Opponents of human body part replacement claim that tweaking man in this manner is a form of playing God, and the replication of bodily structures does not mean the human body is “replaceable.” The fear of playing God has been a worry for centuries; man does not want to put themselves into a position in which they have the ultimate say over life and death. In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Dr. Victor Frankenstein attempts to create a new species made from spare parts of humans, but in doing so creates a horrific monster seen as a morbid abomination (Shelley). This morbid abomination eventually becomes more and more humanlike, such as showing compassion for the drowning girl (Shelley 120) and wanting Victor to create him a companion to prevent his terrible loneliness. Although not physically accepted as being human, the …show more content…
Victor brought a living being into the world that reacted to stimuli in a human matter and was only condemned because of his horrific appearance, something that can be blamed on the technology of the time. A modern Frankenstein’s monster would quite possibly look very human, and would be challenging to discern as not being so. The monster would not necessarily be a monster anymore; it would fall in line with the human condition and at its core, be no less human than someone naturally born of a man and a woman. This concept translates to the replication of body parts. It is claimed that replacing parts of the human anatomy are unnatural and creating our own structures to make up for our faults is a form of playing God, an unforgivable crime. If at its core, the parts that are created simply make life simpler for humanity, then it is not something negative at all. One is still human when they have a pacemaker, a bionic limb, or even an entirely artificial brain. Humans have always found ways to improve life, and this replication is just one of those
Frankenstein’s creation was lost in the world with no one who could have understood him . It felt sorrowful and unfulfilled emotions as seen in this quote. Betrayal by Victor leaves a large impact the monster carried, which, turned into a monster full of hate and dissatisfaction. Victor’s creation was not a monster , but new born baby in a grown horrific body that was not to be called his own . It becomes a monster both mentally and physically, who will be feared by all . Victor not giving him the love he needed gets the monster enraged, which leads the monster to cause series of events that affects Victor unforgivably. .
Throughout Frankenstein, Victor proves to be quite an egotistical person. Victor’s actions will sometimes be selfish and not as noble as he would like others to believe. He creates the monster with a desire to obtain awe and fame and to make sure that his name will be remembered throughout history. “… a light so brilliant and wondrous… that I alone should be reserved to discover so astonishing a secret” (Shelley 37). While this discovery of Victor’s may be groundbreaking, he fails to think of the negative consequences, only thinking of himself and what this could potentially
Victor is also a villain in a Archetype sense. Victor was trying to play god, when he created the creature, and that is something he shouldn't have done, because humans can't become too powerful, even though they always try. Victor became so obsessed with creating life, that it clouded his judgment, and took up all of his time and energy. On page 66, just before Justine's trial, Victor thought to himself, "During the whole of this wretched mockery of justice I suffered living torture. It was to be whether the result of my curiosity and lawless devices would cause the death of two of my fellow beings." This line shows two things, first Victor knew that Justine, and William's death was his fault. Also, he knew that his experiments, shouldn't have been done, and were against the laws of nature and god. On page 39, Victor says, "Life and death appeared to me ideal bounds, which I should first break through, and pour a torrent of light into our dark world. A new species would bless me as its creator and source, many happy and excellent natures would owe their being to me." This quote shows how Victor wanted to be like a god. He wanted to be admired, and praised as a species creator. And this want is another reason he was the real villain of Frankenstein.
This need of power led Victor to create what he believed would be a beautiful human being. But he failed to see that combining the most beautiful human features does not necessarily create a beautiful human being. He was inspired by scientists who ...acquired new and almost limitless powers... (Shelley, Frankenstein, P. 47). Victor sought this unlimited power to the extent of taking the role of God. He not only penetrated nature, but also he assumed power of reproduction in a maniacal desire to harness these modes of reproduction in order to become acknowledged, respected, and obeyed as a father. While bringing his creation into the world he was himself alienated from society, and isolated himself from the community. Isolation and parental neglect cause viciousness within man. Because of his upbringing, Victor had no sense of empathy, and therefore could not realize the potential harm he was creating towards himself and his creation. The sole purpose of his project was an attempt to gain power, but instead of power Victor realized that a morally irresponsible scientific development could release a monster that can destroy human civilization.
