appunti FRANKENSTEIN inglese, Appunti di Inglese

Scarica appunti FRANKENSTEIN inglese e più Appunti in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! FRANKENSTEIN by MARY SHELLEY Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus. Published in 1818, is the story of a scientist who tried to defeat death by giving life to a creature made up of parts of corpses. Viktor Frankenstein leaves home in Geneva to study natural philosophy and chemistry at the University of Ingolstadt in Bavaria where his thirst for knowledge leads him to experiment with electricity and the animation of dead bodies . Thanks to his research he succeeds in giving life to a creature that he immediately recognizes and repudiate as an aberration; however the creature lives and once abandoned by his creator starts roaming the country alone and confused. Rejected by people because off his ugly appearance the monster finds some solace in the woods where he learns how to speak and breath by observing a family in a cottage. This experience also makes the creature aware of his repulsive appearance and seeing in his creator’s actions the main cause of his loneliness, he seeks revenge against him . He reaches Frankenstein in Geneva where he starts to kill members of his family, to make him feel alone as he himself feels. He blackmails the scientist into giving him a female companion but Viktor refuses to create another abomination. One by one Frankenstein’s family and friends are horribly killed and the scientist sets off to hunt the monster down and finally finds him in the Arctic region of the North Pole. Viktor’s desperate chase has left him exhausted and even though he is rescued by a ship (trapped in ice and snow), he dies on board. The creature tells him goodbye then jumps out on to the floating ice, and he is carried away by the waves. The novel has a COMPLEX STRUCTURE and is told by different narrators.  It begins as an epistolary novel with a series of letters that Robert Walton, the captain of the ship that rescued Victor Frankenstein, writes to his sister in England.  Frankenstein in person offers Walton the story of his life as a cautionary tale against the evils of extreme ambition.  The narrative is concluded by the captain who describes in his letter Viktor's death, the appearance of the monster and the creature’s version of the story. While Walton’s letters frame the entire tale, Frankenstein is composed of different forms of writings, such as notes, journals, inscriptions and books. This abundance of texts and the multiplicity of the points of view may represent the authorial stratagem to convey an idea of truth. Moreover the composite structure of the novel might be seen as a mirror to the origin of the creature’s body that is in self made up of different parts. Frankenstein also testifies to Shelley’s interest in the developments of science and in particular her awareness of the experiments with electricity that were been carried out at the time. Finally, referring to the myth of PROMETHEUS , who stole the fire from the gods to give it to mankind, the subtitle, The Modern Prometheus, compares the mythical figure and the modern scientist pointing out his ambivalent role and the dangers his experiment may represent. Viktor learns from his mistakes and while talking to Walton he seems to warn the attentive linstener against the danger of extreme ambition : those who defy gods are inevitably punished. CHAPTER 5 In a gothic setting The creature comes to life in front of Frankenstein Eyes. The creator is deformed and idious that The Scientist cannot even Look at it. The horrible and repulsive sight makes The Scientist realize What a horrible mistake is has made. When The Monster gazes The Scientist sight and awkwardly try to Reach Out it seems as though Nature Itself Where About To seek Revenge Against him who has violated his lows. In this Chapter Victor Scientific Obsession appears to be A Kind of Dream: one that ends With The creature's birth. He awakens at the same time that the creature awakens. The moment the creature Eyes Open Victor Eyes Open to the horror of his Project. He is raked by a sickness of both mind and body. This reflects the unnatural character of his endeavor in which he attempted to take the place of god. The narrator sentences become abbreviated indicating He's nervous Paranoid state. It is significant that Victor Dreams of his mother and Elizabeth, as Women are naturally both capable of Creation. With their deaths the Natural Creation and earthly virtue They represent dies as well. Victor Kiss is the Kiss of death and his marriage with Elizabeth is equivalent to both a marriage with his mother and a marriage with death itself. At the moment of it Birth the creature is entirely benevolent, he affectionately reaches out to Frankenstein only to have the letter violently abandoned him. Despite his frightful appearance he is as innocent as a new born child, and in a sense this is precisely what he is. Viktor's cruel treatment of the creature stands in sharp contrast with both his parent's devotion and his friender clerval’s selfless care. He renounces his child at the moment of its birth. The reader begins to recognize the profoundly unethical character of Viktor's experiment and of Frankenstein himself. CHAPTER 24 In this passage the creature's torment at the sight of the Dead Body of his Creator questions the categories of RIGHT and WRONG while the relationship between creator and destroyer is confused. The creator account of his Own suffering sheds new light on the reason for his bloody behavior. The emphasis in the ambivalence of Frankenstein as both the creator and the Destroyer is a clear response to the doubts about the danger of the scientific enterprise which were cast from the beginning of Viktor's tale. We discover that the creature did not relish his crimes instead they were a borren(?) to him. He is racked, as the creator was, with guilt and self-hate . His last description of himself is as an abortion, a metaphor that is of the utmost significance. The creature does not feel that he has ever truly lived, like an aborted child he was unwanted by his parents and was never permitted to fully develop. He is a monster not quite human but with the capacity for humanness. This creature, that has been set to carry hell within himself, chooses to die by fire, in this way can he completely destroy the body that was so hated by so many. THEMES The first theme is creation, Frankenstein creates The Monster Out of death issue, the monster concedes of himself by reading about the creation of Adam in paradise lost, The Monster asks Frankenstein to create a mate for him. 3 different levels of narrative are actually created: 1. the letters that Walton sends to his sister telling of his time sailing to the North Pole, 2. the story that Frankenstein tells Walton embedded in the letters, 3. the story the monster tells Frankenstein of his youth embedded in Frankenstein stories. The texts can be seen as a continue exploration of creating something. One of the ways in which the text explores the creation event is by posing the questions of what responsibilities, if any, the creator bares to the created.