Preview

Victor Frankenstein, to an extent, is a tragic hero. Do you agree to with this statement?

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
481 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Victor Frankenstein, to an extent, is a tragic hero. Do you agree to with this statement?
In Frankenstein also known as The Modern Prometheus, the protagonist, Victor Frankenstein, to an extent is a tragic hero. This is because it follows some of the many common traits of a typical Aristotelian tragic hero. These include how the Frankenstein is lead to his downfall due to his excessive pride. Other points include how Frankenstein, the hero discovered his fate by his own actions and also how he saw and understood his demise, and that his fate was because of his own actions. The last point is how he was physically and emotionally scarred of his experience. These points all point to the philosophy of Aristotle and his belief of what a typical tragic hero should have if it is to be a tragedy.

Firstly, Victor Frankenstein shows the trait of how he leads to his downfall due to his excessive pride in his work of making a dead person coming back alive. With his determination and knowledge, he speedily creates his monster at the cost of his personal health and family time. Victor's choice of utilizing his time to build the monster shows how his pride to become the first person to bring the deadalive again is his first major flaw in the story. This is one of the many points that lead to an average Aristotelian tragic hero.

Secondly, Victor discovers his fate by his own actions, especially when he learns of his entire family's deaths and finally acts to stop the monster and get his revenge, however he acts too late as all his loved ones are killed, which brought him to his own demise as he chases the monster through the wildness for many years. This is a common trait found in many tragic stories and one of the many features that concludes that Victor, to an extent is himself an Aristotelian tragic hero.

The last point that Victor Frankenstein has that is part of being a typical Aristotelian tragic hero is that he is both physically and emotionally scarred of his experience as he loses his life in his attempt to destroy his monster. This shows how he wishes to

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein presents that Victor’s creation is a monster and that is not true. The true monster in this story is Dr. Victor Frankenstein. Victor had one goal in creating his creature and that was to gain fame and to gain praise from his creation. The one difference that separates Victor and the Creature apart is that Victor thought that the creature was still evil in the end, but the creature realized that what he had done was…

    • 370 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Composed during the Industrial Revolution at a time of increased scientific experimentation, Shelley warns and forebodes her enlightened society of the consequences which come about from playing god. She uses Victor Frankenstein as her platform, whose self-exalting line “many excellent natures would owe their being to me” represents a society engrossed with reanimation. Recurring mythical allusions to Prometheus, “how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge” portray Victor as a tragic hero; a noble character whose “fatal flaw” of blind ambition ultimately results in his own downfall and dehumanization, “swallowed up every habit of my nature”. In addition, Victor’s impulsive rejection of his grotesque creation, leads to the Monster’s rebellion (“vowed eternal hated and vengeance to all mankind”).…

    • 626 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Victor’s selfishness is the cause of his biggest setback of being the creator of a monster rank with distain for anything with a heart that casts it aside. Early on in the story, Victor’s thirst for knowledge and ambition to create new life is quenched, but not enough for him to be proud of it. Victor’s self-centeredness is portrayed in his reaction to producing his worst nightmare in the form of a new life: (Shelley 35)…

    • 969 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Is Victor Frankenstein a victim of circumstance, or is he responsible for his own destruction. In the early pages of the book, Victor already tells Walton and the reader that he is enticed by world and won’t give up on his dream of being successful in science, “The world was to me a secret, which I desired to discover” (Volume 1 Chapter 1 pg.20). Victor explains to Walton how he enjoyed the recollections of his childhood before hardship had soiled his mentality; he altered his future because of his obsession with Natural Philosophy, which would later lead from obsession to repugnance and the reader gets a sense of this as he narrates in and out of his story with little bits and pieces of negative words like his “misery”, or his “fate”.…

    • 3053 Words
    • 13 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Macbeth is the protagonist in the play “Macbeth” by William Shakespeare; He is a tragic hero causing himself pain from his own flaws, leading to his death. Where as Frankenstein’s monster, the creation of the protagonist Victor in “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley is a noble savage, an outsider and the innate goodness of humanity when free from the corrupting influence of civilization. With out this corruption he would have been a civilized, wonderful individual. This opinion and the statements above are supported in the following essay with quotes and texts from the two different novels.…

    • 682 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Frankenstein fits the elements of an Aristotelian tragedy by portraying Victor as a tragic hero with a tragic flaw of craving knowledge, which conclusively leads to his ultimate downfall and…

