Frankenstien raises many questions about the ethics of creation. Looking at Mary Shelly's childhood and early adult life, we can see certain subtle biographical references within the novel that raise the question of the right to create life and parent a child. The novel also highlights the importance of identity and the parent's responsibility to assist in developing this. Many Psychology theorists have debated over the "correct" way to raise a child. Looking at these theories in the context of Frankenstien, we will discuss the ethical and moral implications of creating a lifeform that the creator is responsible for.
Mary Shelly's life was surrounded by death and rejection. This would have undoubtedly influenced her writing of Frankenstien . Shelly would not remember her first experience of the death of a loved one, but her entire childhood would have been carved by her mother's death. Unfortunately, her mother died whilst giving birth to Shelly in 1797 . It could be argued that in some way, Shelly blamed herself for the death of her mother. Shelly's father quickly remarried the French speaking royalist and devout Catholic, Mary Jane Clairmont. There is no doubt that Shelly would have been well aware of the French Revolution, the disrespectful abuse and misuse of the bodies of the deceased through her step-mother. Her husband, Percy, also had a keen interest in science, including galvanism. This would have influenced the idea of manipulating the bodies of the dead within Frankenstien.
Within the novel the theme of rejection is represented through Victor's horrified and fearful reaction to his creation. Victor views The Monster as a 'catastrophe' a 'wretch' and 'demonic corpse' whilst feeling 'horror', 'disgust', 'bitterness' and 'disappointment' towards his creation. In an attempt to escape his own guilt, he rejects The Monster by taking great care and haste to 'avoid the wretch' exclaiming that he 'did not dare return' . This rejection of The Monster has connotations of an unwanted child, much like Shelly's experience of being sent away to Scotland by her newly married father and stepmother . For most of Shelly's childhood, she felt inferior and detached from her successful parents . To be sent away would have deepened this state of mind.
Following the death of her infant daughter in 1815, Shelly wrote in a letter to a close friend “My dearest Hogg my baby is dead —… It was perfectly well when I went to bed — I awoke in the night to give it suck it appeared to be sleeping so quietly that I would not awake it. It was dead then, but we did not find that out till morning — from its appearance it evidently died of convulsions — Will you come — you are so calm a creature & Shelley is afraid of a fever from the milk — for I am no longer a mother now” . What is perhaps the most disturbing thing about this letter is the word choice. There is no gentle sentiment. It is quite blunt and to the point stating “My baby is dead”. This indicates Shelly’s numbness of emotion and sentiment during this time. This is emphasized and explained by her comment “I am no longer a mother”. Shelly is stating that because her infant child’s life has been taken, her identity as a mother has also been taken. This indicates that Shelly was suffering from a crisis of identity and perhaps some form of post-natal depression following her loss. Considering the fact that Frankenstien was written during this time, it is highly likely that Shelly’s personal trauma and emotions would be woven into the text.
The reader can identify The Monster’s confusion surrounding his identity and where he belongs in society. The Monster describes in chapter 15;
“I was dependent on none and related to none. The path of my departure was free, and there was none to lament my annihilation. My person was hideous and my stature gigantic. What did this mean? Who was I? What was I? Whence did I come? What was my destination? These questions continually recurred, but I was unable to solve them.”
The Monster is aware that he is different to the other humans he has come into contact with and read about. Describing himself as hideous and gigantic is only possible by comparing his physical features with another. Had he not come into contact with humanity, he would not have known any difference. He must be gigantic if everyone else around him is small and he must be hideous if others are pleasing to the eye. These are also negative connotations and may represent both The Monster and Shelly’s depressed state and low self-esteem. The Monster has no companion to either guide or prevent his way. He cannot think for himself or make decisions as he has no sense of self and what direction he has to take in a physical sense, or metaphorically in his life. This lack of dependency or relation results in a very lost individual. The list of ‘big’ questions is indicative of a mind going wild with anxiety, over thinking the purpose of life. Feeling ‘unable to solve them’ indicates a helplessness for the situation.
Shelly's personal struggles with the loss of her children and the rejection she felt as a child is reflected within The Monster. It is also clear that the young author of Frankenstien is exploring the processes and elements required for the birth of a child . In doing this, the novel encourages readers to question scientific interference within nature and in particular the process of creating life. This is done through imagery and word choice throughout the novel. We are told that Victor Frankenstien had 'a fervent longing to penetrate the secrets of nature' and that he 'pursued nature to her hiding place' . Penetration is the main function within sexual intercourse, therefore this choice of word indicates some form of mating or reproductive act. By describing Victor as 'longing', Shelly is suggesting that Victor is wistful or yearning in his pursuit, descriptions usually used to describe someone who is sexually attracted to someone else. By personifying nature as a woman Victor wished to pursue, Shelly is describing the flirtatious and coy manner than men and women who are in the early stages of courting behave. In doing this, Shelly is setting the stage for reproduction and the creation of life.
