Frankenstein Summary Essay

Frankenstein opens with a preface, scared by bloody shame Shelley precisely comm just supposed(p) to have been written by her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley. It states that the reinvigorated was begun during a summer vacation in the Swiss Alps, when unseasonably rainy survive and nights spent reading Ger spell trace stories inspired the author and her literary companions to carry in a shadiness shank writing contest, of which this work is the but blameless product. succinct Letter 1The saucy itself begins with a series of garners from the adventurer Robert Walton to his sis, Marg art Sav upsete. Walton, a well-to-do English service universe with a rage for sea out-of-the- look(prenominal)ing, is the captain of a ship headed on a terrible voyage to the northmost Pole. In the runner letter, he consecrates his sister of the preparations leading up to his departure and of the relish burning in him to accomplish whatever massive purposediscoering a Federal passage to the Pacific, revealing the source of the flat coats magnetism, or simply backing foot on undiscovered territory.Summary Letters 23In the second letter, Walton bemoans his lack of fri checks. He feels sole(a) and isolated, too sophisticated to draw otto musical composition in his shipmates and too uneducated to find a clarified soul with whom to partake in his dreams. In the brief third letter, Walton tells his sister that his ship has set sail and that he has full confidence that he go away achieve his aim.Summary Letter 4In the fourth letter, the ship stable between huge sheets of ice, and Walton and his men degree a sledge guided by a gigantic creature some half a mile away. The close d aver morning, they encounter a nonher sledge obscure on an ice floe. All that one of the dogs drawing the sledge is dead, and the man on the sledge non the man seen the night beforeis emaciated, weak, and starving. Despite his condition, the man refuses to board the ship until W alton tells him that it is heading north. The quaint spends two days recovering, nursed by the faction, before he butt end speak. The crew is burning with curiosity, but Walton, aware of the mans silent-fragile state, pr fifty-fiftyts his men from burdening the other with questions. As m passes, Walton and the eerie compel helps, and the stranger yettually consents to tell Walton his level. At the end of the fourth letter, Walton states that the visitor will deject his communicatory the close day Waltons framing account ends and the strangers begins.Summary Chapter 1The stranger, who the reader shortly learns is schoolmaster Frankenstein, begins his news report. He starts with his family background, birth, and early puerility, relation back Walton about his father, Alphonse, and his aim, Caroline. Alphonse became Carolines guardian when her father died in poverty. They married two years later, and superordinate was born before long subsequently. Frankenstein then describes how his childishness companion, Elizabeth Lavenza, entered his family. Elizabeth was discovered by his mother, Caroline, on a trip to Italy, when passkey is about five years overaged. plot of land visiting a poor Italian family, Caroline nonices a beautiful ash-blonde girl among the dark-h publiciseed Italian children upon discovering that Elizabeth is the orphaned daughter of a Milanese overlord and a German woman and that the Italian family tooshie barely afford to render her, Caroline adopts Elizabeth and brings her back to Geneva. master keys mother decides at the m forecastt of the adoption that Elizabeth and sea captain should someday marry.Summary Chapter 2Elizabeth and superior grow up together as best friends. captains friendship with heat content Clerval, a class fellow and only when child, flourishes as well, and he spends his puerility happily surrounded by this close domestic circle. As a teenager, passe-partout becomes increasingly fa scinated by the mysteries of the innate(p) human beings. He chances upon a book by Cornelius Agrippa, a sixteenth-century scholar of the occult sciences, and becomes participationed in inherent philosophy. He studies the over-the-hill findings of the alchemists Agrippa, Paracelsus, and Albertus Magnus with enthusiasm. He witnesses the destructive power of disposition when, during a raging storm, imperfectning destroys a tree near his house. A modern subjective philosopher accompanying the Frankenstein family explains to succeeder the workings of electricity, devising the ideas of the alchemists seem outdated and worthless.Summary Chapter 3At the age of seventeen, original leaves his family in Geneva to attend the university at Ingolstadt. unsloped before superordinate departs, his mother catches red fever from Elizabeth, whom she has been nursing back to health, and dies. On her deathbed, she begs Elizabeth and passe-partout to marry. Several weeks later, still gr ieving, Victor goes off to Ingolstadt. Arriving at the university, he finds lodge in the town and sets up a meeting with a professor of natural philosophy, M. Krempe. Krempe tells Victor that all the time that Victor has spent analyse the alchemists has been wasted, but turn Victor on the study of natural philosophy. He then attends a call down in chemistry by a professor named Waldman. This lecture, along with a resultant meeting with the professor, convinces Victor to pursue his studies in the sciences.Analysis Preface and Letters 14The preface to Frankenstein sets up the fresh as entertainment, but with a sound twista science assembly that nonetheless captures the truth of the elementary principles of kind-hearted constitution. The works of Homer, Shakespeare, and Milton are held up as shining examples of the kind of work Frankenstein aspires to be. Incidentally, the savoir-faire to Dr. Darwin in the first sentence is not to the famous evolutionist Charles Darwin, who was seven years old at the time the novel was written, but to his grandfather, the biologist Erasmus Darwin. In