Hello Readers!
This assignment is a part of internal evaluation of student's
academic activity in the Department of English, MK Bhavnagar University. Here
is my assignment.
Name: Rohit Vyas
Class: Semester 2
Roll No: 21
PG Enrolment Number: 2069108420200041
E-mail: rohitvyas277@gmail.com
Course: M.A. English, at Department of English, M.K. Bhavnagar
University
Paper 5 – Romantic Literature, Unit 2
Submitted to: Dr. Dilip Barad
* Works Cited
Frankenstein – Test of
Human Abilities
Introduction
Human evolution and the continuous development in every
coming generation can be taken as firm proof that humans have endless capacity
to think, to grow and to expand the horizons. Time and again it is witnessed
that the extraordinariness of variety of people who have set the milestones in
their respective fields. Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawkins, Nicola Tesla and
several other scientists came up with many revolutionary theories and
inventions that could change the whole way of human life. It wouldn’t be the
exaggerating to state that literature is considered as mirror of society.
Indeed it seems to be true in the case of the preset novel Frankenstein:
The Modern Prometheus. Mary Shelly had written this novel in 1818 which
was anonymous edition.
19th
century inventions (Barna, Tarlach and Scharping)
The 19th century was full of thinkers, critics,
theorists, scientists, biologists, mathematicians who were thinking something
very different and ahead of their time. Many inventions came into being that
amazed people with awe and set the people think that to what extent human brain
can go? Charles Darwin, who was a biologist, wrote ‘The Origin of Species’ in 1859.
There were many important discoveries in 1800s which make us
believe that human thinking capacity and tendency to excel in many fields is
unbounded and limitless.
According to a website,
in 1818, British obstetrician
James Blundell performed the first successful human blood transfusion. This is only one medical
discovery, but the list is very long. In a nut shell, Frankenstein is the novel written after Mary Shelley’s dream about
a monster.
Artificial Intelligence and Human beings
Frankenstein
keeps on experimenting with dead bodies of humans and used to join various
parts with each other to make one full body. Several attempts are made for
making the AI bots. The monster learns reading from the books. This can be seen
as feeding of the information into a program which helps an AI to speak, to
understand and to respond at sudden movement. Frankenstein understands the
language and tries to speak something.
Victor
Frankenstein’s caliber and his eagerness, ambitiousness to create something
new, set him on a quest to the creation of the monster. He was versed with
medical examinations and experiments.
To quote the extract,
Today we are constantly confronted with new
developments in fertility science and new philosophical conundrums that result
from genetic engineering, in vitro
fertilization, cloning, and the prolongation of life by artificial means.
Couples taking fertility treatments sometimes have to face the difficult choice
of "selective reduction" or the possible adverse results of multiple,
premature births. People wonder, has science gone too far? According to
cultural critic Laura Kranzler Victor's creation of life and modem sperm banks
and artificial wombs show a "masculine desire to claim female
(re)productivity" (Kranzler 45). Frankenstein and its warnings about the
hubris of science will be with us in the future as science continues to question
the borders between life and death, between "viability" and
"selective reduction," between living and life support. (Guerin,
Labor and Morgan 317)
Organ
Transplantation
In the novel Frankenstein, one finds
that Victor’s experiments lead the readers to think of transplanting various
body parts. In today’s medical science, it is possible to transplant the organs
such as kidney, liver and in some cases heart also. But the case in the novel
is a bit different than the real incidents. Victor tries to make a new body by
joining limbs of other dead bodies and brain. Here a quote is mentioned in
which Victor describes his creed to create the creature.
“I collected the instruments of life
around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the
lifeless
thing that lay at my feet.” (Shelley)
This quote from the original text confirms
that Victor was creating the whole new creature by joining the body parts. In
the same manner it can be directly connected with today’s organ transplant. It
can be stated that such surgeries were considered as major achievement for
doctors when it was first introduced. There is one more reference of one
journal’s article which says about Indian surgeon and medical scholar, Sushrut.
He is known as father of Indian surgery. (Singh)
It is believed that ‘Shalyachikitsa’ means surgery was initially laid by him. One
can see the connection between Victor Frankenstein and Sushrut in terms of
surgery and cutting body parts of dead bodies.
