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How Shelley Essay Example

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How Shelley Essay Example
How does Shelley’s presentation of the creature in Frankenstein enlist our sympathies for him? Explore these sympathies, with reference to Brave new World.

There are many ways that Shelley presents the Creature in Frankenstein, and in many ways, we’re driven to dislike the Creature, for example, in chapter sixteen when he strangles William in the forest – “Frankenstein! You belong then to my enemy… you shall be my first victim... my heart swelled with exultation and hellish triumph”. The self-description that the Creature gives us is one of a murderer, therefore, we’re driven to dislike him at this point; firstly, because he kills William out of cold blood, and secondly he says that his heart swelled with hellish triumph. Hell is affiliated with sin, and so leads us to believe the Creature is some sort of monster.

However, Mary Shelley’s main objective was to encourage us to feel sympathy for the monster, and she does this in many ways.
Firstly, and more obviously, we feel sympathy for the creature because his father left him alone. It’s hard growing up without a father figure, and Shelley also portrays Victor Frankenstein as being abusive towards the Creature when he is ‘born’: “I beheld the wrench - the miserable monster that I had created… one arm was stretched out… but I escaped” This tells us that Frankenstein was actually shocked by his creation, not pleased; and instead of nurturing it, he actually runs from it and threatens it with a wrench; even though it was trying to learn about the world around him, and feel Victor.

In Brave New World, Huxley enlists our sympathy for John, the ‘savage’, because he doesn’t really have a parental figure. His mother’s described as being ‘so fat’, her two front teeth missing, and that she ‘smelt too horrible’. This tells that his mother, Linda, was an alcoholic, and that she’s either ruined her body through drinking, or gave birth to John at a very old age. Therefore, John probably wasn’t brought up properly,

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