Future Frankenstein Posts
Nov. 10th, 2022 01:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
grayestofghostsI suppose I don’t have to actually ask for permission from anyone here but I’m thinking at the very least reposting the literary analysis essays I’ve posted on tumblr on the novel Frankenstein here, and maybe some notes/excerpts from my large Frankenstein project here once I have any.
I saw a post on twitter wondering about when we were getting “The transmasculine Whipping Girl” and though I don’t really think this is the next Whipping Girl per se, the thesis of the project (which I was thinking of as a book, then a site, but now I’m back to book again) as being how Victor Frankenstein is widely villainized for having the same problems as modern transmasculine people, and the reason why these problems are seen as unsympathetic is because he is silenced both inside and outside the book and assumed to be incapable of having these specific problems as a man. This project was put on hold, in large part because even with JSTOR access research was very hard because I don’t know how to do it. For example, somehow even for a major character of a famous 200 year old novel, trying to search for “Victor Frankenstein Disability” only dredged up analyses of the creature as an abandoned, disabled child and nothing about the main narrator who is constantly bedridden, collapsing, hallucinating, etc. to the point of dying at 27 years old.
I know there’s still research to be done but some other writers have encouraged me to go do it anyway because I might actually be the first person to say these things. I don’t feel that’s especially likely and feel like it would be embarassing not to cite them, but maybe I should go on anyway.
I saw a post on twitter wondering about when we were getting “The transmasculine Whipping Girl” and though I don’t really think this is the next Whipping Girl per se, the thesis of the project (which I was thinking of as a book, then a site, but now I’m back to book again) as being how Victor Frankenstein is widely villainized for having the same problems as modern transmasculine people, and the reason why these problems are seen as unsympathetic is because he is silenced both inside and outside the book and assumed to be incapable of having these specific problems as a man. This project was put on hold, in large part because even with JSTOR access research was very hard because I don’t know how to do it. For example, somehow even for a major character of a famous 200 year old novel, trying to search for “Victor Frankenstein Disability” only dredged up analyses of the creature as an abandoned, disabled child and nothing about the main narrator who is constantly bedridden, collapsing, hallucinating, etc. to the point of dying at 27 years old.
I know there’s still research to be done but some other writers have encouraged me to go do it anyway because I might actually be the first person to say these things. I don’t feel that’s especially likely and feel like it would be embarassing not to cite them, but maybe I should go on anyway.
no subject
Date: 2022-11-11 03:30 am (UTC)I'd love to see the notes for your project. Your tumblr posts about Frankenstein have been interesting, I want to reread the novel with them in mind.
I also think you should go ahead with the project; if there is other writing someone might be able to find you more easily than you could find them and they could direct you to what you were seeking. I'm looking forward to reading more Frankenstein analysis from you.
no subject
Date: 2022-11-11 05:11 am (UTC)If I don't get a significant amount of my notes up before your next reading of the book, I will say this:
it's very obvious that Victor is an unreliable narrator with his emotional extremes and because of this nearly all readings of him give him the most uncharitable interpretation as possible. However I think there are two important things that all these uncharitable readings miss:
1) Victor finds the creature completely loathsome despite the creature's actual character, so his assessment of the other people around him are unlikely to be accurate either, and
2) people are far more likely to insist they are well when they're actually sick than to claim they are sick when they're not.