April 3rd

How does the story of the Monster’s first years of life illustrate the similarities and differences between Mary Wollstonecraft’s and Mary Shelley’s theories of how nature and society contribute to the formation of modern human identities?
How does the story of the Monster’s first years of life illustrate the role of nature and society in shaping the following dimensions of modern human identities: sex/gender/sexuality, race/ethnicity, class, religion/spirituality, and citizenship/subjecthood/nationality?
How does the Monster’s “history of my friends” illustrate issues of political justice held dear by Shelley’s parents, Wollstonecraft and Godwin? What parallels do you see between this “history” and another “story within the story” of Frankenstein, the story of Justine?
How does the post-revolutionary European context of Shelley’s writing of the novel affect the political contours of the Monster’s story?
The 1818 edition of Frankenstein was edited fairly substantively by Percy Shelley—to the degree that it included a preface entirely written by him. Mary Shelley always insisted that the novel—its plot, characters, and meanings—was her original authorial and imaginative creation, however. The 1831 edition, edited and published by Mary Shelley herself after Percy’s death, contains substantive additions and revisions to the text by the author alone—including a new preface, and a more substantive focus on the theme of fate as it relates to the life of Victor Frankenstein. Given these facts, do you agree with Anne Mellor’s argument that the 1818 edition of Frankenstein is a better choice for teaching the novel than the 1831 edition because it is “closer” to the time in which the story was first conceived, and thus “closer” to the story’s original themes? What role should feminist theory—indeed, even the feminist theories of Wollstonecraft and Shelley—play in making this choice?

Citation: Botting, E. H. (2007, November 07). April 3rd. Retrieved February 12, 2012, from Notre Dame OpenCourseWare Web site: http://ocw.nd.edu/political-science/mary-wollstonecraft-and-mary-shelley/discussion-questions/april-3rd.