1. Horror, Monsters, Mary Shelley, and the Romantics
Frankenstein
Horror, Monsters, Mary Shelley, and the Romantics

2. Horror Stories What scares us? Why?
Think about the scariest movie you’ve ever seen...what made it scary?
What is the scariest monster in film/books?
>What makes the monster scary?
Why do we seem to take pleasure in scaring ourselves?

4. The Emotion of Terror
-An emotion understood by both the human, intellectual world, and the natural world
-Triggers a powerful “fight or flight” response
-Experiencing true terror can having lasting effects, both emotionally and physically
-Horror stories attempt to simulate and represent this powerful emotion.
>We’re fascinated by it, but why? Why is Mary Shelley pursuing it in Frankenstein?

5. Using a Monster
-Shelley’s monster suggests a new way of looking at evil
>Monsters are not new. Ancient civilizations feature monsters. Monsters created by the gods, or other powers of the universe.
>Medieval monsters are generally products of Satan and symbolically represent the evil and sin in life that the noble knight must overcome
>But Shelley’s monster is unique. It was created by a human being.
Essential Question: Are monsters born as monsters, or are they created?

6. Romanticism
Mary Shelly, the author of Frankenstein, is considered an author of the Romantic movement
The Romantic authors were fascinated by the emotions felt by human beings
They valued individualism: the idea that one person’s life experience is uniquely their own, not shared by anyone else
The Romantics believed that experiencing extreme emotions, like terror or jubilation or awe, was the key to understanding the world around us
Caspar David Friedrich, Wanderer above the Sea of Fog, 1818

7. Romanticism
-This movement began in Germany in the late 18th century, and spread around Europe, becoming the most popular movement in art and philosophy well into the 19th century
-It valued the beauty of the natural world
>Being in awe of nature is a popular emotion in Romantic works
-The Romantics were responding to the Enlightenment era of the 17th and 18th centuries
-With advancements in scientific thinking came advancements in technology, which led to industrialization
>The Romantics wanted their audience to consider what was being lost by all of this advancement
>”Slow down and smell the roses”

8. Joseph Vernet, 1759, Shipwreck
Explain how this painting displays Romantic topics and ideas.

9. Science-fiction Genre
-Mary Shelley has been called the “grandmother of science-fiction” (Rabkin 2013)
>Frankenstein is arguably the first fully realized science-fiction work
-Science Fiction focuses on the seemingly plausible, even if we haven’t developed the technology to achieve what we’re seeing in the story
>With enough scientific advancement, maybe this is possible -

10. What inspired the story?
At the time (1812), British society was very concerned with the topics of life and death…
>The Royale Humane Society (at the time it was called “Society for the recovery of Persons Apparently Drowned”) was providing methods to resuscitate people who had recently drowned
>This led to many tales of people coming back to life after they “died”
>There was also an interest in “suspended animation” which we call a coma, or being passed out

11. What inspired the story?
>Galvanism was also fascinating British society...this was the practice of reanimating the truly dead
>Shocking dead limbs with electricity resulted in the limbs springing “back to life”

12. What inspired the story?
-Plenty of other scientific advancements were occurring at this time
-Shelley is questioning whether or not we have a responsibility to make sure we’re doing good in our scientific pursuits...or should we abandon morals for the sake of advancing science?

13. Creating the story
-Mary Shelley, with her husband Percy Bysse Shelley, and their friend Lord Byron, challenged one another to a horror-story writing contest
>Mary Shelley tapped into the zeitgeist of the times and wrote a short story on