A Clichéd plot of a tragic hero story goes as follows: a hero is born with a dark background and soon notices a greater power within himself. But as the hero uses that power for good, it slowly consumes him both mentally and physically. In the end, the hero meets a dooming fate, mostly portrayed as death. “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley is a perfect example of a story which the hero is consumed by his own uncontrollable talent and power. Just as great trees are more prone to lightening, “Frankenstein” introduces a tragic hero whose power ultimately leads him to self-destruction To be a hero, skill is an essential thing. In this case, the main character Victor has the ability to create a live human being from the corpses. Driven both by his passion and obsession to contribute to the humanity, Victor ardently creates an eight-foot creature with an abnormal power called “Monster” in the story. The problem occurs when the Monster, after series of unfortunate events, become hostile to Victor and his loved ones. It ends up …show more content…
Victor’s circumstances draw sympathy from the readers as he is faced by dismal events. The story could be interpreted as the battle between the good and the evil, as it shows the protagonist chasing his nemesis. This is a wrong assumption. The story is biased toward the monster and provides unparalleled view toward it. It was Victor who made such decisions that brought the consequences to himself. Victor was the person who, in the first place, reluctantly refused to notify others about his creation. He was also the person who capriciously broke the promise and threw away his last possible salvation down the lake. Instead of being labeled as anecdotes of a poor man’s struggle, “Frankenstein” should be interpreted as a story of an extraordinary man who is fighting against the cruelest, the bitterest enemy that could ever exist,
Heroes Is Frankenstein a hero? In frankenstein, some people wonder if he is or isn't a hero. Although some people think he's not because of messing around with sketchy ideas, others believe the opposite. As said by (anonymous) “A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.”
Victor Frankenstein is a very cowardly man. He is unable to stand up to mistakes and problems that occur in his life. Instead of facing dilemmas V. Frankenstein runs away. In the beginning of chapter five after he has brought life to his creature he expresses his cowardliness “I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation… the beauty of the dream vanished… Unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room” (Shelley 42) V. Frankenstein’s inability to deal with problems is atrocious, instead of comprising a plan about his creature, he simply runs in fear unable to fix his mistakes. The consequence of not dealing with his creation V. Frankenstein faces for being a coward not only affects him, but it affects his family. When his brother,
At first glance, the monster in Frankenstein is a symbol of evil, whose only desire is to ruin lives. He has been called "A creature that wreaks havoc by destroying innocent lives often without remorse. He can be viewed as the antagonist, the element Victor must overcome to restore balance and tranquility to the world." But after the novel is looked at on different levels, one becomes aware that the creature wasn't responsible for his actions, and was just a victim of circumstance. The real villain of Frankenstein isn't the creature, but rather his creator, Victor.
Next, Frankenstein is not a hero because after creating the monster, he wants to destroy it because it has taken so much from him as revenge. Frankenstein is unable to kill his creation and dies after his life is destroyed completely. Why would Victor want to live his life trying to kill off something that he made? Because the monster he created was not what he wanted it to be. Why would he want to create life? Because he was mourning the loss of his wife-to-be. Frankenstein was overall a good man, he just didn't thoroughly think out his
As Victors brother was killed by the creature he created, the remourse victor and his father have towards his death show weakness. Men in society are conditioned to be brought up as brave and protective. While Victors father is letting the death of
The pity that the reader once felt towards this child-like creature who was abandoned upon creation, is turned to hatred and fear towards this monster who slaughters innocents. One doesn't blame the parents of a mass murderer for the crimes of their offspring simply because they gave birth to him. So why should Victor be held accountable for the treacherous deeds of his creation? The portrayal of the monster as the villain in this story attributes to the conflicting feelings of whether he is purely good or evil.
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. .
Critic Northrop Frye once commented that "Tragic heroes are so much the highest points in their human landscapes" (Frye 1). Few characters illustrate this characteristic of a tragic hero better than that of Victors Frankenstein, the protagonist of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. His story is one of a brilliant man whose revolutionary ideas brought suffering to himself, his family and friends, and his creation. Victor is an instrument as well as a victim to this suffering throughout his story.
Victor was crying because inside he was falling apart, but at the same time the world around him was perfect. The descriptions and natural beauty of the world in Frankenstein help make the theme of appearances.The theme of appearance is most evident in the novel because of the monster’s struggle with his appearance. Throughout the novel the monster is tormented for his looks, but no one takes the time to get to know him as a person. The monster is so hideous even when he does good deeds he is still looked at as evil, “This was then the reward of my benevolence! I had saved a human being from destruction, and as a recompense I now writhed under the miserable pain of a wound which shattered the flesh and bone. The feelings of kindness and gentleness which I had entertained but a few moments before gave place to hellish rage and gnashing of teeth. Inflamed by pain, I vowed eternal hatred and vengeance to all mankind. But the agony of my wound overcame me; my pulses paused, and I fainted” (Shelley 103). The monster is just walking and notices a girl and she falls in the river, the monster jumps in and saves her and a man comes up and grabs the girl then shoots the monster. The guy that shot him judged the monster by his looks and automatically looked at him as evil. This is how his good deed is repaid. The monster meant no harm he just wanted to help. From this point on in the novel the monster is seeking revenge
Dictionary of Narratology). Because if we identify the character of Victor start from his happy childhood, university environment, but since he created the human-like, the complexity of his life getting worse and worse. He tried to struggle and beated down the monster to reconcile his mistake, and went back to his hometown to safe his family but ironically he couldn’t.
What follows the creation of his monster, is a very dark, chaotic time for Victor. “It was on a dreary night of November, that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils… by the glimmer of the half extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of
Tragic hero’s can come in all shapes and sizes. They may appear as a villain in multiple works of literature. In the novel, Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, the tragic hero is the creature. He is a main character whose faults led to his overall downfall. Often, the creature is misinterpreted by people to be named Frankenstein because he is such a prominent character. While the creature is able to identify the faults in mankind it is only after extreme suffering on his own part.
Although some critics view Victor Frankenstein as a Tragic Hero because of his one essential flaw, his overambitious desire to discover what cannot be known, he is truly a Byronic Hero by definition. Although Victor is of a higher social class than the average person and his essential flaw triumphs all of his others, he has a deeply troubled past, struggles with integrity, secludes himself away from society, and is a willful individual who seeks redemption by carving out his own path. Victor’s many, deep flaws, which often induce the reader to believe that he is actually the antagonist and the Monster the hero, and ultimate redemption in telling Robert Walton his life’s story make him a Byronic Hero.
Something that most humans tend to do, is to immediately judge people based off their physical appearances. These judgments come from stereotypes that society has created and sinks into everyone's minds. But, people don’t actually know what someone is like until they actually talk to them. As always, there are good people, and there are bad people, but physical appearance don’t show the true colors of people. The Greek philosopher, Aristotle, defined the concept of a “tragic hero” as a man of noble stature who makes an error of judgement that leads to his downfall. The “error of judgement” is also known as a tragic flaw. Meaning, a tragic hero is an honorable person with a tragic flaw that causes their life to turn for the worse. In the novel, Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, the “creature” is a huge, ugly figure that everyone fears because he looks different than the everyday person so they choose to fear and hate him. The creature is the tragic hero in the novel because he originally has no intention to harm people, he helps others, and he is trying to find happiness.