Frankenstein Context Flashcards
The Enlightenment
the age of reason, a time of exploration and discovery, they were obsessed with science (late Georgians 1811-1837)
Robert Mclure
He was a British explorer who sought out the North-west passage and spent four years stuck in the Arctic in 1854.
The Romantics
They rejected a number of ideas of the Enlightenment, namely, the industrialization of land, by which nature was damaged.
Edmund Burke
He wrote “A Philosophical Enquiry (1757)” he looks at the theory of the sublime- “nature is capable of generating the strongest of emotions for those beholding it.”
Physiognomy
In the 19th century, this was a form of pseudo-science that suggests a peron’s character/personality can be determined by their outward appearance.
Lombroso
physicist during the 19th century championed the notion that “criminals could be identified by physical attributes.”
Tabula Rasa
a theory explained by John Locke in his essay concerning human understanding that everyone is shaped by their experience and is born as a blank slate.
The French Revolution
This erupted in 1789 in response to the poor working conditions and Marie Antoinette’s lavish lifestyle. The Romantics supported the movement. Shelley’s father also wrote a book called “An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice.”
The Modern Prometheus
This is another title for Frankenstein. It is a didactic message of the Greek Legend of Prometheus- to be careful of the dangers of crossing boundaries. This is because by giving fire to humans, Prometheus spends eternity suffering.
The Gothic Genre
The sublime, doppelgangers and isolated settings are tropes of the gothic.
Mary Wollstonecraft
She was a proto-feminist, having written “The Vindication on the Rights of Women.”
Mary Shelley’s grief
Shelley lost her first child, Clara, born in 1815, and she said that she dreamt of reviving her, recording her grief- “I awake and find no baby.”
Fear in Frankenstein
Shelley declared that her desire with Frankenstein was to “curdle the blood and quicken the beatings of the heart.”
