Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, which is regarded as the first true science-fiction and one of the most influential English novels ever produced, was in fact initially written for a ghost story competition upheld by Percy Shelley, Lord Byron and Mary Godwin herself on the shores of Lake Geneva.
It tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a highly-intellectual and ambitious scientist who is obsessed with the possiblities of imparting life to non-living matter and manages to create a humanoid out of the shattered and lifeless parts of human body. Yet, this life-giving process proves to be nothing like the joyous and glorious creation tale of God but merely a herald of unbearable grief and immense sorrow. This creature, abandoned by his cruel creator, knowing nothing about the world around him, decides to embark upon a journey to seek for love and warmth, like a newly-born infant who naturally yearns for the sweet milk of life. But the road ahead is destined to be full of poisonous thorns considering his monstrous appearance. The cold scorn and harsh beating of people finally tear his wings of hope asunder and drive him down to the deepest pit of hell, where only hatred reigns. The unquenchable fire of revenge burns fiercely in his bosom. He becomes a murderer and the last victim will be his own creator. And Victor, after witnessing the horrible deeds his creation has done to his family, especially his bride Elizabeth, also decides to seek for a righteous revenge. He must make his own creation perish. The cycle of vengence thus began, which must end in a tragic way.
As readers, we cannot help but to reflect and ask: what on earth leads to the final tragedy of Frankenstein? If we try to follow the chains of complex causality and arrive at the very beginning of this creation tale, the scene of Victor maddening himself with piles of books must have reminded us of another similar figure - Doctor Faust portrayed by Goethe. Both of them are extemely intelligent and eager to know the ultimate mystery of life. With this almost overwhelming intellectual power, they decide to challenge natural order itself and become some kind of necromancer who is proud of talking to the dead. This is the sin of hubris, of eating the forbidden apple in the Garden of Eden. Like Icarus riding through the firmament on his father’s chariot, or Ulysses travelling across the Mediterranean without invocation of the Gods, Victor tries to turn the inanimate into animate things, to make sentient beings out of decaying bones and flesh, thus befitting the name of “creator”. So, His upcoming miseries can be regarded as a kind of repairing work done by the natural order and the penalties for trespassing the divine principles in nature.
Another important cause for the ultimate tragedy is the lack of love between creation and creator. The so called monster is nothing but a deserted child, helplessly howling for the warmth of care and love. He is a mirror of the other people’s actions and his lived experience makes himself drown in the burning furnace of hell. What he can perceive from the world around is merely hostility and hatred towards him, even from his own creator, as if he was the arch enemy of the whole universe, the infamy fallen angel Satan. No wonder he feels so sympathetic when reading Paradise Lost, for he, now already fallen from the innocence of Eden, has lost all the gentle protection of his creator. He ends up holding Hell inside his aching bosom, like Milton’s Satan, thus committing all those horrible crimes. It is so true that mutual hatred builds Hell within and Love elevates the soul to the gate of Heaven.
The tale of Frankenstein speaks of two angels fallen from grace - Victor and his creation. Upon the barren crags of the fallen world, nothing but bleak coldness remains, sans heat, sans light. So, what is the real meaning of Creation? It is not meant to be a mechanical process which can be imitated with scientific methods but an interwoven web of Love and Meaning which is so intricate and mysterious that we human beings may never attempt to make but can always appreciate with ecstasy.