Champlin 1

Rina Champlin

Professor Crofton

American & British Literature 1

26 January 2022

Short Writing Assignment #2

Frankenstein is a fascinating book when it comes to interpreting how theoretical gender

roles play into the book’s overall theme and how it helps shape the characters and their reactions.

Throughout the book, I have been going back and forth over my opinions of the characters and

their actions. Though much of the story seems point-blank, I feel like there is an underlying

theme or message. Mary Shelley must have been thinking this as she wrote it; otherwise, this

may have been a completely different story.

Victor Frankenstein must be one of my least favorite book characters right next to

Scarlett O’Hara. Victor is selfish, self-centered, and negligent. When you read the beginning of

the book, you sympathize and feel somewhat bad for him, but as time goes on, you learn that he

is arrogant and a malicious individual who enjoys playing God. I believe that Victor had selfish

intentions from the start. His obsession with creating life and the control that came with it is

enough to push him to create life. What was frustrating was that he didn’t think of its

consequences. Shelley, however, did an excellent job of writing Victor. She was fantastic at

making us sympathize with him before realizing who he truly is and recognizing him as the real

monster.
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I do not believe that Victor’s goal was to subvert women or if it were ever to become his

goal. If anyone was subverting women, it was the creature. Victor was so single-minded when

making his creation and having the thought of control being “God” that he didn’t have time to

step back and evaluate. I do not think Victor intended to subvert women. However, I believe that

the creature did. Although the creature comes across as highly human-like in the beginning, that

is not the case. The creature at first seems like his goal is purely not to be alone, but it soon

spirals into something else. When the creature is not given what he wants, he is willing to take

extreme measures.

The murders that the creature commits stand out a lot to me. The deaths of Willian and

Henry are more disorganized. They are messy, and one of them wasn’t even planned. Elizabeth’s

death, however, was foreshadowed and stated out loud that it was planned. The creature saw

women as objects, specifically disposable objects. In contrast, the creature saw Henry and

William as motivation and incentive. The creature longed for a mate. He saw women beneath

him that was there for his personal use. He desired a mate out of loneliness and because it was

something he could control. Victor had something beneath him, the creature, and so in the

learned behavior, the monster wanted something too.

Frankenstein’s inability to mother supports my theory of the creature taking the role of

subverting women. The creature at first tries to humanize himself to belong cohesively and try to

adapt. Still, after the behavior he observes from Victor (i.e., not fulfilling the promise, the

constant rejection, persistent degradation, etc.), he realizes how he needs some form of control.

Victor reinforces the creature’s motivation due to no stability within the creature’s “childhood”

days. Victor reveals that he did not know what he was getting himself into. Victor decided to

play God without knowing the repercussions and how the butterfly effect would come into play.
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This story shows the true duality of man and how women play their role within the

concept. Because every man has good and evil within them the always needs to be a motivator.

That is the role of the woman. The woman is the incentive for which way they are leaning and

which choice they choose.