FRANKENSTEIN Letters 1 4 http www youtube comwatch

FRANKENSTEIN Letters 1 -4

• http: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=4 PLvdmif. DSk

Mary Shelley • 1797 -1851 (Note she is born at the END of the eighteenth century and comes of age at the height of the ROMANTIC Period ) • Daughter of radical intellectuals: Political philosopher William Godwin and proto-feminist philosopher Mary Wollestonecraft, who wrote the famous Vindication of the Rights of Women

• Her mother died, however, when she was only eleven days old, so she was raised by her father. • Her education was very good because of her proximity to high-level intellectual parentage, but it was not structured or formal. She read books on her own and was allowed to explore ideas to a depth that interested her.

• At age 16 she began a romantic relationship with a devotee of her father’s philosophical ideas: Percy Shelley, a married man. • She became pregnant with his child, and they faced ostracism for their relationship; the child died as a result of premature birth. • Shelley’s wife committed suicide and the two were married– a complicated start to the marriage, to say the very least.

• 1816: The Shelleys spend a famous summer in Geneva, Switzerland, during which time Mary Shelley conceives of the idea for the novel Frankenstein. • In 1822, Percy Shelley drowns when his boat sank during a sailing trip off the coast of Italy. • Mary continues to write and publish until she dies of a brain tumor at age 53.

Letter 1 • The opening story of Frankenstein (the man) is narrated in a series of four letters written by Robert Walton, a twenty-eight year-old British explorer, to his sister, Margaret Saville, in England. • Walton is following a long-held dream to become a distinguished navigator, Walton has left to embark upon an expedition to the North Pole despite Margaret’s reservations.

• Think about Walton’s goal: he wants to satisfy his obsessive curiosity by “discovering a part of the world never before visited” and by stepping on a land “never before imprinted by the foot of man. ” • He is also interested in discovering more about magnetics and astrology when he reaches the Pole. • He is also somewhat disregarding Margaret and her fears, and we never read anything from Margaret in the opening letters.

• Some warning bells: • Walton wants to conquer an area of the planet, wants to conquer nature • He is extremely dedicated to this idea • In order to accomplish his goal he is willing to cut himself off from the world • He is ignoring feminine/family influences

Letters 2 -3 • Written four months after the first letter, the second letter informs Margaret that a vessel has been hired and that Walton is now hiring sailors. • He also looks (yearns for) a companion, a welleducated friend who can correct and guide him and in whom he can confide. • Warning bell: there might be something narcissistic in that desire, since Walton want to “recognize himself” in his friend!

Letter 4 • Walton and his sailors glimpse a sledge drawn by dogs and guided by a huge man. Later that night, the ice breaks, and in the morning, a big fragment of ice carries another sledge and a nearly frozen man to the ship. Walton and his crew take him on board the ship and revive him. • (Note how Walton and his crew nurse him back to life, and how Shelley dwells on the word “animate” in these letters– some echoing and foreshadowing).

• Eventually the man decides to tell Walton his story (this is the frame story in the novel) because he recognizes in Walton the same dangerous desire that once propelled him: the destructive ambition to transgress the allowed limits of knowledge.

• Triumph over nature • Conquer an undiscovered region • Find a perfect companion (have two beings complete each other) • Satisfy his ambition

• How does Walton compare to… • Satan in Paradise Lost • Macbeth • Milton (the narrator) in Paradise Lost • Beowulf? ?

• Go through the letters and find two comments (sentences) from Walton that you think make him sound interesting and ambitious in a good way. • Then find two comments from Walton that you think could be questionable.