Frankenstein, also known as The Modern Prometheus, written by Mary Shelley, is a Gothic novel narrating the story of scientist Victor Frankenstein creating a destructive monster. The novel starts with four letters written by a sea captain named Robert Walton to his sister. Trapped in the North pole, Walton encounters a wretched man named Victor Frankenstein, traveling on a sledge. After carrying Victor aboard Walton’s ship and relieving his wounded body, Victor expounds his tale of his failing creation of a monster. Victor was born in a wealthy Genevan family, with educated parents as well as brotherly siblings. Gradually, Victor develops his fervent passion of understanding the inner spirits of natural philosophy. At the age of 17, he boarded the university of Ingolstadt, where he met two perspicacious professors, teaching him natural science. Inside his laboratory, he starts creating his own mysterious monster. The monster appeared to be both ugly and revengeful of his master’s abandonment. The monster learns human languages, lifestyles, and actions, but also performs numerous murder of innocent cottagers. The monster then escapes to the North Pole, with Victor chasing him, ending up slipping on ice.
The story of Frankenstein resembles the God of fire Prometheus, a supreme trickster known to be a forethinker. Both Prometheus and Frankenstein undertook the role of a creator (Prometheus creating morals and Frankenstein creating the monster) who intends to do good for humanity. According to Greek mythology, Prometheus steals fire for the benefit of people’s living. However, Prometheus was later punished by Zeus for his act of stealing, where he’s forced to eat his own liver every day and have it regrowned. Mary Shelley compares Prometheus to Frankenstein by foreshadowing the relationship between power and suffering. In the novel, Victor had the capability of being God toward his creature, but later on, he struggles to resist the monster’s murder toward the people and its disturbance toward himself. The theme of the connection between God’s creation and punishment is revealed. Despite the success of both of their creations, they are deeply affected by the damage that the creatures caused. Moreover, till the end, the creatures are uncontrollable, therefore they endure heavier consequences. Just like Prometheus regrowing his liver, Frankenstein experiences similar rebirth in the North Pole, where he almost lost his life. This also shows the prominent symbol of life and death.
God exists as a spiritual holy being capable of changing any situation people may be facing. The inveterate power of God kind of instigates admiration of common folks, while some individuals equipped with strengthful abilities might think of playing the role as “God”. However, playing the role of God is impossible to succeed, because they would inevitably fail in these categories in which only the perfect God masters: responsibility, good virtues, and the power to control power. God being a creator of humankind shows responsibility in caring humans when he sends his own son Jesus for personal sacrifice. Oppositely, in the book of Frankenstein, Victor creates a bad creature and lacks the responsibility and caringness to purify it to a point where the creature is incapable of damaging other things. Lacking the virtues of God of being self-less, caring, and responsible, Victor is therefore not the role of God. Whenever we experience an ominous start rather than a propitious one, the consequence might be unimaginable and devastating, leading to significant destruction. The monster created by Victor eventually starts manipulating the world, instead of being manipulated by Victor himself. No one could play the role of god no matter how strong our abilities are.
Creating the imperfect robots is equivalent to creating monsters. Usually, the intention of creation always yearns for a positive result. However, imperfect creations may cause pessimistic consequences. Till this point where the monster starts to activate itself into destroying the environment, the creator becomes evil. No one would blame only the created monster, but also the creationist. Mary Shelly describes Victor Frankenstein’s monster as ugly-looking, disgusting, and designed to be loathsome and uncared by Victor himself. What’s the purpose of creating an illegal, mysterious, and ugly human-like creature if you simply abandon it freely in the rest of the innocent world? The monster created by Victor committed multiple crimes by killing innocent lives of the cottagers. If Victor didn’t stop and chase him away in the end, he might harm more individuals, and eventually attack Victor. The monster’s hatred toward its imperfect creator suggests Victor's irresponsibility. Another error made by Victor is the immense size of his monster. The larger, the more devastating the monster would be; in summary, Victor creates a big, useless, ugly piece of waste that brings monstrous destruction toward the morals.
Mary Shelley’s gothic novel Frankenstein incorporates newfangled themes bursting in the nineteenth century, both scientific and religious based. The relationship between Frankenstein and the Greek myth of Prometheus is foreshadowed in Shelley’s novel. Mary Shelley clarifies the blurring connection between God and imperfect creators, as well as the concepts of life and death. The novel mainly talks about how an ugly giant monster takes revenge on his own careless master by performing devastating destruction of human civilization. This gives emphasis on Victor’s own responsibility for his creation, and so far, we can apparently view him as a careless, ashamed scientist who fails to improve the field of natural philosophy by creating such a horrific creature into mankind.
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