FRANKENSTEIN CONTEXT

Question 1

what is a bildungsroman?

Answer 1

a literary genre that follows the protagonist’s psychological and moral growth from youth to adulthood, focusing on their spiritual development, education, and journey to maturity within society

Question 2

what do you call a novel which explores a characters journey from youth to adulthood?

Answer 2

a bildungsroman

Question 3

what may have inspired the artic exploration in the novel?

Answer 3

increasing exploration of the oceans during the 1800s

Question 4

what were the advances in electricity?

Answer 4

Luigi Galvani –> ran electricity through dead frogs in an attempt to reanimate them

Question 5

how does Shelley suggest that the creation of the creature is de-evolutionary?

Answer 5

Erasmus Darwin = theory of evolution
- single sex creation is for simpler life forms like bacteria - Victor creates the monster without a female

Question 6

what does the noble savage link to?

Answer 6

Rousseaus ‘innate goodness’ of human nature -> the uncivilised man is free from the corrupting influences of civilisation
- suggests that man would be happier in a state nature

Question 7

what did the romantic period inspire?

Answer 7

a greater appreciation for nature, emotion, individuality , and the arts
- seen in the creatures appreciation for literature
- Henry Clerval
- sublimal descriptions of the Alps

Romanticism emphasized the individual, the subjective, the irrational, the imaginative, the personal, the spontaneous, the emotional, the visionary, and the transcendental.

Question 8

who and what could have inspired Victors desire to have God-like powers?

Answer 8

Shelleys own father - invented the concept of anarchism - the idea that humans could become

Question 9

how does the noble savage link back to Ancient Greece?

Answer 9

Homer, and others idealized the Arcadians and other primitive groups
- From the 15th to the 19th centuries, the noble savage figured prominently in popular travel accounts and appeared occasionally in English plays such as John Dryden’s Conquest of Granada (1672)

Question 10

what can romanticism be seen as a rejection of?

Answer 10

Romanticism can be seen as a rejection of the precepts of order, calm, harmony, balance, idealisation, and rationality that typified Classicism in general, and late 18th-century Neoclassicism in particular

Question 11

how did the enlightenment inspire the gothic?

Answer 11

• The Enlightenment idealised order — the Gothic embraced chaos
• the gothic was was a deliberate rebellion against the Enlightenment’s belief that the world was orderly and knowable
• the enlightenment also challenged traditional ideas of creation through the scientific revolution/evolution theories - the supernatural challenged this

Question 12

how did the French Revolution influence the gothic?

Answer 12

• inspired the challenge to authority - hence the transgressive theme sin gothic writings
• inspired themes of horror/terror/morbidity
• brutality of the revolution led to exploration of the darker aspects of humanity

Question 13

when was the French Revolution?

Answer 13

1789-1799

Question 14

how did antiquarianism influence the gothic?

Answer 14

• encouraged authors to reinterpret medieval architecture - these structures linked to folklore and the supernatural

Question 15

why did the sublime become popular?

Answer 15

romanticism –> encouraged the exploration of the power of nature, human insignificance, and the influence of nature on the human mind
- fear of the unknown

Question 16

what was physiognomy?

Answer 16

the pseudoscientific belief that the physical body and face reflects moral or psychological health - or lack thereof - link to Cesare Lombroso

Question 17

what is the significance of nature being referred to as female?

Answer 17

‘Mother Nature’ - reflected in Greek mythology -> greek goddess of Gaia (earth)
- male protagonists often penetrate nature

Question 18

where is the Judeo-christian link in Frankenstein?

Answer 18

Genesis 1:26 - ‘and god said, let us make man in our image’

Question 19

why might Mary have had a strong feminist stance?

Answer 19

her mother Mary Wollenstonecraft wrote ‘the vindication of the rights of women’

Question 20

how is reverse colonialism shown in Frankenstein?

Answer 20

the alps being unsafe - in Central Europe

Question 21

which greek myth does Frankenstein recall?

Answer 21

Prometheus and icarus -> warning of overreaching in science

Question 22

how does Frankenstein link to the rime if the ancient mariner?

Answer 22

the mariner shoots the albatross ‘I shot the albatross’ who was sent by God
- he is subsequently punished: ‘Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse, And yet I could not die’ - just as victor is for defying god - trying to become him