Shelly describes The Monster's creation in a way that is similar to the birth of a baby. Victor tells of 'midnight labors, while, with unrelaxed and breathless eagerness' . The use of the word 'labors' indicates the labor a woman must go through during childbirth. The physical exhaustion of muscles contracting for hours on end whilst trying to control one's breathing is normal during childbirth. Shelly's description of Victor's 'unrelaxed and breathless eagerness' describes this. Most expectant mothers would definitely feel eager to see their newborn child after an exhausting and painful labor. For Victor, this resulted in horror and devastation as his new life form appears as a frightening monster. For the author, Shelly, this reflects the trauma of losing her babies after they were born. The eager excitement of meeting her baby only for it to die tragically would fill most mothers with horror and devastation. The novel describes how 'convulsive motion agitated his limbs' as The Monster comes to life. We are later told that 'every limb became convulsed ' within Victor Frankenstien. In repeating these convulsions with both The Monster and Victor Frankenstien, Shelly is suggesting that when the creature is born, his creator is reborn. This would indicate that Shelly feels like a different person after the birth of her children. As we have discussed previously however, her sense of identity changes again after the death of her child. We can relate this to contemporary society today, where infertility can sometimes have a huge impact on how a woman identifies herself. The pressures on women today to reproduce has been discussed by various charities including The National Adoption and Infertility Education and Support Charity
The theme of parenting is also represented through the character of Victor. Many adaptations of the novel have identified The Monster’s “birth” as similar to the birth of a child. In Kenneth Branah’s 1994 film adaptation , The Monster is birthed from a bath painstakingly filled with amniotic fluid. In Bernard Rose’s modern-day film adaptation , The Monster is portrayed as a newborn in an adult man’s body, in great need of a nurturing mother figure. He is mentioned to have the mental capabilities of a one year old infant. The entire plot of this adaptation is focused on a child abandoned by their mother and the emotional and mental harm this causes. Closer to God, A Frankenstien Story (2014) directed by Billy Senese, takes this theme even further by depicting the devastating effects of the neglectful parent or creator. In this particular adaptation, a genetic scientist creates the first successful human clone, Elizabeth. What the viewer eventually discovers is that this is a second attempt. His first attempt, resulting in a child named Ethan, went horribly wrong. Rather than destroy the child, he requests his housekeeper and her husband raise the child in secret in their home. The child, severely disfigured and tormented by daily pain and neglect from his creator, is kept locked up and becomes furious with manic rage. The creation escapes, murders his caregivers and the successful clone Elizabeth. This plot highlights the risks of creating something unnatural, playing God in a way, and neglecting the responsibilities that this brings.
Mary Shelly's novel describes how Victor Frankenstien is horrified by his creation and shows no love, care of compassion towards him. Victor 'sought to avoid the wretch […] I did don't dare return to the apartment which I inhibited.' By neglecting and abandoning his “child”, Victor deprives him of a healthy and nurturing upbringing. The Monster explains 'Let him live with me in the interchange of kindness; and, instead of injury I would bestow every benefit upon him with tears of gratitude at his acceptance.' The Monster only experiences hate, fear, disgust and violence however so decides 'if I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear.' By rejecting his creation, Victor Frankenstien creates a being who feels hate, disgust at himself and is very bitter, vengeful and violent. This is deepened within the character's state of mind by his brief interactions with other men. Having just saved a little girl from drowning, he is negatively rewarded with fear and a gunshot wound, so vows 'This was then the reward for my benevolence! I had saved a human from destruction, and as a recompose I now writhed under the miserable pain of a wound which shattered the flesh and bone. The feelings of kindness and gentleness, which I had entertained but for a few moments before, gave place to hellish rage […] I vowed eternal hatred and vengeance to all mankind.' This lack of positive reinforcement for good behavior has clearly made an impact on The Monster.
The novel was written before Freud’s Psychodynamic theory , Bowlby's Maternal Deprivation theory Theory, Piaget's theory of cognitive development , Vygotsky's Social Development theory and Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs . We can, however look deeper into the relationship between Victor Frankenstien and The Monster and the personality of The Monster whilst considering these theories.
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs states that needs must be achieved in a particular order. For one need to be achieved, it's previous need must be met. Maslow describes this order as ; physiological, safety, belongingness and intimacy, esteem, and finally, achieving self-actualization. Rather than Victor providing support to The Monster, as a parent would to help him meet these needs, The Monster has to try and achieve these on his own. 'A strange multiplicity of sensations seized me, and I saw, felt, heard and smelt at the same time ' suggests that immediately upon awaking he began to experience and achieve the first tier of physiological needs. In order to meet the next level of needs, safety, The Monster took refuge in a low hovel […] I found it an agreeable asylum from the snow and rain.' The next level however proves difficult. The Monster has to form friendships and intimate relationships to meet the need of belongingness. Rejected and feared however, The Monster cannot meet this need therefore cannot continue further in order to achieve his full potential. What this tells the reader in very few pages, is that The Monster is human. He is a living being with desires and needs. By making the creature human, Shelly is highlighting the relationship between mother and child, creator and creation. What this also suggests is that had The Monsters needs been met by his creator, the outcome of the story may have been entirely different for both Victor and The Monster.
