Frankenstein: December 2011

This essay should cover your reading up to this point. Remember to look at the feedback and advice from the first essay, as well as your writing mat.

Compare Shelley’s version of the incident with the drowning girl in Chapter 16 with the famous scene in the 1931 film version – what are your different reactions to the Creature?

Put the Creature on trial for the murder of William and the framing of Justine. Divide the class into prosecution and defence andprepare detailed cases based on evidence from the text. Are there any grounds for leniency?
In Chapter 16 list the arguments the creature gives for why he deserves a female mate. How does his attitude to women and sex differ from Victor’s? Find quotes as evidence from across the novel.

The Creature learns a lot in this section, stating ‘Of what a strange nature is knowledge! It clings to the mind, when it has once seized on it, like lichen on the rock.’ in groups research the different books which the creature reads or overhears: Ruins of Empire, The Sorrows of Werther and Plutarch’s Lives. How does the Creature react to them and why might Mary Shelley have picked these books?
Make detailed notes on the De Lacey family – how are they similar and different to the Frankenstein family?
Read aloud together the dramatic climax of Chapter 15. How does Shelley generate sympathy for the Creature?

The creature shows a great capacity to learn. Create a 6-panel comic strip across these two chapters showing the key stages of development in the Creature’s journey from baby-like helpless mute to the end of Chapter 12 when the creature is sentient and has started to develop speech. Pick a key quote to label each of the six stages.
What is the Creature’s attitude to nature in these chapters? How does it compare to Victor’s?
What might be symbolised by the fire in Chapter 11?

Make notes on how nature is presented as sublime and Victor is presented as a Romantic in these chapters. Quotes could be placed against images of the Alps using ICT.
In pairs prepare dramatic reading of the confrontation between Victor and the Creature at the end of the Chapter, condensing the dialogue down to a two minute version which covers the main arguments.
Look closely at the Creature’s speech which begins ‘How can I move thee?’ Identify and discuss the effect of different rhetorical devices used by the Creature. How does his language compare with Victor’s? (Is he more eloquent and rational than his creator?)
An extension activity could involve looking at a short passage of Paradise Lost (one of the books the creature first reads) and analysing the influence on the creature’s diction and syntax.

TIPS

Keen readers may want to explore Percy Shelley’s poem ‘Futility’ which is alluded to in Chapter 10.
http://www.virtualsalt.com/rhetoric.htm (very detailed glossary of rhetorical devices)
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~milton/reading_room/pl/note/index.shtml (online annotated paradise lost)