Frankenstein Mary Shelley's Struggles

Frankenstein: The Relationship Struggles of Mary Shelley
What secrets hide beneath Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein that make it the subject of such extensive research and discussion by many of the world’s preeminent literary scholars? Is it the elements that make it the first example of what we today call science fiction (Ginn)? Perhaps in part, but the fascination of many with Frankenstein comes not from the story itself, but from the mind of the author who created it. It is thought that Mary Shelley’s writing of her famous novel actually portrays her emotions and struggles at the time (D’Amato 121). Much of the emotional hardship that overshadowed Mary Shelley’s life had to do with her family and with Percy Shelley, her husband
(Ginn).
Mary Shelley loved her father and wanted to be the only one to receive his attention (Badalamenti 421). Later in life she wrote of her “excessive and romantic
Weiner 3 attachment to [her] father” (qtd. in Badalamenti 421). The tension between Mary Shelley and
Clairmont finally became so great that one of the two had to leave. Unfortunately, William Godwin sided with his wife, sending Mary to Scotland in June of 1812 (Badalamenti 428). This first estrangement from her beloved father shows itself in Victor’s trip to Scotland for the creation of the female Creature (Badalamenti 428). Mary Shelley was again estranged from her father when she fell in love with Percy Shelley (Means). Godwin liked Percy, but he did not approve of marriage; in fact, his marriages, or at least his marriage to Mary Wollstonecraft, had only been out of concern for his children’s upbringing (Johnson 250). He wrote angry letters to Percy in attempts to keep his daughter and Percy apart, after having him as an honored guest only a year or two before (Means).
Her father’s scorn towards her relationship to Percy Shelley left Mary miserable, an emotion clearly reflected in the Creature’s depressive statement to Victor: “I am malicious because I am
Awake and find no baby” (Hogsette 539). Mary’s dream denies death, something that Victor seeks to do through his creation of the Creature (Lucas 63). Victor denies death and brings life to his
Creature through a process interpreted as Galvanism; the use of electric current to stimulate nerves in an attempt to excite life (Ginn). Galvanism was a relatively new process in Mary’s time, but it had more influence on her life than might have been normal. Percy Shelley had a great interest in
Galvanism, even since the age of ten, when he began a ten-year cycle of experiments to explore the new process (Badalamenti 428). It is said that he even used the process on his wife Harriet, who committed suicide by drowning herself, a fact not lost to Mary Shelley (Ginn). After Harriet’s death, she wrote, “Poor Harriet, to whose sad fate I attribute so many of my heavy sorrows, as the atonement claimed by fate for her death” (Badalamenti 425).
A great deal of Mary Shelley’s “heavy sorrows” were a result of her relationship with Percy
Shelley. Their relationship was stressed from the beginning due to Mary’s father’s disapproval of their relationship (Means). The real tensions began when Mary gave birth to her first child,