The two dominant forces of our universe are man and nature, they need to be existing in a delicate equilibrium. One should not go beyond the other’s dividing line, we as humans should not meddling with nature and cross the line. In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, the point is emphasized that the balance between man and Nature must be preserved. In the book, Dr. Victor Frankenstein gives life to a creature constructed from the parts of dead humans. The creature was a hideous abomination of unnatural origin, which makes him an outcast that has no place in our world. The creature is fueled by the hatred and violence of humanity, thus both the creature and Victor
In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus, the protagonist Victor Frankenstein is portrayed as a morally dubious character. Passionate about the natural sciences and interested in it since a young age, he dedicates years to the project of creating life. Painstakingly piecing together bit by bit body parts from dead people scrounged up from labs, he succeeds in creating his creature. Once he creates it, however, he is disgusted with it, abandons it, and regrets ever creating it as it slowly goes about killing all those that he loves. Though through the entire piece he refers the creature as a ‘monster’ or a ‘demon’, Victor neglects to take responsibility for his actions or make a serious effort to rectify them.
This experiment places him out of society and in isolation for months, showing his obsession with creating something that is his own. In addition, Frankenstein knows he has the ability to create the monster where he "[emphasizes] the necessary deference to nature that empirical science lacked, [Shelley] found her portrayal of Victor's artificial human complicated by the materialism of his genesis" (Willis 2). Victor's arrogance in knowledge led him to create the monster only because he knew he could. The monster is purely experimental and Victor creates the monster because his knowledge overcame his decision between morals and achievements.
Taking God’s role into your own hands proves too much for someone to take on and Victor could not escape the negative repercussions of his actions. Victor Frankenstein is the protagonist in the 1831 novel Frankenstein. Victor unnaturally creates a monster from the bodies of the deceased. This creation would haunt and torture him for the rest of his life. Victor Frankenstein foolishly assumed that he could take the role of God into his own hands and create life from death. Victor shows the negative effects of playing God through Victor’s mental state, his negligence of the creature, and the behavior of the creature.
Oscar Wilde uses his witty criticism of Victorian immorality to argue what true morality is. In this period of time it was normal for people to lie and it was okay. He takes a satirist view on how the people of this time period generally acted. Victor Frankenstein believed he could create something beautiful out of death, but ended up creating destruction. It did not go quite as planned though, Victor was instantly horrified when he saw the monster he had created.
People today would undoubtedly say that they know who the real monster in Frankenstein would be. It is the creature that Victor Frankenstein has created, that killed everyone that he loved dearly. But, looking beyond the outer appearance of the monster, it seems evident that what he began as was not a monster. It was society’s quick assumption of a monster based on appearance, resulting in extreme isolation of the creature, that caused him to become a monster. Victor Frankenstein, an ambitious scientist who thirsts for knowledge, is actually the real monster in this horror novel by Mary Shelley, because he possesses many of the characteristics that define what a monster is.
Can science go too far when it equips man with tools to manipulate life? Some of the underlying ethical dilemmas presented in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein are similar to ones we struggle with today, such as selective abortion. Shelley’s doomed creature mirrors the devastating result of bringing an unwanted offspring into the world, then shirking responsibility for it thereafter. The practice of playing God and choosing who does and who does not “earn” life ultimately results in profound negative moral consequences.
But what are we to make of Victor Frankenstein? We know that he is in fact a human being. However, he displays several traits that lessen the level of his humanity. The first of which being his desire to make his creature in the first place. By bestowing life
In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein we are introduced early in the story to one of the main characters Victor Frankenstein and subsequently to his creation referred to as the monster. The monster comes to life after being constructed by Victor using body parts from corpses. As gruesome as this sounds initially we are soon caught up in the tale of the living monster. Victor the creator becomes immediately remorseful of his decision to bring the monstrous creation to life and abandons the borne creature. Victor describes his emotions and physical description of his creation as follows:
The first of Frankenstein’s flaws, is his foolishness. Victor is foolish in various aspects, more specifically his intention to bring life from the dead. Throughout history it is a known fact, when someone or something has died, there is no hope in bringing life back to them. It is one of the fundamental laws of life and Frankenstein is foolish to think he can surpass it. To his credit, he is indeed able to breathe life into the creature but this is also where his