Essay 2

‘Originally conceived as a ghost story, Frankenstein is far more – it is a story of alienation.’ Examine Shelley’s portrayal of the Creature in the light of this comment.

The novel was written in answer to a challenge, by Lord Byron, to write a ghost story, when he, Polidori, PB Shelley and Mary Shelley were staying near Lake Geneva in the Swiss Alps. Mary Shelley determined to write a story that would ‘curdle the blood and quicken the beatings of the heart’.  However, the novel became more than a ghost story. It does not deal with ghosts; Shelley argues that real horror does not derive from the supernatural, real horror arises from reality – the reality of the dangers of modern science. For Shelley, modern science caused alienation and in turn destruction. The novel deals with many issues of the day, one of which being alienation.

The Creature was alienated from the beginning. He was rejected by his creator and then rejected by society due to his appearance. Alienation is the cause of the Creature’s unhappiness. Because he was created unnaturally, by man, he was set apart. He was not created out of love between a man and a woman, and conceived in the womb, but in a ‘workshop of filthy creation’, the result of Victor Frankenstein’s obsessive ambition to create life himself.

The Creature is alienated from his creator, when Victor rejects and abandons him as soon as he has given him life, just because of how he looks, ‘unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room.’  Later on in the novel, the Creature realises this, when he reads Victor’s journal, which describes Victor’s repulsion for his creature, so he is alienated by hatred for his appearance. Victor is clearly representative of society in that he is shallow and judges people by physical appearance.

Through her depiction of the Creature’s alienation, Shelley shows an outraged awareness of injustice. Like the French peasants in France in 1789, the Creature is alienated and oppressed and like the French peasants he rebels. In her presentation of the Creature’s alienation, Shelley is warning against state oppression. Shelley’s original readers would be aware of this especially when considering the Luddites, who were also similar to the Creature in their oppression and alienation. Alienation caused them to rebel. The Creature was born benevolent but as Jean Jacques Rousseau acknowledged ‘man is born good but corrupted by society’. The horrific treatment endured by the Creature caused him to be alienated and this, as stated, caused him to turn evil and rebel against the society from which he is alienated. 

When the novel was written a scientific revolution was taking place. Advances in electricity and biology were causing some concern as people were actually discussing the possibility of bringing the dead back to life. Shelley was aware of Galvani’s experiments and through her depiction of the alienation of the Creature, she is warning against the dangers of the obsessive, reckless pursuit of science. The creature is the product of science. Science therefore causes alienation, as the Creature is hideously disfigured he is rejected, and therefore this alienation causes the Creature to rebel against society and commit murder. This can be related to the 21^st century as people who are disabled are still shunned by some people and this therefore causes alienation and therefore unhappiness. 

The Creature is also alienated from women, as he begins his life with no mother, and is later denied his wish for a female companion, again by his creator, when Victor destroys the female he is making for him. ‘The wretch saw me destroy the creature on whose future existence he depended for happiness’, which also denied him the opportunity of maybe being part of a family.

The Creature’s very appearance sets him apart from society, which sets so much store on looks. This can be seen by the reaction of the villagers when they see him – they stone him, he saves a child from drowning but the father shoots him. The De Lacey’s drive him out of their home when they see him and William, the younger brother of Victor, although young, has already learned the prejudices of society against things that are not considered normal. All this served to alienate the Creature still further from the ‘natural’ world.

Even so, the Creature finds pleasure in nature. ‘I even raised my humid eyes with thankfulness towards the blessed sun, which bestowed such joys on me.’ But it was nature which revealed his appearance to him, when he looked in the pool and ‘became fully convinced that I was in reality the monster that I am’, as he saw his reflection. Now the Creature had more understanding of why he had no friends, and why he would have no family. This episode is a clear parody of Eve who, in Paradise Lost, saw the pool reflect beauty. She was created naturally so perhaps the Creature’s hideous appearance could reflect his unnatural origins. Eve had a companion but the Creature did not. His appearance is the sole cause of his alienation and ultimate unhappiness.

The Creature’s alienation leads him to live in the forests, and sneak around during the night so he can keep out of sight. Alienation has caused him to be an outsider; he realises how different he is to everybody else; ‘when I looked around, I saw and heard of none like me’. As he says ‘all men hate the wretched’ and this hatred causes alienation.

When the creature takes refuge in a hovel, next to the DeLacey’s cottage, he begins to learn about people. He also learns to speak, and hopes to win them over by the ‘beauty of his soul’. His alienation does not stop him dreaming of being accepted by humans. He sees Safie, also an alien, being accepted, but she is beautiful, not a hideous monster. The Creature is doomed to be excluded from society, and devotes himself to the destruction of it, especially Victor’s family, because he will never have any of these things.

The Creature first compares himself to Adam, after reading Paradise Lost. Like Adam he was ‘apparently linked by no other human being in existence’ but Adam was cared for by his creator. Then, because of his turning evil, the Creature compares himself to Satan, ‘the fallen angel’. So he was alienated even more from his creator by acts of rebellion and revenge. He says that he was turned into a monster due to his exclusion from Paradise (the love and care of his creator) and became wretched and alone.

In conclusion the plight of the Creature is a warning against man playing God, and setting himself apart from women and society. The theme of alienation is a Romantic one, set amongst the remote scenery of the Gothic tradition. This mixture works well because it points out the frightening prospects of these events actually happening, not being brought about by the supernatural and magic, but through science. It also shows that anything unnatural will be alienated from the world, because of society’s attitude to anything ‘abnormal’.