Frankenstein By Mary Sh elley
Anticipation Guide 0 Everyone has a hidden monster inside of them. 0 Isolating ourselves will magnify our problems rather than resolve them. 0 Parents/Guardians have a never- ending responsibility for their children. 0 Fame and glory are worth seeking. 0 Science is better than Nature. 0 Some secrets are worth hiding. 0 What we choose to do will have an effect on others. - Thomas Reyes- Cairo, 2008
Frankenstein: What s in a name? 0 What are some ideas that come to mind when you hear the name Frankenstein?
Meet Mary Shelley 0 Born in 1797 to William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft 0 Her mother died 10 days after Mary was born 0 Shelley learned about her mother only through writings her mother left behind, including A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792) which advocated that women should have the same educational opportunities as rights in society as men.
Meet Mary Shelley 0 Avid reader and scholar and knew through her father some of the most important men of the time (William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge) 0 Married Percy Bysshe Shelley in 1816; he had been married to another woman
Meet Mary Shelley 0 Wrote Frankenstein when she was 18 years old 0 Percy Shelley died in 1822 0 Three of the the Shelleys children died in infancy 0 She supported her family as a writer 0 She died in 1851
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley 1797-1851
Ideas of the Enlightenment 0 ScientiZic observation of the outer world 0 Logic and reason; science and technology 0 Believed in following standards and traditions 0 Appreciated elegance and rezinement 0 Interested in maintaining the aristocracy 0 Sought to follow and validate authority 0 Favored a social hierarchy 0 Nature should be controlled by humans
Important Revolutions 0 American and French Revolution (call for individual freedom and an overthrow of rigid social hierarchy) 0 Industrial Revolution social system challenged by change from agricultural society to industrial one with a large, impoverished and restless working class
John Locke 0 Believed in tabula rasa 0 At birth, humans are a blank slate 0 Their identities are shaped by their sensory experiences 0 The mind can process experience, but there is no innate knowledge
John Locke
Jean Jacques Rousseau 'Man was born free, and he is 0 everywhere in chains'. 0 Believed that man is inherently good 0 Man is corrupted by society
Jean Jacques Rousseau
The Roman tic Age
Wanderer above the Sea of Fog by Caspar David Friedrich, 1818
Characteristics of Romantic Period 0 Emphasis on imagination and emotion, individual passion and inspiration 0 Rejection of formal, upper class works and a preference for writing (poetry) that addresses personal experiences and emotions in simple language 0 A turn to the past or an inner dream world that is thought to be more picturesque and magical than the current world (industrial age)
Characteristics of Romantic Period 0 Belief in individual liberty; rebellious attitude against tyranny 0 Fascination with nature; perception of nature as transformative
Characteristics of Romantic Period 0 Concerned with common people 0 Favored democracy 0 Desired radical change 0 Nature should be untamed
Style: Gothic Novel 0 The story is set in bleak or remote places 0 The plot involves macabre or violent incidents 0 Characters are in psychological and/or physical torment 0 A supernatural or otherwordly element is often present 0 Sense of indeziniteness; nothing is exactly explained 0 Ghostly, eerie atmosphere
Vocabulary List 1: Letters 1-4 0 Ardent (adj.) passionate 0 Countenance (n.) face; expression 0 Dauntless (adj.) fearless 0 Harrowing (adj.) extremely distressing 0 Irrevocably (adv.) in a way impossible to change 0 Perseverance (n.) steady persistence
Read Introduction to Frankenstein By Mary Shelley