addition to scene the scene for the telling of the strangers record, Waltons letter introduce an grand characterWalton himselfwhose story parallels Frankensteins. The second letter introduces the idea of loss and loneliness, as Walton complains that he has no friends with whom to share his triumphs and failures, no sensitive ear to listen to his dreams and ambitions.Walton turns to the stranger as the friend he has perpetually treasured his seek for companionship, and his attempt to find it in the stranger, parallels the hellers desire for a friend and mate later in the novel. This parallel between man and monster, still hidden in these early garner but increasingly clear as the novel progresses, suggests that the two may not be as different as they seem. Another theme that Waltons letter introduce is the hazard of familiarity. The stranger tells Walton, You s tress for knowledge and wisdom, as I once did and I ardently hope that the atonement of your wishes may not be a serpent to sting you, as mine has been. The theme of destructive knowledge is demonstrable throughout the novel as the tragic consequences of the strangers obsessive lookup for understanding are revealed.Walton, like the stranger, is beguiled by the opportunity to know what no one else knows, to delve into natures secrets What may not be evaluate in a country of never-failing sportsmanlike? he asks. Waltons is only the first of many voices in Frankenstein. His earn set up a anatomy narrative that encloses the main narrativethe strangersand provides the context in which it is told. Nested at heart the strangers narrative are even much voices. The use of twofold frame narratives calls attention to the telling of the story, adding newborn layers of complexity to the already intricate affinity between author and reader as the reader listens to Victors story, so does Walton as Walton listens, so does his sister.By charge the readers attention on narration, on the importance of the storyteller and his or her audience, Shelley may have been trying to cerebrate her novel to the oral tradition to which the ghost stories that inspired her tale belong. Within separately framed narrative, the reader receives constant moveers of the front end of other authors and audiences, and of perspective shifts, as Victor breaks out of his narrative to address Walton at present and as Walton signs off from each one of his letters to his sister.Analysis Chapters 12The view that Victor draws of his childhood is an idyllic one. though loss aboundsthe poverty of Beaufort and the orphaning of Elizabeth, for instanceit is always quickly alleviated by the nominal head of a close, loving family. Nonetheless, the reader wizards, even in these early passages, that the stability and relieve of family are about to be exploded. luster through Victors narration of a joyful childhood and an character reference adolescence is a glimmer of the great tragedy that will soon overtake him. Women in Frankenstein fit into few roles the loving, sacrificial mother the innocent, sensitive child and the concerned, confused, abandoned issuer. end-to-end the novel, they are universally unresisting, rising only at the most extreme moments to ask action from the men around them. The oral communication Victor uses to describe the relationship between his mother and father supports this image of womens passivity in reference to his mother, he says that his father came as a protect spirit to the poor girl, who committed herself to his care.Elizabeth, Justine Moritz, and Caroline Beaufort all fit into this mold of the passive woman.Various metanarrative comments (i.e., remarks that pertain not to the content of the narrative but rather to the telling of the narrative) remind the reader of the fact that Victors narrative is contained within Waltons. Vic tor interrupts his story to relate how Elizabeth became a part of his family, prefacing the bending with the comment, But before I handle my narrative, I must record an incident. much(prenominal) guiding statements structure Victors narrative and remind the reader that Victor is telling his story to a detail audienceWalton.Foreshadowing is ubiquitous in these chapters and, in fact, throughout the novel. Even Waltons letters prepare the way for the tragic events that Victor will recount. Victor constantly alludes to his imminent doom for example, he calls his interest in natural philosophy the mastermind that has regulated my fate and the fatal drift that led to my ruin. Victors narrative is rife with nostalgia for a happier time he dwells on the fuzzy memories of his blissful childhood with Elizabeth, his father and mother, and enthalpy Clerval. But even in the midst of these tranquil childhood recollections, he cannot ignore the signs of the tragedy that lies in his imminent future he sees that each event, such as the death of his mother, is vigor but an omen, as it were, of his future misery.This lowering use of annunciateing has a doubled effect. On the one hand, it adds to the suspense of the novel, leave the reader wondering about the nature of the awful tragedy that has caused Victor so much grief. On the other hand, it drains away some of the suspensethe reader knows far ahead of time that Victor has no hope, that all is doomed. Words like fate, fatal, and omen reinforce the inevitability of Victors tragedy, suggesting not only a soul of resignation but also, perhaps, an attempt by Victor to deny responsibility for his own misfortune. Describing his decision to study chemistry, he says, thereof ended a day unforgettable to me it decided my future destiny.Summary Chapter 4Victor attacks his studies with enthusiasm and, ignoring his social keep and his family far away in Geneva, makes quick progress. Fascinated by the mystery of the foun dation garment of life, he begins to study how the human form is built (anatomy) and how it falls apart (death and decay). by and by some(prenominal) years of tireless work, he masters all that his professors have to ascertain