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Frankenstein: Getting to Know Victor 17657 Views


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Description:

Is Victor Frankenstein a: Romantic Hero? b: Byronic Hero? c: Satanic Hero? d: Guitar Hero? All of the above (but maybe not D…) We don’t know what any of these terms mean, so let’s just watch the video


Transcript

00:01

We speak student!

00:03

It's alive!

00:05

[ sobbing ]

00:06

In the name of God,

00:08

now I know what it feels like to be God!

00:14

Frankenstein a la Shmoop

00:15

Getting to Know Victor

00:17

Is Victor Frankenstein a Romantic hero?

00:22

Yes. Short answer, yes.

00:24

He is kind of the perfect Romantic hero.

00:27

He is brooding.

00:29

He's torn - "Did I do the right thing?

00:32

Should I go back and help the monster?

00:34

I don't know what to do."

00:35

Totally torn. He's torn up about his family and everything.

00:38

He also kind of has a

00:40

healthy-ish sense of self-importance about him,

00:43

which is another part of the Romantic hero.

00:45

These guys have egos on them.

00:47

This guy thought he could create life.

00:49

He, as you said before, played God.

00:51

He also embodies the Romantic hero

00:54

in that he is inspired by nature.

00:57

And he kind of has these --

00:58

He describes them as these visions of nature

01:00

where he goes out into it

01:01

and he realizes the sublime.

01:04

The sublime is -- It actually kind of has never really been defined.

01:08

No one's ever agreed on what it means,

01:10

but generally, it's that when you go out into nature

01:13

and you get this awe-inspired feeling

01:16

that you can't get anywhere else.

01:18

That's the sublime.

01:19

And that's what happens when Victor is out in nature

01:22

and looking out at the bigger world.

01:25

He gets this sense of it's greater than him.

01:28

What is a Byronic hero?

01:31

Romantic hero is kind of synonymous with Byronic hero.

01:34

You remember that name.

01:36

"Byron" from Lord Byron, who was actually the one

01:38

who was like, "Hey, we should write ghost stores."

01:41

So, thank you, Lord Byron, for Frankenstein.

01:44

And we call it a Byronic hero

01:46

because it's -- He kind of created this idea

01:50

of the ideal Romantic hero.

01:52

Different from The Six Million Dollar Man, by the way,

01:55

- for those of you who remember that. - Bionic.

01:56

Keep going.

01:57

[ laughs ]

01:58

So, as I mentioned all these things before,

02:01

but who just basically sees the world as bigger than himself,

02:05

but also is kind of rebellious,

02:08

like I mentioned, arrogant, et cetera.

02:10

You start to kind of add all of these pieces together,

02:13

and you end up with Satan.

02:15

So Romantic hero, Byronic hero, Satanic hero -

02:20

all kind of synonymous.

02:22

We'll talk a little bit more about that in later lessons

02:25

of how, you know, we can see the kind of

02:28

God/Adam/Satan situation playing out in Frankenstein.

02:32

That actually makes a lot of sense because Dante

02:34

would have been a big influence in these writers

02:36

who are early 1800s.

02:39

There's Shakespeare, Dante, Canterbury Tales.

02:42

There wasn't a lexicography of literature

02:44

the way there is today where you, you know,

02:45

have tons of great writers to read.

02:47

Right, exactly. And it's actually, in Frankenstein,

02:50

the particular influence is John Milton with Paradise Lost.

02:52

And we'll talk about that a little bit more.

02:57

How would you classify Victor Frankenstein?

03:01

What is a Romantic hero?

03:03

What is a Byronic hero?

03:07

Not ironic hero, Byronic.

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