    • 612 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    You can’t tell what someone is like just by looking at him. Yes, you would definitely call Victor’s creation a monster if you saw him walking down the road, but would you call the average joe Victor a monster, also? They may not look alike, but they both have negative characteristics that make them appear to be a monster figure. In my perspective, Victor is more of the monster in this story. No, he didn’t kill anyone, but he abandoned his creation and left him lonely and in exile. Victor had a responsibility based upon these actions, but he neglected the emotional impact, and therefore many lives were destroyed due to his neglect. This affected him tremendously. Victor’s creation can be compared to Grendel in the story Grendel. The creation appears to be some murderous monster, but in reality, just wants acceptance and companions. Acceptance and companionship, things at the very core of humanity, were never considered by Victor. How could he possibly have ignored these basic needs as he moved further into his…

    • 659 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein and his horrid creation had various aspects in common that one might not notice. Despite the fact that the two parted ways they still shared parallel similarities between one another. These similarities would eventually lead to the downfall of both characters in the end of the novel due to the choices they made throughout the book.…

    • 788 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein Victor’s abandonment of his own creation is ironic and hypocritical because he was raised surrounded by a loving and caring family. His attitudes reveals the prejudice side of human nature, and how people can easliy move on or reject the things we love or create. There is a lot about human nature in dislking what does not look like us, the fact that the creature does not look human is the main reason for his ostracization.…

    • 406 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Victor Frankenstein’s constant state of illness after something unpleasant occurs is his means of escape, of ignoring the critical mistakes that he slowly realized was the result of his creation. After creating the monster, Victor realized that the monster is terribly gruesome in terms of appearance, focusing on his image rather than his character: “A mummy again endued with animation could not be so hideous as that wretch” (Shelley 52). He subsequently fell ill because he could not confront his failure and tries to avoid his responsibilities: “I nearly sank to the ground through languor and extreme weakness” (Shelley 52). Victor is weak for being unable to process and accept what he had done. This is continuous throughout the novel, revealing…

    • 262 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    In the book Frankenstein, Mary Shelley, secretly blames Victor throughout the course of the novel as the cause of his own suffering and pain. Victor ultimately is the one and only monster within the novel because of relationship that has built between him and the monster. Victor Frankenstein has created a monster that throughout the novel harms him because of his lack of responsibility and selfishness. The monster commits a number of different crimes which in return causes Victor to view him as the true monster however if Victor wasn’t so self- concerned with achieving his own goals, he would have seen the negative effects of the way he treated the monster earlier then he did.…

    • 1761 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Sympathy In Frankenstein

    • 2094 Words
    • 9 Pages

    The speech, effect on others, and thoughts of Frankenstein and his creation are powerful tools in their characterisations, and allow the reader to sustain their sympathies for the two. Throughout the novel, we are introduced to the idea that there is a distinction between “Victor” and “Frankenstein,” Victor being the ‘good’ side of him. This is done through the contrast in Frankenstein at the beginning of the novel and after he has reanimated his creation. An example of this is when Victor leaves for university and Frankenstein returns home.…

    • 2094 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Victor payed the price for his volatile ambition and his thirst for forbidden knowledge. He was doomed to a terrible fate when he began his academics and search for greatness because if he decided to be a common man all the misfortune that came to him would have never occurred. The danger of knowledge is very prominent in Frankenstein and is the beginning of all Victor’s…

    • 392 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Victor Frankenstein wanted to become this eccentric scientist who conquers death in bringing eternal life to mankind by creating a different form in his vision. With him using his knowledge as power to portray God, Victor never asks himself if he should, but only if he could. In the book of Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein claimed to be creating the monster for the betterment of humankind. He did it out of arrogance, or out of a desire to become like God. Victor not only created life, but destroyed many by becoming the monster that he created through his sinful attempt to be God to only fail by abandoning his creation.…

    • 589 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Frankestein and tragedy

    • 877 Words
    • 3 Pages

    First, it should have a plot where the outcome depends almost entirely on a cause and effect set of reactions. Each action unavoidably leading to the next action without any outside intervention. In Frankenstein, the very first cause would most likely be that Victor loved natural philosophy. Therefore, the very first event that set the whole chain of cause and effect off is when Victor first found a book concerning the works of Cornelius Agrippa at an inn near Thonon. Since Victor loved studying natural philosophy, he did not listen to his father and instead read the book that started him on his spiral of misfortune. Even Victor believes that this point might have been where his descent started. “I should certainly have thrown Agrippa aside…It is even possible that the train of my ideas would never have received the fatal impulse that lead to my ruin.” (pg. 40) Throughout the rest of the tale the story says many times that because of something another thing happened, specifically to Victor. Such as when he first entered the university. Because he had a professor that he did not like he went to another professor that he did like. Because he went to the professor he did like he got back into his old studies of Agrippa and Paracelsus. Because he got back into his old studies he thought about reanimating the dead, etc.…

    • 877 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays