- Read Chapter 3. Discuss your reactions to Caroline’s death and the betrothal of Victor and Elizabeth. What impression is given of science in this chapter?
- Find out / remind yourself about key contemporary scientific influences on Mary Shelley such as Galvanist scientist Luigi Galvani, Erasmus Darwin (mentioned in the 1818 preface by Percy Shelley) and Sir Humphrey Davy.
- Look up the definition of Science Fiction in a Dictionary of Literary Terms. Discuss and make notes on how far Frankenstein could be classified as science fiction.
- Close focus on the end of chapter 4. How does Shelley create an atmosphere of horror and dread around Victor’s experiments? Note also words from the semantic field of birth (‘conceive’, ‘labour’, ‘bore’) – why might Shelley use them?
www.neh.gov/news/humanities/2002-09/itsalive.html (useful background essay on the science which influenced Mary Shelley)
No comments:
Post a Comment