Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Frankenstein |
FrankensteinNoun1. An agency that escapes control and destroys its creator. 2. The monster created by Frankenstein in a gothic novel by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (the creator's name is commonly used to refer to his creation). 3. The fictional Swiss scientist who was the protagonist in a gothic novel by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley; he created a monster from parts of corpses. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "Frankenstein" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1818. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Literature | Frankenstein (3 syl.). A young student, who made a soulless monster out of fragments of men picked up from churchyards and dissecting-rooms, and endued it with life by galvanism. The tale, written by Mrs. Shelley, shows how the creature longed for sympathy, but was shunned by everyone. It was only animal life, a parody on the creature man, powerful for evil, and the instrument of dreadful retribution on the student, who usurped the prerogative of the Creator. "The Southern Confederacy will be the soulless monster of Frankenstein." - Charles Sumner. Mrs. Shelley, unfortunately, has given no name to her monster, and therefore he is not unfrequently called "Frankenstein" when alluded to. This, of course, is an error, but Frankenstein's monster is a clumsy substitute. "I believe it would be impossible to control the Frankenstein we should have ourselves created." - Sir John Lubbock (a speech, 1886). Source: Brewer's Dictionary. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus is a novel by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. First published on March 11, 1818 (but more often read in the revised and corrected third edition, published in 1831), it is an early example of science fiction. Some (led by Brian Aldiss) claim that it is the first science fiction novel.
Warning: Wikipedia contains spoilers.
Plot
Curious and intelligent from a young age, Victor Frankenstein leaves his beloved family in Switzerland to study science in Germany. In a moment of inspiration, Frankenstein discovers the means by which inanimate matter can be imbued with life (when the book was written, science had a very imperfect understanding of the difference between living and dead matter). With great drive and fervor, he sets about constructing a creature -- intended as a companion, perhaps -- from various materials including cadavers.He intended the creature to be beautiful, but when the creature awoke, he was disgusted. Its yellow eyes, rough stitching, large size -- Frankenstein found this revolting and although the creature expressed him no harm (in fact it grinned at him), Frankenstein ran out of the room in terror. He returned home to his family.
Back home in Switzerland, all is quiet for six months, and then something terrible happens: Frankenstein's brother is killed. Justine, the family's maid, is framed for the murder. Then, Frankenstein meets with his creation, while walking through the mountains.
The creature is strikingly eloquent, and describes his feelings first of confusion, then rejection and hate. He explains how he learnt how to talk by studying a family through a crack in the wall. He performs many kind deeds for this family, in secret, but in the end they drive him away when they see what he looks like. He gets the same response from any human who sees him. Wanting revenge, he seeks out Victor, kills his brother, and frames Justine. But now, the creature only wants one thing: he begs Frankenstein to create a female companion for him.
At first, Frankenstein agrees, but later, he tears up the half-made companion in disgust. In retribution, the creature kills the remainder of his family, his best friend, and his fiancée. Frankenstein now becomes the hunter: he pursues the creature into the arctic ice, but in vain -- he dies without managing to catch him. Finally, the creature finds Frankenstein dead, and greatly laments what he has done to his maker. The creature vows to commit suicide and leaves.
Genesis
During the snowy summer of 1816, the "Year Without A Summer", the world was locked in in a long cold volcanic winter responsible for the deaths of million caused by the eruption of Tambora in 1815. In this terrible year, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and her husband Percy Bysshe Shelley visited Lord Byron in Switzerland. After reading an anthology of German ghost stories, Byron challenged the Shelleys and his personal physician John William Polidori to each compose a story of their own. Of the four, only Polidori completed a story. Mary conceived an idea, and this was the germ of Frankenstein.It is worth noting that Byron managed to write a fragment based on the vampire legends he heard while traveling the Balkans. Polidori used this fragment to create the novel The Vampyre (1819), which is the origin of all subsequent vampire literature. Thus, the Frankenstein and vampire themes were created from that single circumstance.
Themes
The novel is subtitled 'The Modern Prometheus', and this suggests the book's major inspiration. Byron was particularly attached to the play Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus, and Percy Shelley would soon write Prometheus Unbound. In addition, Shelley's portrayal of the monster owes much to the character of Satan in John Milton's Paradise Lost. This poem was one of the most popular among young poets of the time, and Shelley even allows the monster himself to read it.Frankenstein is in some ways allegorical, and was conceived and written during an early phase of the Industrial Revolution, at a time of dramatic change. Behind Frankenstein's experiments is the search for ultimate power or godhood: what greater power could there be than the act of creation of life? Frankenstein and his utter disregard for the human and animal remains gathered in his pursuit of power can be taken as symbolic of the rampant forces of laissez-faire capitalism extant at the time and their basic disregard for human dignity. Moreover, the creation rebels against its creator: a clear message that irresponsible uses of technologies can have unconsidered consequences.
NB. In current usage, Frankenstein is often incorrectly used to refer to Frankenstein's monster rather than to its creator.
