Amanda's Apologia

Dear Tom and Laura,
As your mother, I always try my hardest to make the right choices for both of you, even though it may not seem like it at certain times. I nag you because I just worry about your future, a future that I will not always be in. Before I met your father, I had dozens of gentlemen callers and I just want you two to have the best possible life and not end up like me – alone. I act solely for you two and want you to achieve everything I know you are capable of. You may think I am annoying or bothersome, but I promise you, I do it in my best interest.

Tom, your father left us all alone, causing our family to suffer as a result, and I nag because I have a lot of fear concerning your future. I want you to be better than him, your father, and I know you can be. I want you to be an independent, strong, and smart man who achieves all of his personal and work goals. I want you to be everything your father wasn’t. I want you to be the best version of yourself.

Laura, you are and will always be my little girl. You may see yourself as crippled but I promise you that I do not see you this way in my eyes. I live in the past, because my youth makes me happy, and I hate to see you waste yours by playing with glass animals and walking around in the cold. My days of finding a gentleman caller were the best of my life and I just want you to find the same kind of delight I had during this exciting time period. I believe finding a gentleman caller will bring you some joy in your life, which is all I want for you.

My dear children, please do not make the mistakes I have. I just want what is best for you and intend to help you both flourish in the real world. Living in the past saves me from the loneliness I face every day with the absence of your father and I try to reflect my wisdom and experience onto you to help you make the right decisions in your life. I love you, and I hope you understand the reasoning behind my choices as a mother.

Love,
Amanda, your loving mother and biggest fan

Reactions, Thoughts, and Questions Regarding the Glass Menagerie

Reactions, Thoughts, and Questions Regarding the Glass Menagerie

In scene one, I thought the mother, Amanda Wingfield, was very insensitive and paranoid in regard to her two children, Tom and Laura. Amanda was nagging Tom to eat all of his food, which annoyed him to a point where he had to speak up to get her to stop. This shows that Tom himself is not afraid to speak his mind. When Amanda told the story of her seventeen gentlemen callers in one afternoon (which the children have heard many times), this shows that she wants to set up her daughter as well as find her a suitor. She tells the story about how she chose the wrong suitor (their father) who abandoned them later, which shows that she wants her daughter to choose the right man for her and not make the same mistakes.

In scene two, Laura only types when she hears her mother ascend from the stairs, symbolizing that she has not been to school. Amanda found out that Laura had not been attending business school and is sad about losing fifty dollars worth of tuition. From this, it can be perceived that they are low on money or on a budget. From this, the mother decided that Laura must get married and has to develop charm, once again showing that she is desperate to send off her daughter and that she has old-fashioned views about the dependency of women on men, which is not uncommon for this time period.

Paul Cantor's "The Nightmare of Romantic Idealism"

What is the author's argument?

Paul Cantor's main argument is that Frankenstein's alternative title, the Modern Prometheus, is named as the book has various Promethean elements that are stereotypically ambiguous. For example, in the book, Victor Frankenstein plays the role of God, however he compares himself to Satan ("All my speculations and hopes are as nothing, and like the archangel who aspired to omnipotence, I am chained in an eternal hell" (200)). The monster also compares himself to two Miltonic roles, Adam and Satan, which can be seen through the following quotation: "Remember that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed." Cantor argues that by only having two main characters, Shelley made both characters in some sense Satanic.

2-sentence summary of article

This article is about the mythically ambiguous archetypes and stereotypes that the main characters in the novel possess in relation to Satan, God, and Eve. Throughout the novel, romantic idealism is portrayed through the good and evil of creativity (can lead to new creation but is also dangerous).

Why is ambiguity so important here?

Ambiguity is so important here as Frankenstein's characters have an "underlying moral ambiguity" and do not have morally pure motives. Shelley's myth contrasts sharply with that of her husband in Prometheus Unbound where he rejected the figure of Satan as a poetic paradigm due to the moral ambiguity of his nature. Shelley suggests that Satan has both good and bad sides and realized that it would take a struggle for Prometheus to overcome his desire for revenge and become purely good. Mary Shelley displays a deeper sense of the complexity of human nature as she was unwilling to divide up the character of Satan in the same way, parceling out all his good qualities to the rebellious monster and leaving the creator-god, Frankenstein, with all the bad. She maintains the same moral ambiguity in both characters, and in virtually the same proportions.

