Comparing Frankenstein 'And The Modern Prometheus'

Talia Barnoy
Question 3 Frankenstein written by Mary Shelley tells a tale of a man, Victor Frankenstein, who creates life but at a cost. Victor loses his health as he works to create life and ends up with a murdering creature at whom he can not bear to look. Frankenstein’s subtitle is The Modern Prometheus, for the very reason that the book heavily resembles the myth of Prometheus. Prometheus steals fire from Zeus to give to the humans but ends up chained to a rock. Both stories resemble each other because both Victor and Prometheus disobey the idea of things being only available to Gods and end up facing the consequences, as well as the references to fire. Prometheus is a Greek myth about a titan who helped the Gods of Olympus during their battle against the rest of the titans. He loved humankind and wished to aid them in their fight for survival by giving them fire because he looked down at man and saw them struggling and eating raw meat. Greek mythology differs from Abrahamic, the religion that Frankenstein has, where there are many Gods who stand for their own powers instead of one God having all the power. Zeus, the king of the Gods, prohibited him from teaching humans fire because fire was a Godly thing that
humans could not have and Zeus worried that if the humans had fire they would think more highly of themselves. Prometheus disobeyed him and stole fire to give to the humans. When Zeus found out Prometheus’s traitorous acts, Zeus punished Prometheus to eternal suffering where everyday an eagle would come to eat his liver, and he could do nothing but watch from the rock he was chained to. In Frankenstein, the monster that Victor Frankenstein created described seeing fire for the first time. He was overjoyed to have it’s warmth and “thrust [his] hand into the live embers” (p. 107). Since he was seeing fire for the first time he had no idea what would happen. He found it strange “that the same cause should produce such opposite effects” (p.107). The way he interacted with fire is similar to that of how the humans in the Prometheus myth would interact with it. Suddenly light and warmth appear to the humans, they do not understand how it could possibly be more than one thing at the same time. They would be pleased, like the monster was, to find that “the fire gave light as well as heat” (p.107). Victor has brought this monster into the world as if he were the unknowing human that Prometheus gave fire to. The reference to fire in the story, was why the subtitle is The Modern Prometheus. Both Prometheus and Victor got punished for their defiance of man vs.
God. Victor’s defiance being that he took the creation of life into his own hands, and his punishment being the disappointment of the creature and the state he is left in. The punishments may have been different but for the same reason of them having taken Godly powers and bringing it to humanity. Even though Victor strictly tries not to share his findings when he notes Waltons “eagerness” (page 54) to know how Victor created life, Victor is still considered human and has taken the power of life. The basis for punishment, for Victor and Prometheus, are slightly different. Where victor is punished for being human and thinking of himself as a God, and Prometheus giving Fire to
man.
It is for these similarities of deities and punishment that Mary Shelley called it The Modern Prometheus. Since the myth of Prometheus is from the time of B.C.E. and Frankenstein is from 1818, although now it wouldn’t seem so but, at the time it would’ve been a modern take on the myth. Where Godly power is taken to the humans. Where those who brought it are punished. Where fire takes great symbolism in the story. Where knowledge is brought to humankind. Shelley orchestrated it this way to compare it to Prometheus and give it the subtitle of The Modern Prometheus.