Frankenstein question

I would say Frankenstein is a classic because of its enduring quality. With so many advances in science and technology, Shelley's story reminds us that just because we are able to do a thing, doesn't mean we necessarily should. It prompts us to have better foresight, to think of the consequences of our decisions.

I disliked the book a lot, mostly because I found Victor annoying. He whined and moaned for most of the book, and I couldn't really get past that. However, I like the book for the ideas presented (man vs. god, ethics, morals), it's a good novel for analyzing and for research papers for sure.

I was shocked by the gravity and depths that this book brought me to! Why is it significant? Does it not address the human condition with painstaking accuracy. We seek meaning, thus we long to create- to overcome ourselves. Yet, when we cannot control our creation and are instrumental in the destruction of both ourselves and the creation we made to give ourselves some sense of meaning.

This book has become a very good friend to me.

I think part of the problem some folks have with the book is the engrained Karloff version of the creature we all have. Another is to remember that the novel was written in a much different time.the dialogue between creature and creator are important in understanding the arguments about the boundaries of science at the time.

Loved this book, as a psychological novel! I thought it was a brilliant and innovative look at post-partum depression: Victor instantly recoils from his creation, and spends the rest of the book oscillating between loathing and a sense of guilty responsibility for the thing he has made. A very fresh and brave recreation of a uniquely female phenomenon, as experienced by a man.

Ok 1) yall need to look up something before you post about it. 2) Mr. Malcom Mary Shelley was 19 years old 3) Mr. Eric the book wasn't "Probably written as a fictional speculation" She wrote it because her and some friends were having a party and decided that the next time they met they would have written a scary story. Shelley wanted to write the scariest story out of all of them, but was having difficulty trying to come up with one until she had a dream. This dream was of Dr. Frankenstein creating his monster. That is where she got her idea and that is how the book came into play. 4) Mr. David Mary Shelley's intent was not to show how society creates monsters, but that is what ended up happening. Her intent as stated above was to scare her friends. 5) I think this book is a classic because it's a science Fiction book that we still haven't been able to go beyond. We haven't been able to create life from dead parts like what Dr. Frankenstein did in the book. 6) The moral of the story is man should not act like god, but if he does then he should take care of the life he creates not run from it.

7)The storyline emerged from a dream. Mary, Percy, Lord Byron, and John Polidori decided to have a competition to see who could write the best horror story. After thinking for weeks about what her possible storyline could be, Shelley dreamt about a scientist who created life and was horrified by what he had made. She then wrote Frankenstein. ( was found on wiki and was told this in class. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankens... ) please visit the site I have placed in parentheses to read more.

I think it's a classic because of its look at humanity--our capacity for emotion and to do both good and evil. I think that she captures so much intensity in the relationship between Frankenstein and the creature that the story seethes with it, and the reader is drawn in deep for the experience. It's also has a resonance today that is hauntingly relevant, even nearly 200 years later.

I was pleasantly surprised. I found it a great book, a unique storyline, strong characters and exciting. I didn't think about any 'message' or 'deeper meaning'. It was just a good story.

I had to read this book for English class and surprisingly found great interest in it. I don't know how Mary Shelley came up with it all! I mean, i thought I had a wide imagination, but dang! I also found myself feeling sorry for the Creature, he deserved to be loved and maybe just even a name. I find myself telling my brother his name is 'the creature' and not Frankenstein and tell him the whole story, and i feel like a nerd, haha. Oh well though! It was a great book.

I loved the book. I was surprised that it was an epistolary novel. I was aware of the deeper questions raised by the concept but read it as a rollicking good yarn and Gothic romp.

There was only one or two minor niggling points about it. I was amazed at the speed of the the creature's learning - educating itself and conversational skills (but then on reflection it had once been human after all); and where did Victor get all the laboratory equipment from to make his creation its mate when on that remote Scottish island?

It was ages ago when I read it, so I really can't go into much detail and make any salient points like the rest of you.

But, in conclusion I regard it as the classic masterpiece it has become deservedly.

My God, how old was the young genius when she wrote it?

