Reading Frankenstein for Historical Background of Era and Author
First reading: Read by _________________________________
Forward – pgs. v to xviii (13 pages) Written by Walter James Miller
Author’s Introduction – pgs. xxi to xxvi (6 pages) Written by Mary Shelley
Preface – pgs. xxvii to xxviii (2 pages) Written by Marlow, 1817
Second reading: Read by _______________________
Pages 1 to 41. Includes letters from Captain Walton
TITLE: Frankenstein Or, the Modern Prometheus
Prometheus was the wisest Titan. His name means “forethought” and he was able to foretell the
future. He was the son of Iapetus. When Zeus revolted against Cronus, Prometheus deserted the
other Titans and fought on Zeus’ side. By some accounts he and his brother Epimetheus were
delegated by Zeus to create man. In all accounts, Prometheus is known as the protector and
benefactor of man. He gave mankind a number of gifts including fire. He also tricked Zeus into
allowing man to keep the best past of the animals sacrificed to the gods and to give the gods the
worst parts. For this Zeus punished Prometheus by having him chained to a rock with an eagle
tearing at his liver. He was to be left there for all eternity or until he agreed to disclose to Zeus
which of Zeus’s children would try to replace him. He was eventually rescued by Hercules without
giving in to Zeus.
Understanding References or Allusions: (People, ideas, writing that influenced Mary)
David Hartley
History of the Inconstant Lover
Paradise Lost
Milton
Dr. Darwin
German stories of ghosts (Brothers Grimm)
Iliad - Homer
William Blake
Thomas Aquinas Godwin – Mary’s father
John Locke’s – wrote Essay on Human Understanding
Jean-Jacques Rousseau - was a philosopher during Mary’s life who promoted the idea of
the noble savage as one who lives harmoniously with nature, free from want and jealousy.
Mary Wollstonecraft – Mary’s mother: was a liberal and wrote on radical feminist who
wrote A Vindication of the Right of Woman. Ten days after Mary Shelly was born her mother died.
Through this, her dad quickly married a neighbor widow. Shelly shows the sorrow about her
mother while writing. Frankenstein is a book that points out the feelings she felt, loneliness. So
through her mother’s death, Shelly found a dark way of writing. (Brittany Hancock)
Lord Byron/Mazeppa – influenced Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein by being the original
person to suggest the idea of a ghost story contest. It was because of that contest that Mary
Shelley began writing. With his satirical writing style in Mazeppa, Byron uses cleaver humorous
lines to portray unlikely situations. He uses his subtle, free style of writing to contrast Mary
Shelley’s serious, moody style. Lord Byron’s womanizing ways are also mirrored in the life of
Mary Shelley’s husband, Percy Shelley. Mary Shelley uses her experiences with Lord Byron, her
childhood and husband to fuel her story of Frankenstein.
Typical Age of Reason mentality – included in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein in order to
display the contrast between the Age of Reason and the current Romantic Period. While the Age
of Reason focused on science, the Romantic period focused on emotion. During the Age of
Reason industry was very important and science was used to answer all questions. The Romantic
Period switched the view to nature and conserving it and appreciating it. Mary Shelley uses her
two main characters to display the contrast between the two time periods. Dr. Frankenstein
resembles the Age of Reason’s mentality of reason and science. The creature respresents the
Romatic’s mentality of emotion. (Jenna)
Shakespeare- An author for the time period 200 years before the Romantic Period and
Mary mentions him because she read his works and her works are different from his, but she uses
some of the same types if writing as Shakespeare. (Mike Frost)
TASK: Due Thursday – 10 pts.
Pick one allusion from the forward, introduction, preface, or chapters 1 through 5.
Identify how it might be connected to Mary Shelley. Did they express an idea she was interested in? Did
she react to them? Research its meaning and write why Shelley included it within the context of the
paragraph.
Thibo
English 12
Quiz 1
10 pts.
1. Who wrote the forward to your version of the novel Frankenstein?
2. Who was wrote the preface?
3. Name one piece of information you learned about Mary Shelley after reading her
introduction to the novel written in 1831.
4. Who was Captain Walton writing his letters to?
5. Who narrates the first five chapters to the novel?
FORWARD NOTES: Written by Walter James Miller
 (vi) “She cast a new and sickening light on some of the most sacred aspects of the
patriarchal system, from its deepest, unacknowledged animosities toward females to its
glorification of its dangerous work ethic and of hierarchy.”
 (viii) “Daughter Mary would brood all her life on the plight of a person brought up without
a real mother: notice how many characters in Frankenstein struggle with the problems of
the orphan or of the broken family.” From her views, how does she feel about this situation?
What does she think is the solution?
 (viii) The idea that “humans are by nature benevolent and become evil only when abused
by society.” What was going on in society at this time that would make Shelley and her
friends think that society could make people evil?