End of Book Review Questions: Frankenstein

What were your thoughts and reflections on this chapter and the death of Elizabeth?

For most of chapter 23, I (and I assume many other viewers) believed that Victor was going to be the one killed, and I felt as if Mary Shelley definitely tricked me when Elizabeth was killed instead. While Victor worried about his encounter with the monster, the actual death of Elizabeth was very anticlimactic and Shelley didn't drag it out unlike deaths in other books. It was also very shocking when Alphonse died of natural causes when there was no real mention of his health issues or clues foreshadowing his death in the previous chapters. 

In what ways might the Creature & Victor be considered “doubles” for each other?

The creature and Victor can be considered "doubles" for each other as both of them are incredibly lonely and were both linked to Walton. Both did not have a lot of friends or much of a social life. Both characters kept themselves isolated in different periods of time and wanted to stay away from others in order to work and learn (Victor learned about science, the creature learned about society). 

In the final chapters, Victor and the creature are involved in a mad contest of revenge. Record at least four statements made by each character that reveal his motives, feelings, or state of mind. Note the chapter number after each statement.

Victor

• All was again silent, but his words rang in my ears. I burned with rage to pursue the murderer of my peace and precipitate him into the ocean. I walked up and down my room hastily and perturbed, while my imagination conjured up a thousand images to torment and sting me. Why had I not followed him and closed with him in mortal strife? But I had suffered him to depart, and he had directed his course towards the mainland. I shuddered to think who might be the next victim sacrificed to his insatiate revenge. And then I thought again of his words -- "I WILL BE WITH YOU ON YOUR WEDDING-NIGHT." That, then, was the period fixed for the fulfillment of my destiny. In that hour I should die and at once satisfy and extinguish his malice. The prospect did not move me to fear; yet when I thought of my beloved Elizabeth, of her tears and endless sorrow, when she should find her lover so barbarously snatched from her, tears, the first I had shed for many months, streamed from my eyes, and I resolved not to fall before my enemy without a bitter struggle. (Chapter 20)
• This letter revived in my memory what I had before forgotten, the threat of the fiend--"I WILL BE WITH YOU ON YOUR WEDDING-NIGHT!" Such was my sentence, and on that night would the daemon employ every art to destroy me and tear me from the glimpse of happiness which promised partly to console my sufferings. On that night he had determined to consummate his crimes by my death. Well, be it so; a deadly struggle would then assuredly take place, in which if he were victorious I should be at peace and his power over me be at an end. If he were vanquished, I should be a free man. Alas! What freedom? Such as the peasant enjoys when his family have been massacred before his eyes, his cottage burnt, his lands laid waste, and he is turned adrift, homeless, penniless, and alone, but free. Such would be my liberty except that in my Elizabeth I possessed a treasure, alas, balanced by those horrors of remorse and guilt which would pursue me until death. (Chapter 22)
• As time passed away I became more calm; misery had her dwelling in my heart, but I no longer talked in the same incoherent manner of my own crimes; sufficient for me was the consciousness of them. By the utmost self-violence I curbed the imperious voice of wretchedness, which sometimes desired to declare itself to the whole world, and my manners were calmer and more composed than they had ever been since my journey to the sea of ice. (Chapter 22)
• "I was hurried away by fury; revenge alone endowed me with strength and composure; it modeled my feelings, and allowed me to be calculating and calm, at periods when otherwise delirium or death would have my portion." (Chapter 24) 

The Creature

• Farewell! I leave you, and in you the last of human kind whom these eyes will ever behold. Farewell, Frankenstein! If thou wert yet alive, and yet cherished a desire of revenge against me, it would be better satiated in my life than in my destruction. But it was not so; thou didst seek my extinction that I might not cause greater wretchedness; and if yet, in some mode unknown to me, thou hast not ceased to think and feel, thou wouldst not desire against me a vengeance greater than that which I feel. Blasted as thou wert, my agony was still superior to thine; for the bitter sting of remorse will not cease to rankle in my wounds until death shall close them for ever. (Chapter 24)
• 'Frankenstein! you belong then to my enemy--to him towards whom I have sworn eternal revenge; you shall be my first victim." (Chapter 16)
• "For the first time the feelings of revenge and hatred filled my bosom, and I did not strive to control them, but allowing myself to be borne away by the stream, I bent my mind towards injury and death." (Chapter 16)
• “I, like the arch-fiend, bore a hell within me, and finding myself unsympathized with, wished to tear up the tree’s, spread havoc and destruction around me, and then to have sat down and enjoyed the ruin.” (Chapter 16)

The Creature's Story: Writing Prompt

Now that you have heard the creature’s story, do you think he is justified in declaring an “ever-lasting war” against the human species and his creator? Is he justified in asking for Victor to create a mate for him?

