding of prejudice by the monster.
Overall Evaluation of the Novel
Frankenstein is a story about a scientific scientist who is introvert and tries to achieve his intentional secrets. Victor Frankenstein tries to learn about the hidden secrets of earth. In the way of knowing all the secrets, Victor creates a monster who demolishes his life by actually murdering his wife, friends and brother. The images that have been illustrated in the story seem horrific. A horror story has certain figures which would haunt the reader with a tragedy that would take place in the later half of the story. Similar settings have been observed in the story Frankenstein by Mary Shelley as there is a monster, murder, tragedy, introvert scientist but the story cannot be regarded as a horrific story (Shelley, Panshin and Cook). The concept of loneliness and prejudice indicate that the story does include a message which could be implied for the sociological understanding of human associations. The protagonist of the story finds out the faces of people in during the course of the novel. Mary Shelley sends the message through the story that the impact of sociological actions on an individual shapes their lives and understanding (Shelley, Panshin and Cook). For instance, it should be understood that the monster killed the other characters of the novel because he was rejected by his creator. This should be taken as a positive attribute that he was not accepted. Acceptance this becomes a very important and positive element in the novel.
Similar instances could be found in the novel such as the victor’s intension to create a living creature which he later regarded on its creation. Victor Frankenstein had been shown as an irresponsible character of the novel as he does not really cared about making things right after creating the monster (Shelley, Panshin and Cook).
Works Cited
Shelley, M, A Panshin and P. Cook. “Frankenstein”. Phoneix: Arc Manor LLC, 2009.
Spellman, W. “John Locke”. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1997.