Frankenstein (Enriched Classics) by Mary Shelley Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Frankenstein (Enriched Classics)
Book Review: Still Relevant, Though not for Cheap Horror Thrills
Summary: 5 Stars
This book is truly worthy of the term "classic". Mary Shelley began writing this novel at the young age of 18, yet managed to create a landmark work of fiction. The story is interwoven with ever-present social and ethical questions. What does it mean to be human? What are the consequences of using scientific technology to play the role of Creator? How far is too far when tampering with the order of the universe?
Upon my first reading of this book I was pleasantly surprised to find that the creature is very intelligent and human-like, though grotesque in appearance. It is a shame that the Frankenstein creature is universally represented in the minds of the public as an oafish and very dimwitted monster with bolts in its neck and a green pallor. The true Frankenstein is far more intriguing. I love the parts of the book that are a first person narrative by the "creature".
I highly recommend this book as it is an enjoyable piece of classic literature. If you are a fan of horror, read this for an understanding of the early roots of the genre that you so love, and that those roots actually formed intellectual arguments and contained actual substance. This book is a must read for the well rounded reader. In fact, had I graduated from high school and never read this book, I would begin to question the quality of my own education.
Book Review: The Greatest Horror Novel As A Work Of Great Literature
Summary: 5 Stars
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is a classic in the horror genre and to me it far outshines Broker's Dracula and his other novels which can sometimes appear like turn of the century pulp fiction horror. Shelley was a masterful writer who conveyed a powerful theme at the core of Frankenstein. It was the 19th century, the earlier half of the century. Shelley, the infamous poet Lord Byron and another writer were on vacation and living in a castle. They made up a bet. They were to write a work of horror and the writer whose book was the most frightening and intense and most successful was to receive honors by the group. Mary Shelley had a phantasmagorical nightmare which became the plot to Frankenstein. What a way to write a book. Since its publication, it has become an instant classic and attained popularity for years. Hollywood has made various movie versions. Kids still dress up as Frankie for Halloween. Mary Shelley wrote more than a horror piece that was meant to win a bet. Indeed it is intensely scary but its message is strong. In the 19th century it was a cautionary tale. Darwin's theory of evolution was out and man was accomodating themselves into a new, secular world full of inventions and scientific progress. Medicine became more advanced. Industry boomed with railroads, steamships, factories, and later in the 19th century- film, phonographs/record layers, telephones and electric lightbulbs. Shelley was urging people not to lose their faith in God as a creator and that to play God could spell disaster.
Doctor Frankenstein represents the modern man, the atheist, the scientist, the new creator. It rings true today since we are so advanced in our science that we are able to produce new life both bacterial in form and human cloning. Dr. Frankenstein is a naive idealist. Initially, he believes that by creating this man from the cadavers of human beings, he will create the ideal man, free of evil and a figure of hope for mankind. Perhaps Dr. Frankenstein's mistake still applies to scientists today ? Will cloning humans turn out to be a huge disaster ? Will they be more monstrous than human. But it's interesting to note just how human the monster can be beneath his monstrous exterior. He feels human emotions like other people - love, hate, anger. This way, Shelley blurs the line between humanity and monstrosity. We are ourselves monsters because we continue to engage in war, build bigger weapons and believe we are indestructible in our technilogical progress to the extent we sometimes lose our soul. Frankenstein is just that a monster because essentially he is a human missing a soul. Each phrase, each description is poetic, vivid and powerful in is imagery and symbolism. This is the only true literary horror novel that one can make essays and master thesis on. No other work can do this. Perhaps only Anne Rice novels but for the most part, horror novels seem to lack the literary themes that this book contains. If you still haven't read it, and have seen the movies, don't expect it to be the same. This is on a class of its own. But most assuredly the book is better.
