Frankenstein as a Gothic Scientific Fiction

              Frankenstein as a Gothic 

Scientific Fiction

Name:  Pritiba B. Gohil

Roll No. :  21

Course No. 5: The Romantic Literature

Topic: Frankenstein as a Gothic Scientific Fiction.

M.A. English Semester - 2

Batch: 2014 - 2016

Department of English

Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University

Submitted  to:

Heenaba Zala

Department of English

Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University

INTRODUCTION:- 

As we all know that  Frankenstein is a novel written by English author Mary Shelley about eccentric scientist Victor Frankenstein, who creates a grotesque but sentient creature in an unorthodox scientific experiment. Shelley started writing the story when she was eighteen, and the novel was published when she was twenty. The first edition was published anonymously in London in 1818. Shelley's name appears on the second edition, published in France in 1823.

“Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change.” 

― Mary Shelley, Frankenstein

Frankenstein is infused with elements of the Gothic novel  and the Romantic movement and is also considered to be one of the earliest examples of science fiction. Now after this we have question that what is  Gothic novel . So here is the answer of this question.

What is Gothic science FICTION:-

Gothic science fiction is a subgenre of science fiction  that, as the name suggests, also involves gothic conventions. The connection between Gothic and Science Fiction is far from being a new discovery. There is however something to be said about returning to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to fully appreciate the complexity of this genesis, this beginning of a genre loosely termed as Gothic Science Fiction. As an established Gothic text Frankenstein is also considered by many as the beginning Science Fiction. Mary Shelley, in Frankenstein redefines and re-establishes, conflates and mutates aspects and expectations of Romanticism as well as the Gothic to create her “hideous progeny”, in much the same way as Victor does in the creation of his monster; through piecing together fragmented and often strangely opposing elements, from the enlightened knowledge of his science and pieces of dead flesh from the graveyard.

Victor Frankenstein continually wants to transcend boundaries and limitation. This is a Romantic drive towards transcendence or “enlightenment” which due to the Gothic nature of Frankenstein is translated as being a transgression. In undermining Victor’s need for transcending human limitations, Mary Shelley continues to highlight the boundaries that Victor can in fact not break through. He is continually confined to his “solitary chamber” and is obsessed with overcoming the boundary between life and death. Victor becomes an archetypal transgressor by perceiving life and death

“as ideal bounds, which I should first break” (p.36).

We can say that this all are genre of this novel like Gothic Fiction, Tragedy or Science Fiction. Lets elaborate this terms in very deeply. 

(1)    Gothic Fiction :-

Dark and stormy night? Horrid monster? Attempt to excite sublime feelings like terror and awe?  This all are some things related with Gothic Literature.

Definition: -

As much as we would love to talk about gloomy '80s bands like Bauhaus and The Cure, the gothic is actually a literary genre that influence like this.

Some examples :-

• Horace Walpole's Castle of Otranto was published in 1765 and is sometimes cited as one of the first gothic novels.

• Anne Radcliffe's The Mysteries of Udolpho was published in 1794. 

• Jane Austen parodies the gothic genre in her 1818 novel Northanger Abbey.

What is gothic literature? First and foremost, it's a genre known for its spookiness. Think bats, cobwebbed castles, and nasty old tyrants holding good folks captive in towers. In other words, there's a lot of paranormal activity going down.

Gothic authors are also often really into concepts like the sublime. In literature, the term refers to a kind of out of this world experience that someone has in nature. And in gothic literature, it's closely linked with, well, sheer terror—all because the sublime is so awe-inspiring. Variations on the gothic genre include the Southern gothic, which is kind of like the regular gothic, but set in the American South.

Then there's Gothic-Romanticism, which is technically a subgenre of Romanticism, but we're thinking it goes both ways. Romanticism was a movement that rebelled against the stuffy old Enlightenment by valuing emotions over reason. What emotions does Gothic-Romanticism value over reason? Usually horror, dread, and sheer terror.

(2)    Tragedy :- In very short Everyone dies at the end. Frankenstein shows us a great (or, well, pretty good) guy brought low by his own pride, or hubris. so we can say that  definitely this is a tragedy.

