Ives AP Lit

Fall 2014
Things you need to know about Mary Shelleys Frankenstein
The movies have lied to you about the story of Victor Frankenstein and his
creation. Why? Because the novel as it is written would not make for a good movie. It
is about abstract philosophical and psychological concepts, which do not make for good
visual storytelling. Hollywood removes abstracts and replaces them with striking visual
images of death and destruction because that is what appeals to the eye of the moviegoer.
In order to understand this novel, you must forget everything that Hollywood has
told you about Victor and his creature. Forgot what you think the creature looks like or
sounds like. Forget castle laboratories, assistants named Igor, and using electricity to
reanimate parts of dead bodies sewn together. None of that is present in the novel. Here
is what you need to know about the original story:

The name of the main character is Victor Frankenstein. He is the scientist that
discovers how to create life. That means that the title of the novel refers to him
and NOT his creation. This is the Victors story. Victor is the focus of the novel.

The being that Victor creates is referred to as the creature. His name is NOT
Frankenstein, though many people will argue that since Victor creates him, he
should be considered a son and therefore would carry the Frankenstein name. His
name is also NOT the monster. Victor calls him that throughout the novel
because of his appearance and later because of his actions, but Shelley refers to
him as the creature, so that is how we will refer to him.

Victor does NOT sew together pieces of dead bodies and electrocute them to
bring them back to life. That is what the movies tell you. In the novel, Victor
studies anatomy from dead bodies, but he makes his creature from scratch and
gives it life himself. He is a creator, not an animator of already existing parts.

The creature is NOT a dumb, lumbering, green mass of sewn together parts with
bolts sticking out of his neck. He is eloquent, intelligent, empathetic, incredibly
strong, fast, agile, and superior to humans in every way possible except for his
appearance. He is gigantic in stature and ugly; but that is because Victor made
him that way.

This is not a horror story in the sense that it is about blood and gore. This is a
story about the horrors of society: how we as a race do not accept those who are
different from us and also the price that a creator must pay when he refuses to
take responsibility for his own creation. Think of this as a psychological
commentary on the human race that uses another creature to highlight our own
inadequacies.

The story of Victor begins with letters written by Captain Walton to his sister. He
is the first Narrator. He will tell you about his life, then about meeting Victor, and
then Victor will take over as narrator and tell his own story.