The natural and supernatural has always intrigued the most intelligent minds. The natural is the normal, while the supernatural is the abnormal. Science fiction brings these two elements to the same realm. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein brings about this horrific symbol of mankind’s desire to master nature and the extent of the imaginative mind by confining these factors into the main protagonist Victor Frankenstein’s creature’s existences. These factors are extremely significant, especially during times of extraordinary scientific advances in many fields.
Human beings had long sought to conquer nature and be their own masters. In Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein along with other characters has expressed or referenced thoughts in mythical and religious terms. By doing this, these characters are ultimately implying that they're own creation and lives seems to reflect characters from mythologies and religions, ultimately stressing control much like a godlike being. As Frankenstein’s ambitious creation expressed to the doctor, “I ought to be thy Adam; but I am rather the fallen angel”(Shelley, 77). The remarks about Adam, a known figure in the first book in the Christian Holy Bible, seems to expressed frankly that Dr. Frankenstein is the creator of life just as the Christian God was to the Adam character. Adam is often the symbol of mankind’s honest beginnings in the Genesis stories, so using Adam in this particular way points out to both the Doctor’s and Creature’s innocent beginnings. Victor Frankenstein created and ultimately “animated” the Creature to life as a mean to satisfied his overwhelming curiosity in his studies. The Creature, alone, had to endure years without Frankenstein to guide him or to nurture him in essence, but instead the Creature was immediately seen as a monster before his creator’s eyes. As Frankenstein remarked to Walton about his reason to reanimate lifeless objects, “No father could claim the gratitude of his child so completely as I should deserve theirs” (Shelley, 36). The use of the word “father” suggested a godly figure, especially when the Christian God is regarded as “all of creation’s” father. In this context, Shelley is pointing out to the brutal nature of man as many sought to master nature. Frankenstein, in essence, has master nature with is reanimation of a living corpse.
The early 17th century was when the ideas of scientific advances peaked. So much of the scientific advancement ideals are reflected on Victor Frankenstein. Like most early works of science fiction, Shelley is portraying the possible horrific consequences of steadfast scientific advances that could lead to mankind’s very own undoing. Victor Frankenstein established that fact by expressing, “I doubted at first whether I should attempt the creation of a being like myself or one of simpler organization; but my imagination was too much exalted by my first success to permit me to doubt of my ability to give life to an animal as complex and wonderful as man”(Shelley, 35). Frankenstein thus claimed that he held back his original idea to animate dead objects, but because of “imagination”, he was motivated to continue his course with the experiment. Frankenstein used the idea that he can create a being as “wonderful as man”. This idea in the early 1800s would be considered sacrilege in a predominantly Christian society, since the idea of creation belongs to the Christian God in this case, not mankind. Victor’s idea of his “ability to give life” is thus consider rather radical in the age of monarchism and religion. Shelley uses this method to bring out the possible horrors of science’s progressiveness in men who possess radical minds. All of these radical fears preside in Victor Frankenstein’s image.
The portrayal of both Frankenstein and his creature were used as a symbolic method to vaguely represent the social fears during and after the time period. The mix of both radicalism and religious imagery produces this horrific product that acts like all men, but his origins was a true upset of nature’s tranquility. In essence, the creature would be considered as unnatural as his creator’s mind is.
The advancement of science has inspired many science fiction stories and films. In particular is the nuclear horror, Godzilla, where a mutant creature from the prehistoric era suddenly reappears in Japanese waters to trample over major cities. Just because Godzilla is a prehistoric creature doesn't make him science fiction, but it's his origins that does. The story goes on to explain that Godzilla was a product of mankind's ignorant use of nuclear weapons. Both resulting in environmental damages and untold consequences that man isn't willing to accept. Similar to Frankenstein's creature's origins, it's a ultimate upset of nature's tranquility as neither specimen should exist in the first place. The natural world has many methods for equilibrium. The food chain, the cycle of life, and the cycle of terrain. An upset would be when these are all disturbed. Godzilla sets a city ablaze and Frankenstein's monster was made from dead human parts.
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