Freud believed that all behaviors are deeply rooted in early childhood experiences and that our personalities are the result of three main components; the id, the ego and the super ego. The development of these components is dependent upon social and environmental factors throughout, what Freud referred to as, psychosexual development. Looking at Frankenstien and his creation in this context, Frankenstien has deprived The Monster of pleasurable sensations and experiences throughout the key stages in his early life. Oral pleasure for example, by providing delicious meals that Frankenstien has prepared, would have provided The Monster with nurturing and satisfying oral pleasure at a key early stage of his life. By not meeting these needs, The Monster is unable to develop what is known as the super ego. The id is the need and desire for something, the ego is the way of figuring out how to obtain this need, the super ego is the overseeing morality that uses social rules and norms to ensure that this is done in the proper and safe way for the individual and others. The Monster knows what he wants, he knows how to get it, yet he doesn't seem to care if people are hurt in the process. The murder of Frankenstien’s little brother for revenge is one example of this. The Monster wants revenge. He seeks it but he doesn’t seem to comprehend that not only is this child an innocent party, poor Justine is blamed and hanged for the murder.
Bowlby's Maternal Deprivation theory states that the first 9 months of a child's life is crucial in developing an attachment with the mother. The first two years are critical for the child's development of social, emotional and cognitive abilities. If there is any disruption to this relationship between the main caregiver and the child in this time, the consequences include delinquency, reduced intelligence, increased aggression, depression and affectionless psychopathy. This suggests that had Victor Frankenstien bonded with his creation, nurtured and provided for it, The Monster would not have had a tendency towards violence and self-loathing depression. Bowlby's theory also stated that any future relationships were based on the type of relationship the child has with their mother or primary caregiver. This suggests that because Frankenstien expressed fear, loathing, regret and disgust towards The Monster, then any future relationships The Monster had would be damaged or influenced by this feeling of being hated and rejected.
Vygotsky's learning theory explains how a child learns in a sociocultural way. He states that a child learns through interaction and cooperation with a more skilled tutor. The child then internalizes this learning and applies these learned skills and behaviors to tasks they tackle on their own in the future. This tutor could be either a parent, a teacher or peers. The cultural and social ideals of this tutor then become internalized within the developing child. What this says in relation to Frankenstien’s Monster is that the hatred and tendency to embark upon a task, without realizing the consequences, is something that The Monster has learned from his creator. The Monsters violence is learned from the social interactions he experiences with other humans.
Piaget however, believed that cognitive development stemmed from a child's solo explorations with the environment around them. Rather than treating children as miniature adults, people needed to understand that babies were born with what Piaget describes as schemas. As the child grew and matures, these schemas would multiply and become more elaborate. This suggests that The Monster, as a newly created lifeform, may not have had the basic capabilities there to understand and function in the world around him. He needed to be kept in a safe, secure and nurturing environment with plenty of learning opportunities available to him. The Monster instead, was thrown into an unknown world, without the basic capabilities for understanding it and with no one to guide him towards any learning opportunities.
What all of this psychological theory and research suggests is that all children need a safe, secure, nurturing environment that meets their needs, positively reinforces good behavior, provides opportunities to learn in isolation and as part of a cooperative learning experience. The consequences of not having this available can result in cognitive, social, emotional and communication difficulties that are lifelong. This raises the question of the right to parent. Just because someone can reproduce, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they should. If they cannot provide the necessary environment, form a positive attachment or commit themselves to teach and guide the child in a way that is beneficial to their development, then it could be argues that they do not have the right to bring a child into this world. Frankenstien had the ability to bring life to his creation, but without the foresight and commitment to nurture it, he doesn't have the right to do so.
The right to create is something that contemporary society is aware of. The media regularly discusses the ethical questions raised by modern science and technology. When Shelly wrote Frankenstien, science was developing at great speed. Shelly was raising questions about the ethics of undiscovered science whereas today we raise questions about science that has been discovered and whether we have the right to use it or not. Genetic cloning, IVF, altering human embryo genes and fertility drugs all interfere with nature. We have the scientific knowledge and the ability to do these things, but is it moral or ethical. As we see within Frankenstien, the right to create is not as simple as it may seem. The consequences of unnatural creation have to be investigated and heavily thought out before hastily experimenting with a life form.
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