Narrative Structure in Frankenstein

Frankenstein Frankenstein opens with letters from an explorer, Robert Walton, to his sister. The Explorer is stuck on his ship in the ice of the North Pole.

Layers of Stories in Frankenstein Robert Walton’s Narrative Victor’s Story Creature’s Story

Frame Narrative A fusion of two respected 18th century genres epistolary novel, a traditionally feminine genre explorer’s journal, a traditionally masculine genre and an archetypal enlightenment genre

Frame Narrative Functions: provide a frame of verisimilitude to an improbable tale It SEEMS more true It is VERY familiar and conventional: it was told… Ancient Mariner Ozymandias

Epistolary Novel A Novel written as a series of documents Letters Diary entries Newspaper clippings Blogs Emails

Epistolary Novel Conventions Reveal inner life: individual psychological struggles Growth to knowledge and virtue

Ideological Functions Reassure readers of the capacity of individual to combat the temptations of evil and grow towards virtue

Frankenstein subverts the epistolary novel Male narrator No growth: fails to resists temptations; learns nothing

Explorer’s Journal Conventions Protagonist : heroic scientist-explorer Quest structure – pursuit and achievement of a goal (c.f. the hero’s journey) Encounters with strange lands, creatures and beings Increased understanding of the world and humanity

Explorer’S Journal Ideological functions celebrate the quest for knowledge and the power of reason celebrate human achievement - illustrate man’s increasing mastery of his world (archetypal embodiment of enlightenment ideologies)

Frankenstein subverts the conventions and ideologies of the Explorer’s Journal genre Heroic protagonist exposed as flawed: narcissistic etc Quest ends in failure – reveals human limitations, rather than celebrating achievements Protagonist learns nothing from experiences and encounters NB: Gulliver’s Travels

Further subverts the Explorer’s Journal by embedding within it a disreputable genre – a gothic tale. Foregrounds the importance of the Explorer’s Journal genre’s neglect of the: irrational inexplicable supernatural

Victor Frankenstein’s Gothic Tale Gothic conventions Emphasis on the irrational and fantastic Emphasis on emotion rather than reason Challenge to enlightenment values

Setting: relics of past corrupt society or wilds of nature Protagonist: innocent, often virginal, victim Villain: supernatural figure or authoritarian patriarchal figure representative of past, corrupt regime Narrative structure: triumph over the monstrous

Ideological Functions Acknowledge the existence of the monstrous Reassure readers that the monstrous can be defeated or controlled

Frankenstein subverts these conventions and ideologies Setting: locates monstrosity in everyday world: bourgeois domestic sphere Protagonist: is victim and villain/monster Ironically, victim of own villainy

The monstrous a product of human action: external diabolical agency replaced by internal human agency The evil patriarch is an archetypal enlightenment bourgeois figure Villain is victim and hero

Blurs boundaries between victim, villain and hero and human/non-human The monstrous not defeated or controlled