him, and he goes one ill-treat further discovering the secret of life. Privately, hidden away in his apartment where no one can see him work, he decides to begin the spin of an animate creature, envisioning the creation of a new race of wonderful beings. zealously devoting himself to this turn over, he neglects everything elsefamily, friends, studies, and social lifeand grows increasingly pale, lonely, and obsessed.Summary Chapter 5One inclement night, after months of labor, Victor completes his creation. But when he brings it to life, its awful beance horrifies him. He rushes to the next room and tries to sleep, but he is roily by nightmares about Elizabeth and his mothers corpse. He wakes to discover the monster looming over his bed with a grotesqu e grimace and rushes out of the house. He spends the night walk in his courtyard. The next morning, he goes paseo in the town of Ingolstadt, frantically avoiding a return to his now-haunted apartment. As he walks by the town inn, Victor comes across his friend Henry Clerval, who has just arrived to begin studying at the university.Delighted to see Henrya breath of fresh air and a reminder of his family after so many months of isolation and ill healthhe brings him back to his apartment. Victor enters first and is relieved to find no sign of the monster. But, weakened by months of work and traumatize at the horrific being he has haved, he immediately falls ill with a nervous fever that lasts several months. Henry nurses him back to health and, when Victor has recovered, harbours him a letter from Elizabeth that had arrived during his illness.Analysis Chapters 35Whereas the first two chapters give the reader a mere sense impression of impending doom, these chapters depict Victor irrevocably on the way to tragedy. The creation of the monster is a grotesque act, far take away from the triumph of scientific knowledge for which Victor had hoped. His nightmares reflect his horror at what he has done and also serve to foreshadow future events in the novel. The images of Elizabeth livid with the change of death prepare the reader for Elizabeths eventual death and connect it, tho indirectly, to the creation of the monster. Victors pursuit of scientific knowledge reveals a great deal about his perceptions of science in general. He views science as the only true route to new knowledge In other studies you go as far as others have deceased before you, and there is nothing more to know but in scientific pursuit there is continual pabulum for discovery and wonder. Waltons journey to the northernmost Pole is likewise a search for food for discovery and wonder, a step into the tantalizing, dark unknown.The symbol of light, introduced in Waltons first letter (What may not be expected in a country of eternal light?), appears again in Victors narrative, this time in a scientific context. From the midst of this darkness, Victor says when describing his discovery of the secret of life, a sudden light broke in upon mea light so splendid and wondrous. Light reveals, illuminates, clarifies it is essential for seeing, and seeing is the way to knowledge. Just as light can illuminate, however, so can it blind sunnily warm at moderate levels, it ignites dangerous flames at higher ones. Immediately after his first metaphorical use of light as a symbol of knowledge, Victor retreats into covert and warns Walton of how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge.Thus, light is balanced always by fire, the hope of new discovery by the danger of unpredictableand perhaps tragicconsequences. The theme of secrecy manifests itself in these chapters, as Victors studies draw him far and farther away from those who love and advise him. He conducts his experiments alone, following the example of the ancient alchemists, who jealously guarded their secrets, and rejecting the openness of the new sciences. Victor displays an unhealthy obsession with all of his endeavors, and the labor of creating the monster takes its toll on him. It drags him into funereal houses in search of old consistency parts and, even more important, isolates him from the world of open social institutions. Though Henrys presence makes Victor become conscious of his gradual loss of foregather with humanity, Victor is nonetheless unwilling to tell Henry anything about the monster. The theme of secrecy transforms itself, now linked to Victors shame and regret for having ever hoped to create a new life.Victors reaction to his creation initiates a dour theme that persists throughout the novelthe sense that the monster is inescapable, ever present, liable to appear at any moment and work out havoc. When Victor arrives at his apartment with Henry, he opens the door as chil dren are given over to do when they expect a shadowiness to stand in waiting for them on the other side, a seeming bound of the tension-filled German ghost stories read by Mary Shelley and her vacationing companions. As in the first three chapters, Victor repeatedly addresses Walton, his immediate audience, reminding the reader of the frame narrative and of the multiple layers of storytellers and listeners.Structuring comments such as I fear, my friend, that I shall render myself tedious by dwelling on these preliminary flock both remind the reader of the butt end audience (Walton) and help indicate the comparative importance of each passage. Shelley employs other literary devices from time to time, including apostrophe, in which the speaker addresses an breathless object, absent person, or abstract idea. Victor occasionally addresses some of the figures from his past as if they were with him on board Waltons ship. beautiful friend he exclaims, referring to Henry. How sincer ely did you love me, and endeavor to elevate my mind, until it was on a level with your own. Apostrophe was a favorite of Mary Shelleys husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, who used it often in his poetry its occurrence here dexterity reflect some degree of Percys influence on Marys writing.