Mary Shelleys Frankenstein Essay -- Frankenstein Essays

bloody shame Shelleys FrankensteinNineteen-year-old Mary Shelley didnt know when she began it that her ghost story would become an put up part of classic literature. Frankenstein is an admirable work simply for its captivating plot. To the thrifty reader, however, Shelleys tale offers complex insights into human experience. The reader identifies with all of the study characters and is left to heed or ignore the cautions that their situations provide. Shelley uses the bite person storey style, allusions two to Coleridges Rime of the Ancient Mariner and the legend of Prometheus, and the symbols of both light and fire to discourage against the destructive thirst for forbidden knowledge. Frankensteins tale is narrated in the uphold person in order to warn the audience at present. Relatively few novels are pen in the southward person, but those that are have the singular ability to talk at a time to their readers. Shelley went to great lengths to preserve this adm onishing quality in her narrative in order to speak to the reader as you, the book had to be written as a letter. Knowing the destinies of her characters, however, Shelley knew that neither of the principals would survive long complete to realize their mistakes. She therefore invented Capitan Walton who would, in his letters, preserve the imperative tone of the trice person that is so essential to her purpose. The book was written in the second person so that the admonishment that Dr. Frankenstein gives to Captain Walton is preserved and relayed to Shelleys readers you and me. A classic example of the warning voice inherent in the second person narrative is Coleridges Rime of the Ancient Mariner. The entire purpose of the mariners tal... ...th knowledge not informed by ethics has let loose on our 21st-century world such monsters as the nuclear bomb, whose whereabouts are unknown, and whose existence threatens our lives every minute. Shelley may not have realise a ll of the implications of her writing, but she understood human tendencies. She raised a warning that unfortunately has gone largely unheeded . Like the ancient mariner, Frankenstein addresses his readers directly and warns against the destructive fire of forbidden knowledgeknowledge not anchored by morality. Perhaps the most compelling warning in the book is attached in Frankensteins own weary voice as he prefaces his tale Learn from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge (57).Work CitedShelley, Mary. Frankenstein. Ed. Johanna M. Smith. Boston Bedford, 2000.