Bringing up the Monster. The Absence of the Mother in "Frankenstein" by Mary Shelley (PDF)

Seminar paper from the year 2016 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 1,0, University of Cologne, course: Figures of Frankenstein | Mary Shelley's Novel and its Afterlife, language: English, abstract: Since its publication in 1818, Mary Shelley's magnum opus "Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus" has given rise to a wide range of readings and interpretations. A vast majority of these focus on the genre of the Gothic horror novel and the age of Romanticism, the evolution of modern science, or the correlation between creator and creation.

Other renditions are preoccupied with more concise subject matters such as the underlying feminist structure, or the relevance of Milton's "Paradise Lost", which is frequently alluded to in the original text by Shelley. This paper serves as partial fulfilment for the completion of the seminar "Figures of Frankenstein - Mary Shelley's novel and its afterlife", and is designed to explore the failure of education in the upbringing of Frankenstein's monster, determining to which extent these shortcomings in education relate to the lack of female nurture.

The second chapter will establish the foundation for the exploration of the subject of education in Frankenstein by setting a framework of Romanticism and the Gothic novel as an originating genre of literature. Gender roles and emerging dominions in Romantic European societies will be surveyed in the subsequent chapter, thus providing a focused analysis of the absence of female attendance. The third chapter will contain research on educational responsibilities in the 19th century and provide an in-depth analysis of educational failure taking place in Frankenstein, both by male and female teachers. Herein, the central literary source is the novel by Mary Shelley in the original text of 1818, edited by Marilyn Butler (Oxford World's Classics).