Book Review: Sucks Sucks Sucks
Summary: 1 Stars
I have to add this to the top of the list of books that I have had to read but HATED! Let's see it was up there with Call of the Wild, The Odyssey, Farenheit 451, The King Must Die, True Grit, When the Legends Die, etc...I think you get my point. It is as if the teachers and district pick the worst possible books. Frankenstein has SOOO much potential to be great, however it falls abysmally short. I am sad to say that I had to read this horrible book front to back without the option of throwing it in the fireplace like I was so longing to do. We even had to read the lame(for lack of better word) letters at the beginning. Our teacher said that most teachers don't make their students read those--I guess he is not one of those teachers. Book Review: great book
Summary: 3 Stars
Book Review
A strange man is met by a ship headed through Antarctica and tells a story about making a monster and its destroying of his life. A man on the ship writes letters to his sister telling about their voyage and how they met a strange man by the name of Dr. Frankenstein. In the letters he retells Dr. Frankenstein's story of the creation of a monster that he abandons right after giving life to. Because it was so hideous nobody could meet it without running away and his creator abandoned it. With the lack of friends the monster is driven crazy and demands Dr. Frankenstein to make him a woman companion. When his request is turned down he promises a life of misery to Dr. Frankenstein and it keeps its promise. With all friends gone Dr. Frankenstein chases the fiend in hope of vengeance all the way to Antarctica were he gets on this ship. While on the ship Dr. Frankenstein dies and the fiend comes in to see his fallen creator. The fiend then repents and leaves the captain of the ship with the promise of burning himself alive. Frankenstein by Shelly is a sad, warning for the future, descriptive book worth every minute it takes to read it.
This book builds very sad images while your reading along. The short story the monster tells about secretly helping a family but when it goes to confront them is beat with a frying pan and drove away it gives you a feeling sorrow for the monster. But when you read about Dr. Frankenstein's newly wed wife screaming as the monster strangles her to death you feel hatred for the monster and sad for Dr. Frankenstein. And even more heart compelling is when the monster is standing over its creator grieving and repenting for all the horrible things he has done to Dr. Frankenstein.
During the book people are warned the possibilities of what would happen by giving life to a creature by man. It says by doing this you make a monster unable to be loved by the nicest of people. It also implies that by making a creature your just making a burden for yourself. Another factor proposed in the book that would disapprove of the making of a human is the chance of a violent natured monster set out to harm its creator and not a nice monster only there to help.
The book is very descriptive in all aspects. The formation of the fiend is very in depth and the feelings the monster goes through are numerous. The landscape and harsh conditions the monster has to endure and the way he survives is covered, and the mental state of Dr. Frankenstein is always known.
If I could I would reread the book to have the same emotions I had the first time round. It was a very sad book that carried an important message for people about the creation of a human in a descriptive manner. It was a fun experience for me and I am sure it will be for you also.
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Book Review: Had I the right to inflict this curse upon everlasting generations?
Summary: 5 Stars
This is an immortal tale about hybris, love and hate, justice, racism and the responsibilities of scientists.
Its fundamental question is: 'Had I the right to inflict this curse upon everlasting generations? ... future ages might curse me as their pest, whose selfishness had not hesitated to buy its own peace at the price, perhaps, of the existence of the whole human race.'
The 'unhallowed arts' of Frankenstein produce a 'filthy mass that moved and talked', but it is nevertheless a human being with normal human aspirations: 'Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. I was benevolent and good, misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous.'
But, Frankenstein is a 'painted bird': 'Am I to be thought the only criminal, when all human kind sinned against me? I, the miserable and the abandoned, am an abortion, to be spurned at, and kicked, and trampled on.'
His reaction is : 'If I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear.'
Mary Shelley's vision of mankind is far from rosy: 'I heard of the division of property, of immense wealth and squalid poverty.' 'A man was considered, except in very rare circumstances, as a vagabond and a slave, doomed to waste his powers for the profits of the chosen few.' 'Was man yet so vicious and base? I could not conceive how one man could go forth to murder his fellow.'
Her world is one of resentment, racism and jealousy: 'religion and wealth had been the cause of his condemnation.'
But, 'how strange is that clinging love we have of life, even on the excess of misery.'
Frankenstein is the scion of the evil principle, the invention of a man-scientist and a 'painted bird', who is therefore not accepted by the rest of the human race. His reaction is revenge.
This is a great text by an 18 year old.
As Oscar Wilde said in 'The Critic as Artist': 'For when a work is finished it has as it were, an independent life of its own, and may deliver a message far other than that which was put into its lips to say'.
Some texts become even more important and luminous with time, like this masterpiece.
A must read.