(3)    Science Fiction :- This is where it gets interesting: Frankenstein is often considered the first work of science fiction. What's key is that the science isn't just window-dressing: the whole point of the novel is to explore heavy questions about What It All Means, where "It" can be loosely translated as "science, fate, free will, nature, and humanity."

(4)    Fiction:-  Frankenstein’s fictions peter Haining, editor of the indispensable Frankenstein omnibus has called Frankenstein “the single greatest horror story novel ever written and the most widely influential in its genre”. The first story about a female monster is French author Villiers de Lisle Adam’s “the future Eve”, an 188 novelette not translated into English until fifty years later, in which an American inventor modes on Thomas Edison makes an artificial woman for his friend. Jack London’s early story, “A thousand Deaths” (189), is a gruesome science fiction tale of a scientist who stays at sea on his laboratory ship, repeatedly killing then reviving his son, until the son has enough and kills his father.

What are some characteristics of gothic science fiction?

Gothic literature has certain qualities the influence the story or paper.  It usually has a mystery involved, secrets, curses, murder, and the illusion of ghosts or the supernatural.  The setting often entails components such as castles, mansions, secluded streets, fog, chilly air, and remote areas.  Writers from the Victorian era began to include the dynamic of psychologically confused or torn characters.  Romantic undertones are also present.

In the book "Frankenstein," we have a doctor who is driven by his own desire to succeed at creating the perfect man, free from disease or ill health.  Victor has a love interest that he is engaged to be married.  They love each other but the "secret" threatens to destroy his relationship.  The creature is an emotionally torn being and so is Victor Frankenstein.

The setting places us in a lab and the streets and settings all correlate to make the story dismal and dark.  Once the secret is revealed the events that unfold create a conflict in relationships and death of Victor's wife.

Victor is also representative of the gothic hero.  He is brooding and his vision is of a man torn between his need to create the perfect being, having made a horrid vile creature, and his life ending as a consequence of his choice.

Gothic literature is really the beginning of the horror genre, but it focuses a lot on landscapes. There are a lot of dark places and locations in Gothic novels, think about castle ruins. There is also typically a pinnacle evil; a phantom, monster, or evil person. Second in the science fiction genre. Some traits would be fictitious events based in science occurring, again possibly ghosts (phantoms), monsters, or crazy scientists.

In regards to Frankenstein, there is the strong science element, a monster, death of the innocent, and wild, yet ruined landscapes.

As the name suggests, this is a hybrid of the best/worst of both genres. When I checked this out on the Internet, several sites came up. One common denominator is the grafting on of such literary prototypes as Frankenstein's monster and vampires based on the model of Stoker's Dracula. However more upbeat, modern scenarios appear. Some favourite "problems" deal with mismanaged genetic engineering (particularly cloning), space colonies, computers (particularly artificial intelligence), and ecology.

As a whole, most science fiction stories are cautionary tales; that is to say that they convey a warning about future consequences of technology and scientific "advancement" gone awry. Because of their "gloom and doom" message, science fiction stories are inherently "gothic" anyway; just pour in a little more gore, one of the 'modern problems' mentioned above, a pinch of radioactive waste, and blend.