ABSENT ON 10/25/16

After hearing the creature's story, I do believe he is justified in declaring an "ever-lasting war" against the human species and his creator. The monster is seen as a villain of society when in reality, he is just misunderstood. Because he is judged only due to his horrible looks, the creature has never truly experienced any sort of love or support throughout his life, and as someone without a family to teach him the right and wrongs, he does not learn to control his feelings in a civilized way. From the start, society corrupted the monster and he never had a support system, family, or even a friend to talk to. The creature is justified in asking Victor to create a mate for him as he just wants someone similar to him with whom he can travel the world for. After observing the family living in the cottage, the monster just wants to be as happy as them when they spend time together. 

Frankenstein Review Chapters 5-6

Summary/Actions of Main Characters
In Chapter 5, Victor successfully brings an eight-foot man to life in November of his second year in college. He is excited, yet disgusted at his creation. Frankenstein wanders around Ingolstadt when his best friend, Henry Clerval, finds him in poor condition. Henry has come to see Victor and enroll in the university of Ingolstadt. When the two return back to Victor’s apartment, the monster is missing. Victor is happy that the monster is gone and has a fit of exhaustion due to his anxiety about the monster. Henry spends the rest of the winter and spring taking care of Victor and advises him to write a letter to his family, as he received on from his family in Geneva.

In Chapter 6, Victor receives a letter from Elizabeth and is full of good news from home. Elizabeth speaks about Justine Moritz, her housekeeper and friend. Justine was treated poorly by her own family, but is a loyal friend to the Frankenstein family. Victor introduces Henry to his professors, who speak of him very highly. Victor and Henry begin their studies together, studying ancient and foreign languages in order to engage their minds. Victor plans to return to Geneva in the fall, but the weather makes the trip impossible, and winter sets in. He plans to return in May when the weather improves.

Themes, Character Development, and QuestionsA very Gothic theme is developing within the story as many descriptions as well as the overall tone are very dark and highlight the negative side of humanity (violence, creativity, murder). Frankenstein describes the monster in a very contrary way thoroughly discussing the gore and gross anatomy of it's body. This story explores the deepest fears of the main character, Victor Frankenstein. 

In the earlier chapters, we knew Victor Frankenstein as a young man with a happy childhood, however since he began his studies at the university of Ingolstadt, he has become obsessive, lonely, and frankly, unhealthy. After the death of his mother, Frankenstein keeps himself isolated from the world and focuses only on discovering the secret of life. 

A question I have is, "Why did he create the monster if he does not want to care for it or look after it?"

Frankenstein Reading Questions and Thoughts: Letters 1-4 and Chapters 1-4

Questions on Letters 1-4

1. Why exactly does Walton not have any friends or companions?
2. What does a sledge look like? It can be inferred that it is similar to a dog sled, but may have different features or varying shapes.
3. Why does the man found in letter 4 only have one living dog and missing limbs? How did he get like this?
4. Why did the men think brandy would warm up the human body (actually has the opposite affect)? Who created this theory and how was it tested?

Questions on Chapters 1-4

1. Why does the author decide to write from a first person point of view verses a third person point of view?
2. Why do Victor's parents want him to marry Elizabeth? What did they see in her as a child?
3. Did Victor really want to go to the university of Ingolstadt or did his parents pressure him to study there?

Thoughts

Based on letters 1-4 and chapters 1-4, I am trying to determine the correlation between the two at the moment. In letters 1-4, the author speaks about Walton and his journey to discover something new in his voyage to the North Pole, however in chapters 1-4, Shelley speaks about a completely different character. Perhaps these two varying stories are related as both of the characters go through a personal journey and will somehow tie them back together at the end (just my theory). 

I can personally relate to Victor Frankenstein as I believe his is very driven based on his work ethic and interest in the subject he is pursuing, which I can admire about him as a character, however I feel as if he is not very opinionated as he let his parents decide where he will go to college without a proper discussion and many other major aspects of his life such as who he will marry (did not force him to marry Elizabeth but his mother tried to make him promise to).