(ix) Mary’s loss of her first child and a Percy poem about loss, contributed to her studies
into human psychology and eventually leads her to write about the tragedy of Frankenstein
as a scientist who seeks Ideal Truth but does not find it nor does he find human
companionship. Nor does the monster find companionship.
(xiii) This forward argues that Shelley’s story is more than pure horror because she shows
that: 1) “humans tend to panic at the sight of the strange and different, that we judge others
by appearance not character.” 2) that the monster “was born virtuous and gentle and that
only society’s mistreatment of him could turn him violent and malevolent.” And 3) that
Frankenstein could not be forgiven and be rewarded with a wife and ongoing existence
because science can run dangerously off track. Does the creator owe something to his
creature?
(xv) Failure to listen to the inner voice. Frankenstein fails to recognize the significance of
his dream, fails to save his bride, and himself. Is his blindness attributed to a patriarchal
wish to make women nonexistent? Is Frankenstein creating human life in order to by-pass
the need for women and child birth?
Was Frankenstein allowing the monster to kill Elizabeth because he couldn’t?
Author’s Introduction – pgs xxi to xxvi Written October 15, 1831
 P2 – Shelley makes describes her childhood as a time for day dreaming. “My dreams were
at once more fantastic and agreeable than my writings.” Is to mean that she was afraid of
her writing and that’s why she turned to imitating others?
 P3 – “Life appeared to be too common-place” therefore she expanded her imagination.
 P4 – It was Mary’s husband, Percy, who was anxious for her to produce writings “worthy
of (her)my parentage.” Instead, she traveled, improved her ideas while talking with Percy’s
group of friends.
 P5 – Summer of 1816, while in Switzerland, they stayed in doors due to rain visiting with
Lord Byron and reading ghost stories such as The History of the Inconstant Lover. The
image of ghosts and shadowy shapes stay tattooed upon Shelley’s mind.



P10 - While Mary was thinking of a story of her own, she listened to a conversation
between Lord Byron and Shelley about the nature of life. In particular she was drawn to the
idea of a corpse being “re-animated… perhaps the component parts of a creature might be
manufactured, brought together, and endued with vital warmth.”
P11/14 – recalls her dream and mental vision of her story – “my hideous phantom.”
It is with this idea that she starts her story. Originally she wanted a short tale, but
Percy urged her to “develop the idea at a greater length.”
In closing, Mary claims that her story was written during a happy time of her life and was
not affected by the later losses in her life – i.e. Percy’s death.
PREFACE – Written by Shelley from Marlow, who attended the weekend in Geneva,
Switzerland. His preface verifies the completion of Shelley’s story as the only one finished
from the ghost story challenge.
BACKGROUND –
The time period in which Frankenstein is set is ambiguous and has no explicit references to
current events that could be used to pinpoint a specific date. Yet it is safe to assume that the
novel is set in the latter part of the eighteenth century, at the end of the Enlightenment and the
beginning of the Romantic period. In Frankenstein, Mary Shelley addresses these two
opposing philosophical movements. The Enlightenment’s emphasis on reason and scientific
investigation is represented by Frankenstein’s pursuit of a scientific ideal, while Romanticism’s
emphasis on human passion and feeling is represented by the Creature, with his longing for
friendships with humans. In Frankenstein, Shelley helped give birth to the genre of science
fiction – and to a creature who evokes in readers the contradictory reactions of horror and
sympathy.
SUMMARY – Chapters I to IV