Frankenstein as a Gothic Fiction:-

Now let’s take about Frankenstein as a Gothic Fiction. The term ‘Gothic’ is highly amorphous and open to diverse interpretations; it is suggestive of an uncanny atmosphere of wilderness gloom and horror based on the supernatural. The weird and eerie atmosphere of the Gothic fiction was derived from the Gothic architecture: castles, cathedrals, forts and monasteries with labyrinths of dark corridors, cellars and tunnels which evoked the feelings of horror, wildness, suspense and gloom. The haunted castles with secret passages, vaults and dark galleries full of terrible howling wind, which caused thunderous noises of a mysterious nature aroused fear and terror in the minds of the readers as if they were trapped within a graveyard. Belief in the supernatural, the magic and in the existence of spirits and ghosts have always haunted man. In the Introduction to the 1831 edition of the novel, Mary Shelley informs the readers that the novel emerged from the notorious ‘ghost story’ contest in which Mary, Percy Shelley, Lord Byron and Dr Polidori were involved. It was fine weather at the Villa Diodati in Switzerland. It was decided that each one of them should write a ghost story for their mutual amusement. However, she also tells us that it emerged from a long discussion between Percy Shelley and Lord Byron concerning the ‘Principle of life’ which sharpened and gave rise to the mental vision. The scientific experiments made by Darwin on the one hand and by Galvani and Giovanni Adini on the other considerably influenced Mary Shelley. Thus, she had an enormous fund of written materials, including her father’s epoch-making CALEB WILLIAMS which conceives of a Utopia where the presence of women is ruled out and that child would be produced by what he calls ‘social engineering’ and not by sexual intercourse.

“Beware; for I am fearless, and therefore powerful.”
― Mary Shelley, Frankenstein.

Victor Frankenstein is not the only character to strive against and challenge traditional boundaries, however. The Creature that Victor makes is engaged in his own struggle to experience sublime connection with his environment and with other living beings. The Creature makes multiple attempts to connect with other beings, especially before he realizes that he is different from them. Almost all of his efforts are in vain, however. The Creature lacks speech and obvious physical characteristics that would make him more recognizable to human beings. The pain of his multiple rejections leads him to believe that, as explained in one of the important quotes from 
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley :-

“[T]he human senses are insurmountable barriers to our union…. [I]f I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear….” (Shelley 173).

This decision signals the decline of all of the major characters, and foreshadows the novel’s terrible denouement. In a twist on the typical romantic text, which, if it does not end happily, ends on a thoughtful, meditative note, this novel ends with the characters having effected no significant resolution amongst themselves. They have all realized the impossibility of striving against the roles to which they have been assigned in life, and they do not seem to be able to identify any other options for themselves. While this novel is exemplary of the romantic period in that it uses a highly stylized and dramatized frame, more concerned with the realms of the fantastic than those of the real, the fantastic story becomes an allegory for very real emotions and struggles with which romantic writers were deeply preoccupied.

There are many passages which evoke the feelings of fear and terror. Victor collecting bones in the charnel houses and graves and working in his filthy workshop totally cut off from the rest of the habitation. He himself feels horror struck when he looks at his own creation – the yellow skin which scarcely covered the muscles and arteries, watery eyes almost of the same colour as the dun white sockets, shrivelled complexion and black-lips. The gigantic figure he creates horrifies the creator and he rushes out, tries to get sleep finds the monster looking at him; the very sight shocks him and he rushes out to spend the entire night walking about in the courtyard down below. There is then the monster’s attempt to coax the child William to befriend him and strangle him. Though the narratives come from the mouth of the Monster to Victor and Victor to Walton, the effect is truly uncanny and eerie. The same feelings are evoked by the long chase by Victor all through the wilds, hazardous terrains, then getting a sledge, exchanging it with another to pursue the monster as he follows the words carved and engraved on the bark of the trees and on stones, and finally, getting trapped in  the ice. All such descriptions are suggestive of the Gothic.

Frankenstein is by no means the first Gothic novel. Instead, this novel is a compilation of Romantic and Gothic elements combined into a singular work with an unforgettable story. The Gothic novel is unique because by the time Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein, several novels had appeared using Gothic themes, but the genre had only been around since 1754.

The first Gothic horror novel was The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole, published in 1754. Perhaps the last type of novel in this mode was Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights, published in 1847. In between 1754 and 1847, several other novels appeared using the Gothic horror story as a central story telling device, The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) and The Italian (1794) by Ann Radcliffe, The Monk (1796) by Matthew G. Lewis, and Melmouth the Wanderer (1820) by Charles Maturin.

