Shelley's Frankenstein Emotions and Individuality

Driven by his emotions and passion towards knowledge, Dr. Frankenstein disobeys the ordinary rationalistic way of thinking that was familiar to every one of his contemporaries. So, with great curiosity, he devotes his life for science, and then he puts the knowledge he learned into action, to the extent that he creates a living creature out of the parts of dead bodies. By doing so, he calls himself a creator: “except I, the creator…” (p.63) or a god-like man, which embodies the sense of one’s appreciation of his own existence. This appreciation shown through the character of Frankenstein, crystallizes the concept of individualism, one of the main features of the Romantic period.

Mary Shelley herself is an artist driven by strong emotions and feelings, not only feelings of love towards her husband, but also deep emotions of sorrow and sufferings for her personal life. On looking closely to the psychological study of the novel, we find that Shelley has successfully physicalized her strong feelings and deep insecurities of her tough life into the character of the monster, to prove the existence of a never-ending questionable paradox of what can be judged as right or wrong through certain social standards:

“Let your compassion be moved, and do not disdain me. Listen to my tale; when you have heard that, abandon or commiserateme, as you shall judge that I deserve. But hear me. The guilty are allowed, by human laws, bloody as they are, to speak in their own defence before they are condemned. Listen to me, Frankenstein. Youaccuse me of murder, and yet you would, with a satisfied conscience, destroy your own creature. Oh, praise the eternal justice of man!...” – (p.78)

The character of the monster allows her to be a creator of a great piece of art that is to last for as long as the question of creation remains mysteriously unsolved. A thing that makes her forever appreciated as an individual, firstly by herself, and secondly by her readers or any given society, is the fascination by the true deep meaning of the novel.

Also, the novel is full of inbound and outbound active feelings between the reader and the characters themselves, which is a great feature manifested in the novel that reflects its contribution to Romanticism. Taking a role in the novel as Walton’s sister reading the letters, we find that the reader faces a conflict of deep raised intuitions, shifting the reader’s response from reasonable judgments to emotional sympathy. These feelings push the reader himself to interact instantaneously and spontaneously with the characters.

The novel agitates a great amount of deep emotions, which engulf the rational thinking of mere reason. It allows the reader to give more space to understand the flaw of his own instincts and intuitions, instead of giving rational judgments based on the rules of a certain social standards. Also, it creates a free psychological world, where the reader’s feelings are to be more trusted and appreciated by himself. Hence, the novel is considered as one of the great works in Romantic literature, for affirming individualism on one hand, and showing more interest in emotions over rationality on the other; which are two main features of this literary movement.