The young and brilliant Victor Frankenstein finds a way to bring inanimate flesh to life and decides to play God by creating his own living being. He becomes so obsessed with his work that he does not stop to think about whether he should be undertaking such a task and his ambition compels him to work tirelessly until his dream is achieved.
He toils to produce what he imagines will be a perfect and beautiful being, an angel if you will, but when his creation lives and breathes, he realises that he has, in fact, produced a deformed and terrifying facsimile of a man instead.
Horrified by what he has done, he abandons his creation to an unknown fate, wishing it away from him, and vows to ensure that the knowledge he possess will go with him to the grave.
The abandoned creature is left to himself to learn about the world around him and with comprehension comes the understanding that he is the only one of his kind and is for ever doomed to a life of loneliness and exile.
The creature seeks out his maker and begs him to make a female creature like himself, so he may have a companion, but Victor finds himself unable to inflict such another aberration on the world and refuses.
The creature takes his revenge upon Victor's family and friends and what follows in a terrible pursuit between creator and creation, in the icy wastes of the North, that will only end in the death of them both.
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I first read Mary Shelley's Gothic masterpiece many years go, in my teens, without knowing anything about its author. In fact, all I did know was that it was a very famous book, with a monster in it, and had been made into a number of pretty dodgy movies.
What really struck me abut my first reading of the book was that Victor Frankenstein treats his creature in a very shabby way. The creature has no choice in its creation and does not deserve to be shunned by its creator at its birth, once Victor realises he has not produced the perfect being as intended. The unfortunate creature is then left to find out the harsh realities of its existence all alone - poor thing.
I have always thought it interesting that, in the majority of cases, movies about Frankenstein and his monster do not portray the creature as a victim of its creation - rather he is shown as a violent monster from birth - even though his descent into degradation, violence and revenge only comes about from the treatment inflicted upon him, and this is pretty central to Mary Shelley's novel.
The only movie I have seen which attempted to portray the monster with any sympathy has been Kenneth Branagh's Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, in which Robert De Niro played the monster, although I wil admit that my viewing has not been exhaustive! However, any idea that Kenneth Branagh's version is actually the same story that Mary Shelley wrote (as suggested by the title) is laughable - if you have seen this one you will know exactly what I mean (gallons of amniotic fluid sloshing about, blanket stitch and head catching on fire on badly placed candle....anyone?).
I actually lost hope of watching a good adaptation after this one, but I can see that there have been a few more versions since this terrible effort, so perhaps I will revisit...
Over the years, I have read quite a bit about the fascinating life of Mary Shelley herself, but it is not until recently reading Alex Nye's excellent book Arguing With The Dead, that I really understood the influence of Mary's own experiences on the development of her novel - a novel which she amazingly produced at the astonishingly young and tender age of nineteen years old!
This seemed an excellent time to re-visit the Frankenstein book itself, in all its Gothic splendour, so I actually made some time to read it again. I have a most beautiful cloth-bound Penguin Classic version, which was an absolute pleasure to read too.
I am very glad that I gave Frankenstein another look, because there is so much in this book that I had forgotten and I am now even more amazed that Mary Shelley wrote this book at such a young age, especially given that this was in the early 19th Century.
I am still as struck as before by the situation of the poor unfortunate creature, but Alex Nye's book has also made me look at Frankenstein with new eyes, appreciating how the events in Mary's own life affected the plot of her novel. Reading it again with these thoughts in mind was a bit of a revelation. Suffice to say that I am now even more in awe of the genius of Mary Shelley and wish that more people were aware of the life of the woman behind the famous novel.
If you have never read Frankenstein I heartily recommend that you give it some attention - it certainly deserves its place among the lists of books you should read before you die. Yes, the language is archaic, but it is also glorious. For those of you that feel this may be a bit much, there are some excellent unabridged audio book adaptations - in fact I alternated between the text and an Audible audio book this time around for when those pesky chores got in the way. Incidentally, audio books are a particuarly excellent way to rediscover the classics - or indeed, to experience them for the first time.
I would also recommend that you spend some time looking into the unusual life of Mary Shelley herself, as it is pretty extraordinary, and it will definitely enhance your enjoyment of Frankenstein. Alex Nye's book would be an excellent place to start and you can see my review of Arguing With The Dead here: Arguing With The Dead by Alex Nye Review
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