Frankenstein (Dover Large Print Classics) By Mary Shelley Dover Publications (2001), 304 pages ISBN: 978-0486415628 Genre: Gothic Thriller

Reviewed by Israel Drazin - March 14, 2011

Readers will be surprised to read this nineteenth century "horror story," because the English woman Mary W. Shelley (1797-1851) did not write this book as it is shown in the many motion pictures that were made of it. She published this gothic tale, which many scholars see as the earliest version of a science fiction novel when she was only 21. Scholars think that she wrote it as an attack against the emerging industrial revolution, but perhaps, as we will see, it is more than that. The story is written in the delightful style of its time, like the mystery tale of the Englishman Wilke Collins, which was serialized in 1859-1860 and published in 1860, The Woman in White, which some scholars say is the first detective story, while others give the honor to Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849).

Mary Shelley became the wife of the famous poet Percy Shelley after writing her novel. She subtitled it The Modern Prometheus. According to some but not all Greek myths, Prometheus was a giant who created people and latter brought them fire. It appears that the Prometheus in the tale is the creator Frankenstein, who was not a giant in height, but in intellect. Most people consider Prometheus a hero, but not Shelley. She thought of fire as being bad because it caused people to kill and eat animals and gave people more implements with which to wage war and murder people. Frankenstein tells the story to a man who saved him while he is pursuing the man he created. He warns the man not to pursue scientific goals that will harm humanity.

The Shelley story is about an educated man of science who was born in Switzerland and educated in a German university, who is interested in helping people. Everyone who meets him likes him. He comes from an educated amicable family who love him, and he loves them. He searches for an answer to what is life. He wonders if he can create life, and succeeds in doing so. He creates an eight-foot man, who is never named in the novel. He is repulsed by the man he creates and thinks of him as a monster as soon as the man is alive. All people who later see his creation are also repulsed and this causes the man to hide and live alone and it accounts for the profound loneliness that the man feels. His creator becomes depressed at what he has done, rushes away from his lab, and is sick in bed for four months. He is Frankenstein. The unnamed man he created leaves.

Frankenstein returns home from Germany and discovers that someone killed his younger brother. He is convinced that the man he created did it, and pursues him to kill him. He meets his creation and is unable to harm him because the man is larger and stronger than he. His creation tells Frankenstein that he killed his brother by mistake. The boy saw him, was disgusted at seeing him, and started shouting. All he did was place his hand over the boy's mouth. He tells how he has been traveling about for more than a year, found that every human despises him, and has become very lonely. He begs Frankenstein to make him a female companion because he, like the biblical Adam, can't live alone. Frankenstein agrees.

However, when he finishes making the female he becomes frightened that two monsters, as he thinks of them, could harm mankind. So he destroys the female. The man he created is enraged and vows vengeance against Frankenstein for destroying his life.

What happens to Frankenstein and the man he created, I will leave for readers to read and enjoy. Will the creation carry out his threat? If yes, how? Which of the two will outlive the other? What will the survivor do? Is it right to call Frankenstein's creation a monster because of the way he looks? Readers may also want to ask themselves: is Mary Shelly's pessimistic approach to scientific advances justified?

Perhaps there is another interpretation of the story. It may be an examination with comments upon the creation of man. The first biblical creation Adam is unnamed, like Frankenstein's creation. Although most people think his name is Adam, the Hebrew word adam actually means "human." There is an ancient Jewish legend that when God decided to create this adam, the angels objected that people were not sufficiently good. This parallels the rejection of Frankenstein's creation by society. Like Frankenstein's creation, the adam was also lonely and wants a companion. Today, many people, like Frankenstein's creation feel alienated and lonely, and live a life without meaning. This is something to think about.

• Great Horror Stories, by Edgar Allan Poe.
  This anthology features nine of Poe's most macabre short stories.
  
  
• Frankenstein: Prodigal Son, by Dean Koontz.
  The first book in Koontz's modern-day Frankenstein series. Every city has secrets. But none as terrible as this. His name is Deucalion, a tattooed man of mysterious origin, who's traveled the centuries with a secret worse than death...