Frankenstein
Mary Shelley
Close Analysis: Chapter 2
By Bertrand Kre
“We were brought up together; there was not quite a year difference in our ages. I need not say that we were strangers to any species of disunion or dispute. Harmony was the soul of our companionship, and the diversity and contrast that subsisted in our characters drew us nearer together. Elizabeth was of a calmer and more concentrated disposition; but, with all my ardour, I was capable of a more intense application and was more deeply smitten with the thirst for knowledge. She busied herself with following the aerial creations of the poets; and in the majestic and wondrous scenes which surrounded our Swiss home —the sublime shapes of the mountains, the changes of the seasons, tempest and calm, the silence of winter, and the life and turbulence of our Alpine summers—she found ample scope for admiration and delight. While my companion contemplated with a serious and satisfied spirit the magnificent appearances of things, I delighted in investigating their causes. The world was to me a secret which I desired to divine. Curiosity, earnest research to learn the hidden laws of nature, gladness akin to rapture, as they were unfolded to me, are among the earliest sensations I can remember.”
The passage that I want to do my close analysis on is the first paragraph of the second chapter shown above. This passage draws a very good contrast between two people that have been brought up together but yet see the world in two different light and angle. The author is even trying to emphasize the comparison and drawing us to the same conclusion that he came up with. He said that: “We were brought up together; there was not quite a year difference in our ages.” Therefore, age or background can’t be any reason for their difference of perspective. The contrast according to the author was that, at the difference of him, she was much calmer and more concentrated while he was more driven by his need for knowledge. He goes by proving his position by giving us some elements that led him to the conclusion on the characters contrast. Even though his position and observation seem true about the way he is presented everything, I would say that I will disagree and to support my position, I will invite you to take a look at the last paragraph of the Chapter 1 of the book as follow:
“Everyone loved Elizabeth. The passionate and almost reverential attachment with which all regarded her became, while I shared it, my pride and my delight. On the evening previous to her being brought to my home, my mother had said playfully, “I have a pretty present for my Victor—tomorrow he shall have it.” And when, on the morrow, she presented Elizabeth to me as her promised gift, I, with childish seriousness, interpreted her words literally and looked upon Elizabeth as mine—mine to protect, love, and cherish. All praises bestowed on her I received as made to a possession of my own. We called each other familiarly by the name of cousin. No word, no expression could body forth the kind of relation in which she stood to me—my more than sister, since till death she was to be mine only.”
When you look at the above paragraph, the first sentence shows that the narrator had some jalousie towards Elizabeth and later that feeling become admiration and pride for her. He started that paragraph by saying: “Everyone loved Elizabeth.” That is a very short sentence but yet full of revelation. It shows us that the author couldn’t possibly make sense to the reason why everybody would like her that much over him, when he is the one with the wealth and from one of the most important family in Geneva (You can see this in the first sentence of the first paragraph of chapter 1). And he continued by using “became” on the second sentence what means that his initial feeling has changed. Look at how the author used “my home” in the third sentence. He could have said, my family’s home (or house), but he said “my home”. This shows that he wants to be the center of every attention trying whenever he can to marginalize the important of other. It’s almost as if he wanted to say this is my world and everyone else is just trying to fit in. He is really arrogant and egocentric as we can see in what he said next: “All praises bestowed on her I received as made to a possession of my own.” This tells us that despite his social class, the author wasn’t really praise or glorified by anybody and you can tell that he was dying to have people bow down in front of him. He was trying to satisfy his unsatisfied thirst for glory by making his, what wasn’t. He decided to look at any praise to Elizabeth as praise to himself. How pity that can be? He should just consider coming down of his pedestal and be human for once and someone might take a look at him in a positive way. Luckily, that paragraph ended on better notes because you can almost see a transformation in the author’s character, mood, and tone and this transformation should be attributed to Elizabeth. He seems reincarnated to a new life with her giving him all this love. We can definitely see that he was deeply touched by her. He stated:
“We called each other familiarly by the name of cousin. No word, no expression could body forth the kind of relation in which she stood to me—my more than sister, since till death she was to be mine only.”
Those two first chapters of the book definitely can be merged into a single one because to really understand the deep meaning of the author’s words, we need to take a look at the big picture and everything will come to life. So the contrast that the author was trying to show actually revealed the way he was looking at Elizabeth once. He came back to a better sense by realizing that she wasn’t a competitor, but someone who made him better by having a different look at the world. In a way, the author is trying to tell us that we should not always try to find the meaning of things because we will miss the big picture and therefore miss the beauty of life.
--Bertrandkre (talk) 22:47, 23 April 2009 (UTC)
