English 123 – Rosichan
Sample Questionsor Considerations for Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
(to get you started and point you in the right direction – by no means an exhaustive list)
Psychological Criticism
What fears and/or desires motivated Victor to act as he did? What about the “Monster”? Did the characters have choices? Does the play elicit sympathy for any of the characters? How? Why/Why not? Do Victor’s dreams have any psychological importance in the story? How? Why/Why not? Are there any archetypes present in the story, and what do they represent? What does the story say about revenge?
Gender Criticism
According to the story, what traditional or stereotypical roles are women OR men expected to play? OR Who (men or women) has the power, what kind, and how do they use/demonstrate it? OR Who (men or women) is oppressed, what shows the oppression, and how do they react to that oppression? Be specific. What attitude does the play demonstrate toward those roles or power situations? Is it upholding, questioning, challenging, or denouncing (etc.) them or it? What evidence in the play suggests this attitude?
New Criticism
What images are repeated throughout the story, and what might these images represent? Look at the language and the cadences used by the characters. Do these differences point to gender, social class, power relationships? What Biblical reference does Shelley use in the story? Why? How does the narrator’s mood influence the narration, and what is its effect?
Deconstruction
You might begin with a New Criticism approach. Take a look at the oppositions, for example, of creation and destruction. Is one idea placed “higher” than the other? Does this ranking change during the story? How does the second title of the book “The Modern Prometheus” fit into the telling of the story (Man’s thirst for forbidden knowledge and the results)? You might also look at a Reader Response view. Are there any parallels between Victor’s creation of the monster and Shelley’s creation of the story itself? Think about Victor and the Monster. Who do you feel sympathy or empathy with? Does this change during the story, and why? These are just a few suggestions, as this same concept can be used with other critical theories, as well.
Marxist Criticism
To what extent are the characters oppressed by the society they live in and especially the class they belong to? What are the characters’ lives like? How do they live (survive)? What economic classes do they belong to? What effect does their economic class have on their lives and choices? What commentary might this story be making about the society it depicts? Who has power, and how do they use it? Who wants power, and how do they acquire it? What do these movements show about power and its applications?Use specific characters and descriptions to support your ideas.
New Historicism
What are the social, cultural, and political forces which surround and circulate through the story? What impact might the French Revolution, the abolition of the slave trade, the rise of power of the British Empire, and debates over the rights of man have on the tale? What might be Shelley’s purpose for writing this story? How do her particular experiences shed light on what she might be saying about ambition, idealism, creation, and responsibility? In essence, use research to back up a particular Criticism argument and give it more weight. But still you must make an argument that focuses on the meaning of the text and prove it with analysis of the text, so the research is in addition, not instead of evidence from the text and analysis of it.
Reader Response Criticism
The most effective Reader Response approach is to look at and analyze the text rhetorically to reveal and explore how and why the writer seeks to appeal to the reader’s emotions and to convey a particular meaning to the reader for a particular purpose. Both the meaning and the purpose would need to be argued (presented and proved with evidence and interpretation, etc.). How and why the text involves the reader (in the meaning-making) would also need exploring and explanation. Questions to consider: Whom does the audience/reader identify with? From whose perspective do we see the events and/or characters of the play? Whose side do we take? Why and for what purpose? Or, are we intended to remain outside the text, looking in objectively? How is this accomplished and why?
Postcolonial Criticism
It would involve identifying the dominant culture of the community (the colonizer) and what it expects all members to believe, how it expects them to act, and how otherness (the colonized) is perceived and treated. You can do this by looking only at the dominant culture, or you could identify and prove who the “other” is, who is having someone else’s rules, beliefs, or standards imposed upon him/her. In this case, you might consider both the English culture of the writer and the culture of the lands where Victor resides and travels to.