A chief way Mary Shelley shows the parent-child relationship in Frankenstein is first through Victor's loving parents, who bestow affection and every kindness on him, feeling he was given to them by God. They therefore believe that they owe him a tender upbringing. As he recalls it:
Much as they were attached to each other, they seemed to draw inexhaustible stores of affection from a very mine of love to bestow them upon me. My mother’s tender caresses and my father’s smile of benevolent pleasure while regarding me are my first recollections. I was their plaything and their idol, and something better—their child, the innocent and helpless creature bestowed on them by heaven, whom to bring up to good, and whose future lot it was in their hands to direct to happiness or misery, according as they fulfilled their duties towards me.
Victor goes on to remember an idyllic childhood provided by his caring and gentle parents:
No human being could have passed a happier childhood than myself. My parents were possessed by the very spirit of kindness and indulgence. We felt that they were not the tyrants to rule our lot according to their caprice, but the agents and creators of all the many delights which we enjoyed.
Victor himself becomes a "parent" in a very different way, playing God and bringing a creature to life through assembling and animating dead body parts. The dysfunctional relationship of Victor to his creation could not be more different than Victor's loving relationship with his own parents. Victor is repulsed by his "child" and rejects it when it comes to life:
Breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. Unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room. . . . A mummy again endued with animation could not be so hideous as that wretch.
When Victor next encounters his creation, he is again filled with horror and wants to kill it, knowing the creature has murdered his loved ones. The creature, however, pleads with Victor to be a loving father, telling Victor that he owes him kindness, for he is the one who gave him life:
Remember that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed. Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous.
The creature, feared and hated by everyone, recognizes that loving parenting will bring out his benevolent side and make him good. On the inside, Frankenstein's creation desires to be a caring member of society. It is simply his outward shell that is hideous. He only becomes a murderer because everyone has rejected him: the love he tried to show was met with fear, hatred, and disgust.
Nevertheless, Victor is unable to get past the creature's outer appearance and, now, the havoc the creature has brought to Victor's family through acting out his rage and grief in murder. Victor is never able to transcend his repulsion toward his "child." He is never able, ironically, to replicate the loving and caring behavior he most appreciated from his own parents.
Shelley is critiquing playing God, but she is also suggesting that having played God, Victor is responsible for the outcome of his actions and should have treated his creation as a decent parent would.
Wednesday, January 22, 2020
How is the parent-child relationship shown through the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley?
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