The modern Prometheus or Frankenstein novel review

The modern Prometheus or Frankenstein novel review

In Mary Shelley’s novel The modern Prometheus or Frankenstein, the main character Frankenstein is portrayed as a controversial character who attracts the attention of the people through his scientific creation of a monster that kills some of the critical characters in the novel. The novel, Victor, spends most of the time trying to defeat a monster that he created.  In most cases, students and critics tend to accuse Victor Frankenstein of portraying the “God Complex” in many of his actions through his personality. However, this accusation may not materialize considering Victor’s character traits. From a different dimension and close analysis of the character, the actions portrayed by Victor do not show him as trying to play God but instead portrays his weaknesses as a human being. In fact, he is portrayed as a person who is suffering from stress depression and many other human disorders that render him insane instead. It can, therefore, be argued that the monster that Victor creates portrays his character as a result of stress and depression. This essay, therefore, examines the character traits of Victor that may be used to dismiss the accusation that Victor is playing God and is instead insane.

Insanity can be defined as a state of mind or a mental disorder that occurs in the human mind, due to which a person cannot differentiate between reality and fantasy. Such people may engage in overwhelming impulsive behaviors. Such people may also infringe on societal customs and even cause danger to themselves or other people, mostly caused by injury or age. Frankenstein is a scientist who is obsessed with the desire to combine chemistry and alchemy concerning dead bodies of organisms. He has a quest to find the secret behind immortality and eternal life. Frankenstein is determined to achieve the idea of reawakening the dead or reanimation. One of the questions that one may raise is: What drives Frankenstein to desire to reawaken the dead?  The answer to this question can be associated with the death of Frankenstein’s mother, who died when Frankenstein was only seventeen. This death played a vital role in his obsession with death.

Victor’s Character traits that show he is not playing God

Victor is a depressed and a stressful man

After the death of his mother, Victor’s ambition of reawakening the death is fueled to a higher level. Due to his desire to conquer death that took away his mother, he allows the obsession and vanity to take better of him, violates the societal normas, as well as his intellectual gift to make a monster. One of the signs of depression he expresses is social isolation. Victor isolated himself from other people to pursue his ambitions. This isolation resulted in significant psychological and mental impacts on his health. Once a person isolates themselves from society, they are likely to face several psychological effects such as depression, sleep disorders, regression, as well as hallucinations.

In some cases, isolation from interactions with other humans can lead to a loss of linguistic abilities. It may be seen to behave like crazy or like wild animals, especially in children. It can, therefore, be argued that the reason why Victor’s monster does not have linguistic is as a result of the lack of interactions with other humans of the creator during the creation of the creature. Victor went for an unnatural manner with his creation, which involved the secretive animation of a mix of stolen body parts from the grave and a cocktail of strange chemicals. The grave robberies and the use of unnatural chemicals are all demonstrations of Victor’s insanity.

Arrogance and ambition

Victor displays a great deal of ambition in his quest to reanimate the dead. Ambition is human nature. However, Victor’s ambition goes beyond measures. The thought of reanimation and the effort to actualize it is not something that can be done by anyone. Not many people can dedicate their energy and time to achieve such a thing, yet Victor’s efforts took him more than two years to achieve his dreams. Despite being so ambitious, Victor becomes exceptionally proud and arrogant, a phenomenon referred by Greeks s Hubris. Victor’s arrogance leads him to indulge in actions that lead to detrimental results in his life and the lives of those close to him. For instance, the creature he creates kills his loved wife on the night of his wedding. Victor, therefore, becomes a tragic hero or a character whose actions lead to his sufferings and death.

Curiosity

It can be argued that the actions of Victor Frankenstein were not intended to play God but were as a result of his interest that he had and had always had since he was a small boy. Victor gives the readers an insight into his early life and his childhood personality. In his childhood, he had a secret that he wished to divine; that is the secret behind the laws of nature. He wanted to learn the secrets behind the heaven and earth. He had this ambition since he was a small kid, and therefore, it was not an intention to play God. Being born an ambitious child, he cannot be blamed for his actions, and therefore a claim that he is playing God cannot substantiate.

However, through his curiosity, another evidence of insanity is that instead of using his gift for a more helpful or useful endeavor, victor decides to pursue a more dangerous ambition that turns to be destructive. If he were sane, he would have used his intellectual capacity to discovering a cure for a deadly or any other disease, find some medicines, or even a machine that could be used in hospitals. Instead, he ends up creating a creature that he spends more time trying to kill. This shows that he regrets his actions and depicts him as a regressive human being and thus not playing God.

The presence of “God” in the creature can be seen clearly in the initial days of its life. The creature struggles to understand the idea of humanity and what it means to be human. Just as God requires human beings to stay and live, the creature tells Victor in their first encounter that it admires good and virtuous values. The creature explains to Victor that it admired being loved and feeling good. The creature, however, is full of different and conflicting desires. For instance, although it loved to be loved by cottagers, it did not advocate intercourse with them. This still shows the presence of Victor’s insanity in his creation. The creature creates its ideal humanity by observing the cottagers. The creature also indicates the presence of God by viewing other people as closer to God, and therefore it acquires morality y observing people.

In conclusion, Victor has been presented as a very controversial character throughout Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein. This controversy as a character has led to many people claiming that the character plays God in his actions. However, when we look closely at the works he did, we see him as a weak human being who is acting out of common problems that face other human beings. Victor is seen as a person acting out of stress and disorders rather than acting God. Through the various character traits that he displays, we can dismiss the claims that the character plays God.