Friday, April 15, 2011
Women of Frankenstein and The British Empire
In Frankenstein the women are not direct characters of the book. The author makes mention of Victor's mother Caroline, his cousin/girlfriend Elizabeth, the servant Justine, Ms. Sayville and Safie. None of these women play strong roles. Ironically enough in the British empire during this time women played substancial roles. Women reered the children, took care of the home and worked very long and strenuous hours carding wool and running looms. These women played active and crucial roles to the Imerialistic movement of the British Empire. So why did Frankenstein have this underlying fear of women? Clearly, he feared women because of strength and power that they held on there own.
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Could you not argue that Shelley's portrayal of women was almost ironic. Her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft, wished in A Vindication of the Rights of Woman 'to persuade women to endeavour to acquire strength, both of mind and body, and to convince them that the soft phrases, susceptibility of heart, delicacy of sentiment, and refinement of taste, are almost synonimous [sic] with epithets of weakness.” Considering the characters of Elizabeth, Justine etc and how they are portrayed,they seem so utterly similar to what Wollstonecraft was disparaging and weak compared to, as you say, the strong women of the British Empire; perhaps Mary Shelley was presenting these weak and rather dull female characters as an antithesis of what she perceives as strong women which therefore easily become victims?
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