Victor Frankenstein narrators these five chapters beginning with his family “by birth a Genevese,” only child for several years. Then his parents adopted an orphan
from Milan, Elizabeth Lavenza. His parents were caring and loving taking much time to
travel and spending quality time with their children.

At seven years old, Victor’s parents had another son. At this time, Victor began to avoid
crowds. He became friends with Henry Clerval, a son of a merchant of Geneva. Henry
loved to read books of chivalry and romance. He was more concerned with the “moral
relations of things.”

At 13, Victor takes interest in the works of Cornelius Agrippa who writes about a modern
system of science. His father disapproves. Victor grows uncomfortable with traditional
learning and was drawn toward scientists who wrote about the elixir of life and the
philosopher’s stone.

At 15, he saw a thunder-storm that intrigued him. At 17, before he attended the university
of Ingolstadt, Elizabeth caught the scarlet fever. She recovered but Victor’s mother caught
the fever and died. At school Victor’s professor’s criticize his interest “in this enlightened
and scientific age, to find a disciple of Albertus Magnus and Paracelsus. My dear sir, you
must begin your studies entirely anew.”

Again Victor was discouraged to continue his interest in the ancient teachers of science. M.
Waldman encourages Victor to look at the philosophers who look toward nature and show
how she works. Victor took these rejections as more reason to make a new way, “explore
unknown powers, and unfold to the world the deepest mysteries of creation.”

He develops a laboratory to apply his pursuit to examine the causes of life. He found this
work to be enjoyable. He felt a power “placed in his hands.” So he plans to make a
“gigantic stature, eight feet in height and proportionally large.”

For a few years, Victor worked on his project neglecting family and friends. His father,
Elizabeth and Henry worried about Victor’s behavior.
Video – History Through Literature
We will watch the section from Romantics to Revolution.
* The video begins with the 1770s story about a man who commits suicide when he falls in love with
another woman. This action goes against the society’s support of progress.
Mention of the Industrial Revolution details the changing landscape with factories. This change makes
people doubt their belief that all is created by God. How can this be God?
GOAL: Note the society of this time, before Mary Shelley writes her novel.
What do you notice about people’s thinking, ideas, changes in society?
* Literature of the late 1700s – Gothic novels with setting in gothic style medieval castles, gloomy
mood. Faust by Goethe is a story about a man who sells his soul to the devil in exchange for the power
of knowledge and eternal youth. He desires to know the infinite. Other writers – Grey, Percy Shelley,
Wordsworth also respond to the feeling of being isolated and alienated by this new society and write
about the desire for wisdom and truth.
*Across the world - Roussea is writing about the importance of the individual in society. Paine writes
about a natural form of government created by individuals. 1776 America creates the Declaration of
Independence. 1789 French Revolution supported by the “Declaration of Man”. Napoleon returns to
power in the “Reign of Terror” 1804, defeated in 1815 at the Battle of Waterloo.
Lord Byron wrote his poem “Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte.” Percy says, “The only good could come of
Napoleon’s defeat” and writes his poem “The World’s Great Age Begins a New.”
*Other important events –
1808-1830 – Latin American countries gain independence from monarchy
1820-1865 – American Literature (Poe and Cooper) the “noble savage”
Daniel Boone and Davey Crocket
1808 – Abolitionists Efforts – ends slave trade in England
1840 – Fredrick Douglas and Sojourner Truth
1852 – Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Beatrice Stowe
1860 – Romantics has left their mark as power to the individual