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Description:
No HBO? Well then, how does a horror short story writing contest sound? And the winner is...drum roll, please...Mary Shelley. You go, girl. And that is how Frankenstein came into fruition. ...Okay, maybe HBO wasn’t part of it. But you won’t know for sure until you check out this video.
Transcript
- 00:00
Frankenstein, a la Shmoop. Science has brought us some pretty incredible
- 00:11
things...
- 00:11
...the artificial heart...
- 00:13
...cell phones...
- 00:14
...a creature made up of the sewn-together body parts of dead people...
Full Transcript
- 00:18
All right... so Victor Frankenstein's scientific work in Mary Shelley's novel, is a tad...
- 00:23
fictional.
- 00:24
But within the world Shelley creates, the good doctor pretty much represents science.
- 00:29
So, with that in mind... how exactly is science portrayed in the novel?
- 00:34
How did Shelley want us to feel about those people in lab coats, who insist on... playing
- 00:38
God? Consider that this book was written right
- 00:41
around the beginning of the Industrial Revolution...
- 00:44
...when the world was becoming obsessed with innovation and advancement.
- 00:51
Heck, even the random guy at the end of your street had a dozen patents.
- 00:57
Was Frankenstein an attack on science?
- 01:02
After all, everything that happens to poor Dr. Frankenstein... not to mention for the
- 01:06
monster himself... goes terribly wrong. Victor's brother and fiancée are murdered...
- 01:13
...the monster's bride-to-be gets... unassembled...
- 01:21
...and both men wind up sad and alone.
- 01:24
Doesn't sound like a ringing endorsement for the reanimation of dead tissue.
- 01:31
However, Shelley was clearly fascinated by science, just like her peers...
- 01:37
...could it be that she was applauding man's ability to create...
- 01:43
...but with it, issuing a stern warning that we should be careful?
- 01:49
It's not like her book condemns scientists...
- 01:52
...just the ones who are... on the irresponsible side.
- 01:56
Maybe if Victor had worked with a team of qualified professionals...
- 01:59
...and his experiments had been performed in a controlled environment...
- 02:02
...things wouldn't have gone so screwy. Although... maybe Shelley wasn't trying to
- 02:13
say anything about science at all.
- 02:15
Maybe science was just the background...
- 02:17
...an innocent bystander in this whole affair. Perhaps she was just trying to make a point
- 02:21
about human nature...
- 02:23
...about us needing to feel a sense of belonging...
- 02:25
...about love, and friendship, and betrayal, and all that good stuff.
- 02:30
And the mad scientist angle was just intended to... sell some copies...
- 02:34
What kind of rap do you think science gets in Frankenstein?
- 02:38
Is it condemned?
- 02:39
Is it condoned?
- 02:41
Or is Mary Shelley turning in her grave, wishing we were asking a different question?
- 02:47
Shmoop amongst yourselves.
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