Mary Shelley - Cloning

In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the topic of cloning and the moral issues relating to it become prevalent. First of all, the creature in the novel was in essence a human clone. The creature was created by Victor Frankenstein in attempt to help humanity by searching of a way to perpetuate life and eliminate death. Ironically, Victor Frankenstein creates a being that takes life away making him, in a way, the real monster of the story. Mary Shelley explores the mindset of society by portraying the way society treats a product of scientific knowledge,such as the practice of human cloning. Shelley depicts society’s reaction to the creature that Victor Frankenstein created as negative, and displays Victor’s reflections on the problems that his creature creates for him. Shelley’s position on cloning is that the possible “benefits” are not reliable enough to overcome the bad and thus, making the practice of cloning negative. Mary Shelley begins her novel with a well-known quote from John Milton’s Paradise Lost, “Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay/ To mold me Man,/ did I solicit thee from darkness to promote me?” This rhetorical question made by Adam, a creation of God, epitomize the creatures feelings toward his creator, Victor Frankenstein. The creature is comparing himself as to both Adam and Lucifer, or Satan, as he is shunned and left in abandonment by his own creator, though he strives to be good. Because of the isolation and loneliness that the creature had to deal with, it caused him to turn evil and eventually, into a murderer. Eventually, it also led to Victor Frankenstein’s ruin in attempt to rid humanity of the creature when ironically, was for humanity in the first place. This reveals man’s attempt to play God, to create life from nothingness, can lead to horrible results. Mary Shelley’s novel is also reference to as the “Modern Prometheus”. Similarly, Prometheus and Victor Frankenstein both attempted to create something to benefit humanity; however,