Creed for Knowledge
Humans have always a habit to know
more about various things. Right from the time of evolution, Homo sapiens used
to roam and travel a lot for survival and this travelling got them to come
across fire, covering their bodies and crafting weapons like bows and arrows,
and importantly invention of wheel. In terms of self defense, humans found
themselves more powerful because of weapons and residing tools like roof, huts,
and other protection elements. This laid superiority into their temperaments
and thus humans started fighting with another tribes and groups, thus they
became monarchs and rulers of colonies. Ego became heavier than humanity and
human didn’t even look back in destroying even nature and disturbing ecology.
This novel can be located with the reference of clear indication of Victor’s
creed for knowledge and finding the secret of life.
One may say that Victor’s creed for
knowledge leads him to destruction and ruins of his life. Although, it is also
true that finding the way out for the ultimate knowledge is like walking on the
double edged sward. It requires lot of sacrifices to gain knowledge and apply it
in various arenas. Victor goes to Ingolstadt and joins university. He seeks for
studying natural philosophy and chemistry. Thorough this one can find that how
he is curious to know more about medicines and chemistry.
Fear of One’s Own
When human
goes beyond its limits, it suffers. It’s creed for gaining knowledge and power
makes it unstoppable in the race of superiority and nothing left at the end.
Victor also gains nothing in this lengthy and tiresome journey. After gaining
such power and knowledge, it becomes difficult to handle it because power and
knowledge gives us fear along with the enlightenment. Thus, through this novel,
Mary Shelley gives us strict warning not to go beyond specific limits. As this
novel was written in the age of Romanticism, it can be said that the novelist’s
love for nature is responsible for generating this kind of literature. The
novel gives the readers horrific feelings and cautionary signs for the upcoming
dangers in life. The novel is still widely popular and considered as timeless
because it best fits in the contemporary readings of human behavior and its
creed for knowledge.
Weapon of mass
destruction and atomic science is the cautionary sign for the future of human
beings, because it generates fear just the same as Victor was afraid of monster
after creating it. Nowadays, all first world countries are focusing upon saving
the ecology from the environmental disturbance such as pollution and wood
cutting. Humans have made their houses and cars air conditioned and forgot to breath
the clear air. The excessive execution of carbon dioxide made the environment
polluted and the layer of Ozone around the Earth started reducing. Humans have
acquired power, authority and knowledge but forgot to take care of nature. Countries
are afraid of their own actions and on first place it seems that governments
are taking decisions for people’s welfare. The inclusion of AI and Unmanned
Armed Vehicles (UAVs) or drones in defense can be seen as the frightful
invention yet meant to protect the humankind from war.
Mary Shelley
might be thinking ahead of its time because it seems to be true that the novel
Frankenstein marks its impact even today’s time. The way character of monster
emerges shows the other side of the coins which is harms and hazards of human
abilities.
In a nutshell
“Necessity is mother of
invention”
With the general overview of human behavior,
right from the period of evolution till today, it can be fearlessly stated that
human is having enough potential to create milestones in terms of development.
It can create beautiful skyscrapers and make the best out of technology.
Ranging from lifestyle to education and health sector, humans have always been
in the doubt of their abilities to make and create something. This self-doubt
and questioning attitude expanded human possibilities to seek beyond what is visible.
In this assignment an honest attempt has been made to locate the novel in
contemporary situations and discourses, where the gothic and supernatural
elements reveal the reality of today’s life.
* Works Cited
Barna, Mark, Gemma Tarlach and Nathaniel Scharping. The
10 Greatest Scientists of All Time. 11 April 2017. www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/the-10-greatest-scientists-of-all-time.
Guerin, Wilfred L., et al. A Handboook of Critical
Approaches to Literature. 5th. New York: OUP, 2005.
McFadden, Christopher. 15 Medical Inventions And
Discoveries of the 1800's That Have Come to Define Modern Medicine. 22 Oct
2019. www.interestingengineering.com/15-medical-inventions-and-discoveries-of-the-1800s-that-have-come-to-define-modern-medicine.
Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft. Frankenstein.
1818. PDF.
Singh, Vibha. "Sushruta: The father of
surgery." National journal of maxillofacial surgery 8.1 (2017):
1-3. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5512402.
