Final: Monster as a Slave

Frankenstein vs. the Abolition of Slavery, or the Monster as a Slave

One of the most basic ideas of Romanticism is “spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.” Considering its importance to the Romantic period, when one is unable to express himself, the consequences are felt across the board. The slaves, who were brought to England, from either Africa or the West Indies, were not given the chance to understand or learn the culture or language of those around them. With this inability to comprehend comes frustration, which leads to violence or pain. With the example of the monster from Frankenstein, when one can concur that before understanding language, the monster from Frankenstein was, quite frankly, a slave to those around him. In effect, he was the Romantic example of a Slave; he was finally able to understand what had happened to him and explain it to others, after he gained knowledge and reasoning.

The fear of the “other” comes from not understand, on the part of the ... non-other (?). He is refuses to teach his subordinate the common language, but also refuses to learn his opposite’s language.

In Volume II, Chapter III, the monster relates to Victor how he felt after his creation.

“A strange multiplicity of sensations seized me, and I saw, felt, heard, and smelt, at the same time; and it was, indeed, a long time before I learned to distinguish between the operations of my various senses (Shelly 96).”

The monster goes on to explain how it seemed Darkness surrounded him, before he was brought into the light. His senses are awakened and he is able to experience the world around him. This couldn’t have been a simple adjustment, just as the transition from their native land, to the crowded ship, before entering the air of a foreign land could have been easy for the slaves. Falconbridge explains how close the slaves were on the ship in saying, “they are frequently stowed so close, as to admit of no other posture than lying on their sides.” Being in such confined spaces limits the invasion of light and fresh air. What’s interesting about both of these instances is how they are described. If the monster was unable to explain what he experienced to Victor, Shelly’s story would be incomplete and the monster’s point of view would not be examined. Such is the case with the point of view of the slave. We would not understand the harsh circumstances they had to endure, or compare it to works of Literature.

While the abolitionists stand proudly on the side of fairness, the proponents are equally erect about their side of the issue. To push an economy, especially in 1700s, is by labor and force. For a time there were animals to power the system, before the physical strength of man was preferred. Interestingly, as Ouobna O. Cugoano points out, the Black People employed would be "as useful in the sugar colonies as any other class of men that could be found." Obviously, this was not case as the people chosen were not from "civilized" countries, but those in areas not up to the social standard of the more polished European.

The ability to take another as a slave or any level of submission is easier done when that person is considered as the "other." In the issue with the Operation Iraqi Freedom and the War on Terror, Americans are able to consider the enemy as the "other" in an effort to desensitize them. For the monster from Frankenstein, it was much simple to consider him nonhuman based on his looks. [Of course, because the monster was built from the pieces of human, by default, wouldn’t he be human?] He looked nothing like what the people of Victor’s time looked liked. His proportions were bigger and he wasn’t created like others were. This way of identifying the monster is similar to how Europeans must have felt about the Black People of the West Indies and Africa. These were people that honestly looked nothing like their neighbors or employers. If language would have been the common link, because the physical similarities had failed, the Europeans had nothing to relate to their “employees” with.

Romantics pushed for the freedom of the mind, so that the body could be free. With the bond of slavery, more than just the physical was chained; the mental and thus, the spiritual was also taken captive. When the slave is unable to learn or understand literature or language, in general, he is more than just as physical slave; he becomes submissive under the rule of the educated around him. For example, the monster from Frankenstein was able to articulate his story and what he understands from what has happened to him, only after he understands the English language and has read Paradise Lost, Plutarch's Lives and the Sorrows of Young Werther. He takes certain things he has learned and applies them to real life by watching a family unit operate. It’s as if Frankenstein has a rhema, or revelation, after having studied the logos, or written word, by seeing the words from the pages of his books come alive before him.

I’ve read Frankenstein every semester for the past three years, including the final year of high school, and every year I get a different reading. From the feminist reading of how Victor’s life went ridiculously wrong because of the absence of a woman in the monster’s “birth” to the much more reader friendly reading of taking responsibility for what you creates or it will literally chase you to the grave. Each time, I gain something more and such is no different with the more Romantic reading of Shelly’s Frankenstein. To compare the monster to the slaves during the Romantic Period, and those of more modern times, has opened the idea of gaining knowledge and understanding in order to share it and further examine, and explain, the self.