Frankenstein:

Conflicting Forces

Alex Morano, Cristian Maldonado, Prathik Patel, Julia

Cao, Monica Gomes

Prompt Meaning

Simplified and explained prompt:

-choose a character who experiences internal conflict, identify the sources of conflict, and show how this conflict with one character helps explain the work.

How it relates

Moral and ethical issues inherent in scientific advancement.

How far should humans go in the name of progress and how much should we be willing to sacrifice for progress’s sake?

Victor is torn between two conflicting forces for the majority of the book as a result of the creature he brought to life.

His reactions to the creature reflect his internal struggles

At first he runs away from it, then he attempts to reason with it, until finally he takes full responsibility for the creature and realizes he has to kill it.

Examples “I knew my silence disquieted

them…but I could not tear my thoughts away from my employment, loathsome in itself, but which had taken an irresistible hold of my imagination” (Shelley 33)

Victor becomes obsessed with the pursuit of scientific knowledge esp. a way to animate life

Torn between familial obligations and his experimentation, Victor chooses to focus on his science and later reveals to Walton this was the wrong choice.

Sacrifices his humanity for the sake of scientific advancement

ExamplesCont.

“My first thought was to discover what I knew of the murderer and cause instant pursuit to be mad. But…I well knew that if any other had communicated such a relation to me, I should have looked upon it as the ravings of insanity”

Desire to pursue the creature and get revenge vs stay silent- guilt and anger vs responsibility

Thought he doesn’t tell because he would be branded insane, Victor feels personally responsible for what the creature does and eventually faces it on his own.

Examples Cont.

“as I awakened to reason, at the same time awakened to revenge…I began to reflect on the best means of securing him; and for this purpose…I repaired to a criminal judge in the town, and told him…that I knew the destroyer of my family”

After the death of Elizabeth Victor tells the magistrate his story at the risk of being thought mad

His desire for revenge was greater than for reason; the loss of Elizabeth made him desperate and though he still felt responsible for its murders he pursued help

6-step thesis

The monster created.

The hideous monster secretly created.

In “Frankenstein,” the hideous monster secretly created by a young and ambitious scientist.

In “Frankenstein,” the hideous monster secretly created by a young and ambitious scientist, Victor Frankenstein.

In “Frankenstein,” the hideous monster secretly created by a young and ambitious scientist, Victor Frankenstein, in order to fulfill his goal of artificially animating a human being.

In “Frankenstein,” the hideous monster secretly created by a young and ambitious scientist, Victor Frankenstein, in order to fulfill his goal of artificially animating a human being, causes him to experience conflicting feelings about the results of his experimentation as the creature violently murders Victor’s younger brother William, friend Clerval, and wife Elizabeth, experiences and relates to Victor intrinsically human emotions such as abandonment and loneliness, and compels Victor to construct a female monster as company.

Significant moments

“I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body…I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart” (Shelley 35)

Frankenstein is overcome with horror when he brings his hideous creature to life

He experiences conflicting forces: pride at his accomplishment, culmination of years of work versus disgust, fear, and hatred once he looks at his monster and realizes what he has created

This conflict ends in Frankenstein running away from the monster and setting in motion the events of the rest of the novel.

The initial internal conflict within Frankenstein is what leads him to abandon his creature, an action which causes it to become violent, hateful, and murderous.

Significant Moments

“Had I a right, for my own benefit, to inflict this curse upon everlasting generations? I had before been moved by the sophisms of the being I had created; I had been struck senseless by his fiendish threats: but now, for the first time, the wickedness of my promise burst upon me” (Shelley 121)

Victor is again faced with an internal conflict concerning two conflicting forces.

He knows the creature will punish him if he breaks his promise, he also feels as though he has a responsibility to the creature and wants to help alleviate its feelings of loneliness

He is also afraid that the female creature will become as wretched and the male and become equally destructive, or else scorn the original creature, or breed with him and cause an eternal plague upon humanity.

Victor already feels responsible for the death of William and Justine, decides he can’t bear having the blood of the human race on his hands and destroys the unfinished female creature

Internal Conflict (Man vs. Self)

Internal conflict was used throughout the story to illustrate the questionable morality of scientific advancement such as Victor’s, represented by the struggles faced by both Victor and the monster.

“I longed to joined them, but dared not. I remembered too well the treatment I had suffered the night before from the barbarous villagers” (Shelley 77).

The monster wants the companionship of humans but fears their rejection

“His tale, and the feelings he now expressed, proved him to be a creature of fine sensations; and did I not as his maker, owe him all the portion of happiness that it was in my power to bestow?” (Shelley 105).

Victor feels as though he is responsible for the monster and wants to make his life less miserable despite the monster’s murder of William

“Have my murderous machinations deprived you also, my dearest Henry, of life? Two I have already destroyed; other victims await their destiny: but you, Clerval, my friend, my benefactor - ” (Shelley 129).

The guilt Victor experiences as the monster commits murder after murder is one of the major sources of internal conflict; he feels personally responsible for the deaths of those murdered by the creature because it is his creation.

Hubris Extreme pride- Victor was arrogant enough to try and

create life which led to the creation of his monster and his own deterioration. It shows the immorality of Victor’s experiments, the forbidden nature of his knowledge

“Learn from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge and how much happier that man is who believes his native town to be the world than he who aspires to become greater than his nature will allow” (Shelley 31)

Victor warns Walton of the dangerous of experimenting with such sacred things as the creation of life and implies that no man should have that power

“How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch whom such infinite pains and care I had endeavored to form?”

Victor spends years perfecting his creation only to realize it is hideous and malformed, a blow to his pride and proof that said experiments shouldn’t have been performed. He can create life but not humanity.

“Wealth was an inferior object; but what glory would attend the discovery, if I could banish disease from the human frame and render man invulnerable from any but a violent death!” (Shelley 22)

Victor exhibits hubris not only by believing he can eventually banish disease but by envisioning the potential for glory and notoriety as a result of his potential achievement

External Conflict (Man vs. Society)

Frankenstein’s suffers rejection from society. The reaction of the people to the monster not only comments on the judgmental nature of man but on the wretched existence of the monster and the immorality of Victor’s experimentation.

“The whole village was roused; some fled, some attacked me” (Shelley 74)

This is the monster’s first experience with the cruelty of humanity. They attack him though he did not provoke him and in his innocence he doesn’t understand why.

“Felix darted forward, and with supernatural force tore me from his father, to whose knees I clung…he dashed me to the ground and struck me violently with a stick” (Shelley 97).

The monster feels betrayed and angry; he has provided for these people in times of need and watched them for over a year and yet he was attacked when he revealed himself.

“I had saved a human being from destruction, and as recompense I now writhed under the miserable pain of a wound which shattered the flesh and bone. The feelings of kindness and gentleness…gave place to hellish rage” (Shelley 101).

Though the monster rescues a girl from drowning he is shot at and wounded by a human being which finally “breaks” him and causes him to hate all humanity; this is the last time he is wronged before he turns to evil and kills William.

Works Cited

Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft. Frankenstein. New York: Dover Publications, 1994. Print.