Gothic novels focus on the mysterious and supernatural. In Frankenstein, Shelley uses rather mysterious circumstances to have Victor Frankenstein create the monster: the cloudy circumstances under which Victor gathers body parts for his experiments and the use of little known modern technologies for unnatural purposes. Shelley employs the supernatural elements of raising the dead and macabre research into unexplored fields of science unknown by most readers. She also causes us to question our views on Victor's use of the dead for scientific experimentation. Upon hearing the story for the first time, Lord Byron is said to have run screaming from the room, so the desired effect was achieved by Mary Shelley.

Gothic novels also take place in gloomy places like old buildings (particularly castles or rooms with secret passageways), dungeons, or towers that serve as a backdrop for the mysterious circumstances. A familiar type of Gothic story is, of course, the ghost story. Also, faraway places that seem mysterious to the readers function as part of the Gothic novel's setting. Frankenstein is set in continental Europe, specifically Switzerland and Germany, where many of Shelley's readers had not been. Further, the incorporation of the chase scenes through the Arctic regions takes us even further from England into regions unexplored by most readers. Likewise, Dracula is set in Transylvania, a region in Romania near the Hungarian border. Victor's laboratory is the perfect place to create a new type of human being. Laboratories and scientific experiments were not known to the average reader, thus this was an added element of mystery and gloom.

Just the thought of raising the dead is gruesome enough. Shelley takes full advantage of this literary device to enhance the strange feelings that Frankenstein generates in its readers. The thought of raising the dead would have made the average reader wince in disbelief and terror. Imagining Victor wandering the streets of Ingolstadt or the Orkney Islands after dark on a search for body parts adds to the sense of revulsion purposefully designed to evoke from the reader a feeling of dread for the characters involved in the story.

In the Gothic novel, the characters seem to bridge the mortal world and the supernatural world. Dracula lives as both a normal person and as the undead, moving easily between both worlds to accomplish his aims. Likewise, the Frankenstein monster seems to have some sort of communication between himself and his creator, because the monster appears wherever Victor goes. The monster also moves with amazing superhuman speed with Victor matching him in the chase towards the North Pole. Thus, Mary Shelley combines several ingredients to create a memorable novel in the Gothic tradition.

Gothic novels called Gothic because of typical setting in Gothic castles—and the castles called Gothic due to their German origins appeared in the second half of the eighteenth century, and they have such titles as The Castle of Otranto (1765) and The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794). It is now easy to see them as a symptom of the change that was sweeping over western civilization. Their heroes are dark, tormented souls, who have committed unspeakable sins, men cut off from the stable values that underlay the Age of Reason. They act out their dramas in dark, mysterious castles that have nothing of the reasonable balance that sane architecture is supposed to have. These castles have secret rooms, hidden passages, lost corridors. The exterior world is not the balanced nature of Alexander Pope—it is nature we see in storms, mountains, moors, forests—a nature that is beyond our reason. In these novels we sense that some great secret is about to be revealed some apocalyptic change about to sweep all before it.

In some ways Gothic horror novels are science fiction in reverse. They focus on the dying of the old without revealing the vision of the future. But the major conventions of SF grow out of these novels, and Gothic traits mark SF to this day. In SF we see Gothic character, Gothic setting, and Gothic plot. Gothic character we see in the tormented heroes of SF, Gothic setting we see in the vast expanses of time and space, and Gothic plot we see in the promise of apocalyptic change.

CONCLUSION:-

As we discus above that this novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley is a Gothic Scientific Fiction novel in genre. And we prove this thing with the help of this all the things. What makes Frankenstein endure as an exemplary Gothic Scientific Fiction is the fact that it takes on these characteristics and concerns that are so central to romantic writing and challenges the common use and treatment of them.

 By appropriating elements of the romantic and combining them with characteristics that are clearly gothic, Mary Shelley expanded the possibilities of both genres. She permits length self-examination without wallowing and self-preoccupation, and she allows characters to express deep desires, even if those desires are impossible to achieve. To her credit, she avoids over-philosophizing or offering her own interpretation for the reader to adopt.

Instead, she creates a novel that is far more complex and sophisticated than the work of many of her contemporaries by provoking philosophical, ethical and moral questions that the reader is left to answer.

“No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks.”
― Mary Shelley

( Words :- 3,214 )