Week One: Frankenstein

We are all familiar with Frankenstein’s monster. He is a big disfigured soul, usually green, that is so repulsive, no one would give him the time of day. I have never read Frankenstein before this point and I was surprised it was nothing like the idea of Frankenstein that I came across growing up. The Frankenstein of my childhood was always presented as the misunderstood tortured soul that the village, even with pitchforks and torches at first in hand, eventually learn to accept. But this monster I read about in the book was truly rotten to the core. Yes, he went through hardships that he did not deserve and he did not ask for the life he was given. But he surely made the decision, out of pure vengeance, to kill the people that Frankenstein held dear. I am not saying that Frankenstein did the right thing by creating the Monster and that he does not hold some sort of responsibility to his creation, but rather that both Frankenstein and the Monster are both truly monsters in their own right.  

Frankenstein is really a story about consequences of our choices and actions. Everything has a consequence! We, as humans, often take things into our own hands. We like control, power. Whether it be in the little things like what and when we eat dinner, or the big things, like what job we are going to have, people naturally want control. Why wouldn’t you? But sometimes taking things upon yourself is not what is best. We are flawed after all; we are not unadulterated. Sometimes what we tell ourselves is best is truly not.


Frankenstein would soon realize this life lesson. He took the extraordinary task upon himself of creating life. This, as we know, did not run out the way he planned. The creature was repulsive, I don’t know how Frankenstein could have thought the monster would turn out any different. But then I think “Isn’t that just like life though?” It drew a parallel to real life and the decisions we make. We rarely can correctly predict the horrible outcomes our decisions could create. Why would we make them if we did? In a fast-paced world, it’s hard to take the time to think through decisions and think, “Is this really the best thing?”. We go off instinct and instincts are often very wrong.  We live in a flawed world. We all accept that, but it’s not until we stop and take responsibility for our actions, that this crazy world will get any better.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week Three: Old Horror

Reading the short stories of Kwaidan was not the experience I was expecting. As an American, when someone says horror, some of the first things that come to mind are, Jason Voorhees, Insidious, and Saw. All gory and or demonic; purely created to disturb its viewers. These do not even belong in the same category as Kwaidan . Looking back, my views on what “horror” is were closed minded. Kwaidan was not gory, demonic and dark, but more like classic fairytales, similar to Grimm’s fairytales in which the stories had some sort of a moral at the end and that was the point. Classic fairytales were made to teach lessons and scare kids into doing what was right. The story, the journey, did not have to make complete sense as long as it was interesting, memorable, and had that lesson. That was the important part. That is exactly what Kwaidan is and even though that surprised me, I really enjoyed the read. I would much rather experience something that makes me think and see the
Read more

Week Ten: The Fiction of Ideas

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Aldrich I found The Three Stigmata of Palmer Aldrich a very ambiguous book packed full of many subplots and extraneous themes. There was a lot going on. As a person who is really bad with names, I found it hard to keep up with which character was which; Myerson, Bulero, Eldritch. Also, this was compounded by the fact that they all seemed to be very similar in character traits. Maybe this was on purpose. Maybe it adds to the confusing story filled with alternate universes and time travel. Even though I had problems with the story, I cannot say I hated this book. I found it very interesting and I enjoyed reading it. I cannot pretend to be a good writer, I am not, but I just cannot help but wonder what the story would be like when it was stripped of some of the themes that felt unimportant to the main plot. For example, the bit about the neo-Christian woman on Mars. That whole subplot was unnecessary.   The story took a detour for this story point a
Read more

Week Two: Vampires

For this week’s reading, I decided to read Twilight . I was a huge fan of the movies when I was in middle and high school, but it has been a long time since I read the first book of the saga. It was interesting returning to a book after so many years. I had to have been in 7 th  grade the last time I read this particular book. It was not my favorite of the series, so I only read it the once.               Reading Twilight as a kid and an adult is a completely different experience. As a kid, like I said, I was a huge fan. I accepted it all, holding onto every word, like Bella’s love life was as important as the book made it out to be. Don’t get me wrong, I am a huge sentimentalist and still adore these movies, although now acknowledging and even sharing the opinions of the critics. But, when reading the book last week, I was able, as an adult, to really separate myself from the book and try to analyze it for what it is really saying.               Twilight, at face value, is a mo
Read more