I enjoyed the book so much at the time of reading it that I knew that it was one which I would love to re-read. I think I shall once I've completed the novel which I am currently reading - thanks to this debate :-)

I think it's a classic because it addressed current (then and now) concerns about life and science and the human need to look into those dark places we're not supposed to look into, as determined by not only religion, ethics, morality, etc. but by our own indicidual instincts. The story is a parody of birth, and connects the godlike power of human creation which women go through (and a man cannot) to an explorer's/scientist's desire to go into those places men have not gone--and what's the true final frontier for a male than creating a human being? The same perversion of gender that makes the 'chest-burster' in Alien work underlines this ENTIRE book.

The story is appropriately subtitled "The Modern Prometheus" and Shelley did that to let us know that this, too, was a story of a human being trying to take from the gods what humans aren't allowed to have, and the inevitable punishment that follows.

I recently reread this and was pleased at how much of it holds up, but disappointed particularly by some of the very slow, talky passages that come AFTER the monster comes on the scene--just when I want it to 'get good' we get a lot of talk. (I hate to even be typing this but I could see myself 'editing' a version of this, for my own enjoyment.) But overall it just works in the memory.

I really liked this book. After reading most of the comments here, I must agree that Victor Frankenstein was a rather disappointing character. I could not understand why he would create life and then run away from it when the creature wanted answers. But I guess that laid the premise for the actions of the creature. I believe this book can be considered a classic because of the timeless ideas presented i.e. destroying what we don't understand, rejecting what does not conform, how cold humans can be etc. and this provides plenty to discuss and debate

Frankenstein was probably written as a fictional speculation on the vast creative powers of mankind gone monstrously wrong. Mary Shelley was at the vortex of the Romantic vanguard and it must have seemed inevitable to her cohort that human imagination and ingenuity would one day create life, not merely through the womb, but by the mind.

In a sense, Frankenstein stands as one of the first popular science fiction novels. However, for me, it is a cautionary parable about the inconvenient contingencies of creativity. You've made a mechanical man...now what? What does one do with one's off-spring? How does one properly integrate it in nature and society? Rousseau asked the question in "Emile." Truffaut would later explore the matter cinematically in his charming film, "The Wild Child." Does the creator owe anything to his creation and to the society on which he foists it? Does he litter his nearest wetlands with old tires and refrigerators,as happens in the New Jersey Meadowlands?

In the end, Dr. Frankenstein must take responsibility for his creation, in the same way that parents must care for that bawling, incoherent infant that cries out for them. The creator must socialize his creation.

There is a poignancy to the final scene of Frankenstein. The monster runs across the white Alpine landscape chasing his father, beseeching his love and guidance. He is after all just another child trying to figure out what why he is here.

But there is also something abject and awful about the monster running amok in the pristine mountains. He is the first Model T off the assembly line, the prototype of uncontrollable man-manufactured life let loose upon the world. He is the stain of creation, a harbinger of what has come,the Anthropocene Epoch of the earth, in which humans are the predominant force of nature.

To tell you the truth I was quite disappointed with the character of Dr. Frankenstein. He kept telling the monster to 'do his worst' and then going to pieces every time the monster did his worst.I kept thinking, "Well, what did you think was going to happen?"

I thought it was really good for a classic. I loved the mystery and suspense. I loved the movie too, but separate from the book.

Frankenstein is never accurately depicted on film. Mary Shelley's intent was to show how society creates monsters. All the creature wanted was compassion, companionship, and love. He was an outcast of society and even when he saved a child's life he was blamed. Richard Wright in Native Son pursued this theme. Each day in the poverty sticken regions of the world society creates more and more monsters, then we lock them up in prisons.

I loved the book WAY more than the movie. (the Hammer Classic I mean.) I love the perspective they give to the creature. I think this book scared the hell out of people when it was first written, not because of the appearance of the monster, but because of the actions of men. People were terrified of the advancement of technology making monsters out of men, in my theory.

The book asks a number of questions about medical ethics, religious faith and acceptance that are still relevant. While the movie adaptations generally go for the scares, there is much more to the book. In fact, I think some folks, only familiar with the movies (especially the old Universal ones) might be disappointed in the book. I remember having some difficulty the first time I read it back in high school. I've reread it since and find it fascinating, but remember liking the novel DRACULA much more.

i liked the story..........especially bcoz of its potrayal of a sensitive monster n how people's failure 2 understand him n their constant betrayal turns him in a real monster from inside n his sudden urge to avenge his creator...........