Analysis of Frankenstein and Romantic Poetry

Posted on Feb 4, 2026 in English Language and Literature

The Narrative Structure of Frankenstein

The novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley uses a frame story structure, where three different stories are connected:

  1. Robert Walton’s letters begin and end the novel, creating a frame around the main story. Walton is a ship captain writing to his sister about his journey to the Arctic.
  2. Victor Frankenstein’s story appears when he meets Walton and tells him about his life, his ambition, and the creation of the creature.
  3. The creature’s story is heard within Victor’s narrative, where he shares his experiences, emotions, and how he changes throughout the novel.

This structure connects the three characters. Both Frankenstein and Walton are very ambitious and driven by their goals, while Walton and the creature share feelings of isolation. The novel is also circular because it starts and ends with Walton’s letters, bringing the story back to the beginning.

Key Symbols in the Novel

  • White color: Represents knowledge.
  • Water: Represents knowledge and tranquility. When water becomes ice, it becomes a representation of danger.
  • Light: Represents knowledge, Enlightenment, and discoveries.
  • Fire: Represents dangerous knowledge.
  • Lightning: Represents nature’s power and electricity, which in the novel replaces the Prometheus fire as a creative but also destructive power.
  • Nature: Represents tranquility.

Jungian Archetypes and Character Analysis

Carl Jung stated that all humans have four archetypes in their psyche:

  1. The Self: The image you have of yourself (represented by Victor).
  2. The Shadow: The deeper aspect of yourself that you usually hide (represented by the creature).
  3. The Anima/Animus: The feminine and masculine sides of our psyche.
  4. The Persona: The mask you wear in social situations (a form of behaving).

Character Roles

In literature, we often see twelve character archetypes. In this novel:

  • Walton (The Explorer): He shows us the morality of the story, seeing everything from the outside. He has a solitary nature, is self-educated, and is obsessed with his quest.
  • Victor (The Creator): The “Mad Scientist” who cannot stop seeking knowledge, fascinated with the secret of life. He undergoes an evolution from a curious, innocent youth to an obsessed, arrogant scientist moved by revenge.
  • The Creature: He does not fit perfectly into one archetype. He evolves from having natural curiosity and being benevolent to wanting revenge against humankind and his creator. He is very strong but has the mind of a newborn. Abandoned and confused, he tries to integrate but is rejected. He is the shadow of Victor, representing his deeper, darker aspects.

Literary Style and Epistolary Form

Frankenstein is an epistolary novel because it includes letters from the beginning; it is also part of travel literature, as the three characters travel across the world. The letters make the text more believable. Historically, women often wrote epistolary novels because diaries and letters were the genres socially reserved for them. The text overflows with letters, notes, journals, and references to other books.

The language is very lyrical. Shelley uses long, complex sentences to discuss the complexity of situations, while using a simpler style when describing horrible events. Antithesis is also prevalent, using binary oppositions to indicate contrast: passion vs. reason, natural vs. unnatural, beautiful vs. ugly, life vs. death, and good vs. bad.

Major Themes: Monstrosity and Bioethics

Monstrosity

The creature is rejected by society because he is made of dead bodies and is physically ugly. His monstrosity stems from his appearance and the darkness of his creation (stolen body parts and secrecy). Victor himself can be seen as a monster due to his alienation, ambition, and dangerous knowledge. Both are the protagonists of the novel.

The Bildungsroman

The novel is a Bildungsroman (a German word for a novel of development or education). The reader sees the characters grow from childhood to maturity. The journey involves a reconciliation between the desire for self-fulfillment and the aim to adapt to social reality, touching on moral development and identity.

Bioethics and Dangerous Knowledge

The pursuit of knowledge is at the heart of the novel. Victor wants to go beyond human limits to know the secrets of life, which proves dangerous. This reflects the 18th and 19th-century European fascination with scientific experimentation, such as galvanism (using electricity to stimulate muscle), body snatching, vivisection, and Polar explorations.

Sublime Nature and the Role of Women

The Sublime

Romanticism viewed the sublime in nature as a source of emotional experience. Victor goes to the mountains to heighten his spirits, and the creature feels better when spring arrives. The Arctic is presented as a dangerous place where their pursuit ends.

Passive Role of Women

Despite being the daughter of an important feminist, Mary Shelley did not include strong female characters in Frankenstein. They are often suffering figures who die, such as Elizabeth, Victor’s mother, and Justine. The creature is created without female intervention, and a “figurative abortion” occurs when Victor destroys the female creature he was building.

Analysis of Key Quotes

  • Q1 (The Companion): The creature asks for a companion to end his isolation, showing he has human-like emotions and a need for understanding.
  • Q2 (Passion): Victor describes his “supernatural enthusiasm” for his studies, showing how his obsession blinded him to the risks of his work.
  • Q3 (The Archangel): Victor compares himself to a fallen angel who wanted God’s power but was punished, expressing his deep regret.
  • Q4 (Rejection): The creature believes people hate him because he is miserable and ugly, highlighting his social alienation.
  • Q5 (Satan): Comparing himself to Satan from Paradise Lost, the creature expresses envy toward the happiness of others.
  • Q6 (Enemies): Victor views the creature as an enemy, refusing to take responsibility for his creation.
  • Q7 (Ambition): Victor dreams of a new species blessing him as a creator, revealing his pride and lack of foresight.
  • Q8 (The Arctic): Walton imagines the Arctic as a place of beauty and wonder, reflecting the Romantic love for discovery.
  • Q9 (The Alpine): Victor seeks peace in the mountains, viewing his “human sorrows” as small compared to the eternal power of nature.
  • Q10 (Responsibility): The creature asks why he was created without permission, raising questions about the moral consequences of creating life.

Thomas Gray: Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard

Completed in 1750, this poem merges the Augustan Age with early Romanticism. It is a meditation on mortality, legacy, and the human condition. The speaker reflects on the graves of ordinary people, treating death as an equalizer.

Structure and Literary Devices

  • Form: 32 heroic quatrains (128 lines) in iambic pentameter with an ABAB rhyme scheme.
  • Tone: Dramatic, melancholic, and somber.
  • Devices: Gray uses alliteration, allusions (Hampden, Milton, Cromwell), anaphora, metaphors, and personification (e.g., “The moping owl does to the moon complain”).
  • Symbolism: The churchyard and setting sun symbolize the passage of time and death.

William Blake: The Lamb and The Tyger

Published in Songs of Innocence and of Experience, these poems show two sides of life: hope/innocence and sadness/experience.

The Lamb

This pastoral poem explores childhood and religion. Nature is presented as an idyllic symbiosis where the lamb symbolizes freedom and God’s work. The tone is celebratory. It consists of two stanzas; the first asks questions, and the second provides answers. It uses trochaic trimeter and tetrameter, intended to be sung.

The Tyger

The speaker views the tiger with both admiration and fear, asking, “Did he who made the Lamb make thee?” This reflects the difficulty of understanding a God who creates both peace and violence. The tiger represents energy and danger. The poem uses trochaic tetrameter, mimicking the rhythmic sound of a blacksmith’s hammer. Key devices include imagery (“forests of the night”), rhetorical questions, and juxtaposition (“fearful symmetry”).