Using Frankenstein's Creation: Susan Tyler Hitchcock on Frankenstein

In this excerpt from her book Frankenstein: A Cultural History, Susan Tyler Hitchcock discusses the ways in which Frankenstein’s name has been used throughout history. The Victorians—who didn’t believe that the scientific breakthroughs of human beings could really add anything to the world—saw Frankenstein as a model of “mistaken idealism” (Hitchcock 263). Cartoonists used the image of Dr. Frankenstein to satirize political decisions, they felt, were leading the social system to an upheaval. In these situations the working class became Frankenstein’s creature, ready to destroy their creator. In other situations, such as wartime political cartoons, the creature often represented the opposing force, feral and ready to destroy the underprepared British forces. Essentially, to the Victorians, Hitchcock argues, the creature represented a dangerous other who, not only, did not deserve sympathy, but who was also capable of leading the misguided ‘Frankenstein’ to ruin. It was only the “radical philosophers [of] the late 1800’s” (Hitchcock 265) who saw the monster as a positive comparison as he was the force capable of making change, despite the situations he was faced with. 

Mary Shelley 1797-1851

In the United States in 1852 the myth was being used in a way similar to how it was being used in the UK. The creation represented something not necessarily evil, but certainly misguided, that required others in the community to educate it and show it the light. The creation in this scenario being the working class or the general public, while Frankenstein represented those in the upper class who were capable of providing education. In the 1900’s, as the United States aged their first colonial war against the Philippines, Frankenstein became a symbol for the United States itself while the creature became a symbol of a giant destructive force bent on ruining the American way of life. Due to the shifting sympathies between Frankenstein and Frankenstein’s monster, by the 1900’s people were beginning to use the name Frankenstein interchangeably to describe both. This was a result of people being unfamiliar with the novel and instead only being familiar with how the myth had been used in political cartoons, articles, and other modes of opinion that utilized Shelley’s story. This confusion over the characters also occurred because there were few copies of the novel actually in circulation and it wasn’t until 1912 that the general reading population actually had access to the text.

Hitchcock provides her reader with useful information about how the Frankenstein myth has been used and abused. From people only having a vague sense of what the story is about, to characters being seen in accordance to completely different sympathies, Hitchcock argues that through societies use of the Frankenstein myth, the original meaning has been lost in a wider cultural sense. The ‘us’ versus ‘them’ mentality being applied to Frankenstein is potentially problematic when looking at the original text because it loses all sense of connection between Frankenstein and his creation. Of course it keeps the sense of responsibility, the sense that Frankenstein brought his monster into the world, that he tried to defy nature, but it loses the sense of Frankenstein as a failed parent, as a mother. Focusing purely on Frankenstein’s God complex—as the political cartoons often do—loses Victor Frankenstein as an individual. Once the personal aspect has been lost then the story becomes less about a person and more about a society. 

Susan Tyler Hitchcock

Frankenstein did not just create the creature out of some need to defy nature. Frankenstein from early on seems to be reverent nature to an extent. Watching the power of lightening, being overwhelmed by the beauty of the sublime in nature, finding comfort in the outdoors, it seems Victor cares less about overcoming nature and more about being a part of it. Nature is often referred to as a feminine force—Mother Nature—Frankenstein creating his monster wasn’t about him being a God, it was about him being a mother. The need to create and be an equal to the world he loves so much. Victor labored over his child, worked hard to create a creature that would reflect his ideal new life. Spending months away from the world, hardly eating or sleeping, until finally he had created something he had thought to be beautiful. Victor’s sin doesn’t lie in the fact that he created this being, his fault lies in the fact that he reduced him to a monster. Reducing the complexities between Frankenstein and the creature to a relationship where Frankenstein was misguided and created something beyond his understanding undermines the femininity of the story, the issues of motherhood, and the responsibility of being a parent. It is through this reduction of the relationship between Frankenstein and his monster that cultural understanding of the text becomes simplified to a problematic extent. 

For excerpts from Susan Tyler Hitchcock's book Frankenstein: A Cultural History, go here.
For a very strange 'Monster Mash' parody video that will probably disturb you on multiple levels, go here.

Discussion Questions:
1.  At various points in history, depending on the situation, the opinion on whether or Frankenstein or the creation is the hero seems to shift. Often they still represent the same things in political metaphors—Frankenstein being the political force or upper class while the creation represents the working masses—only the sympathy changes. What do you think this says about the ways in which readers were interpreting Frankenstein?

 

2. As mentioned in the blog, Frankenstein and the monster used as a metaphor are used as a way to include people under one label and create a very “us versus them” situation. What do you think is the effect of using literary figures as a means to represent entire groups?

 

3. What about the way in which the myth was reaching the public? It is unlikely everyone had read the novel themselves, instead it was often situations like these cartoons that made people aware of the myth. How do these cartoons affect people’s understanding of Frankenstein and the themes presented in the novel?