Name probably taken from German name of a village Frankenstein (nowadays Zabkowice Slaskie in Poland), where silver and gold used to be mined and tremendous killing reek was around due to chemicals used.
Film adaptations
The first film of Frankenstein was made in 1910.
The "classic" film from 1931 stars Boris Karloff as the monster and was directed by James Whale. The film has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry, as has its first sequel, Bride of Frankenstein, also directed by Whale. Later efforts rapidly degenerated into farce. The films have occasionally been parodied, a notable example being Mel Brooks' comedy Young Frankenstein, which borrows heavily from Whale's two Frankenstein films, including the use of Whale's original laboratory set pieces and the technical services of their original creator, Kenneth Strickfaden.
External link
- Project Gutenberg e-text of Frankenstein
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Frankenstein."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Frankenstein is a 1931 horror film based on the work by Mary Shelley. The film tells the story of a scientist named Dr. Henry (Victor in the novel) Frankenstein whose work takes him into the dark side of life after death. It stars Colin Clive, Mae Clarke, John Boles and Boris Karloff (billed only with a question mark in the opening credits).The movie was adapted by John L. Balderston, Francis Edward Faragoh, Garrett Fort, Robert Florey (uncredited) and John Russell (uncredited) from the Shelly novel and the play by Peggy Webling. It was directed by James Whale and has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.
Frankenstein was followed by the 1935 sequel Bride of Frankenstein.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Frankenstein (1931)."
Synonym: FrankensteinSynonym: Frankenstein's monster (n). (additional references) |
Crosswords: Frankenstein |
| English words defined with "Frankenstein": Frankenstein's monster. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "Frankenstein": fas. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | Well, don't look at me like I'm frickin' Frankenstein, give your father a hug. (Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery; writing credit: Mike Myers.) Oh! Frankenstein! (Yellow Submarine; writing credit: Al Brodax; Jack Mendelsohn) Well America, there you have it, Frankenstein has just been attacked by the French Air Force and he's whipped their derrieres (Death Race 2000; writing credit: Ib Melchior; Robert Thom) And I'm the bride of Frankenstein. (Rockula; writing credit: Luca Bercovici; Jefery Levy) Dr. Frankenstein (Young Frankenstein; writing credit: Mary Shelley; Gene Wilder) | |
Movie/TV Titles | Allen and Rossi Meet Dracula and Frankenstein (1974) Flesh for Frankenstein (1974) Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1974) Santo y Blue Demon contra el doctor Frankenstein (1974) Young Frankenstein (1974) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
Books |
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Theater & Movies | |||
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | Dr. Frankenstein and his monster. Credit: Library of Congress. |  | Frankenstein. Credit: Library of Congress. |
 | Wien. The new opera-house / Photo. von Frankenstein. Credit: Library of Congress. |  | Frankenstein Cliff & Mt. Washington, Crawford Notch, White Mts., N.H. Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| "Frankenstein" is generally used as a noun (proper) -- approximately 99.49% of the time. "Frankenstein" is used about 196 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (proper) | 99.49% | 195 | 21,939 |
| Noun (singular) | 0.51% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Total | 100.00% | 196 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
| The following table summarizes the usage of "Frankenstein" based on a population census conducted in the United States. Ranks and frequencies are based on all names reported and classified. |
| Name | Usage/Gender | Usage per 100 million Persons | Rank in USA |
| Frankenstein | Last name | 170 | 51,814 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits. | |||
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "Frankenstein": frankenstein-inspired. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
Misspellings | |
"Frankenstein" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Brandenstein, Falkenstein, Francinstein. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-e-e-f-i-k-n-n-n-r-s-t" | |
-3 letters: ankerites, freakiest, tanneries. | |
-4 letters: ankerite, anserine, arenites, arsenite, entrains, fainters, fakeries, fastener, fenestra, ferniest, frankest, infantes, infester, intenser, internes, keratins, kernites, nankeens, ratfinks, refasten, resinate, sneakier, stearine, trainees. | |
-5 letters: aeriest, afreets, anestri, antsier, arenite, earnest, eastern, ensnare, entires, entrain, entries, etesian, faeries, fainest, fainter, fairest, fakeers, fanners, fannies, feaster, freesia, frisket, inanest, infante. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)46 72 61 6E 6B 65 6E 73 74 65 69 6E |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
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| American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)
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| Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)
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| Braille (1829, in France) (references)
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Morse Code (1836) (references)..-. .-. .- -. -.- . -. ... - . .. -. |
| Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)
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Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)01000110 01110010 01100001 01101110 01101011 01100101 01101110 01110011 01110100 01100101 01101001 01101110 |
HTML Code (1990) (references)F r a n k e n s t e i n |
ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)0046 0072 0061 006E 006B 0065 006E 0073 0074 0065 0069 006E |
| British Sign Language (Fingerspelling, BSL; 1992, British Deaf Association Dictionary of British Sign Language) (references)
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Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)408467807771808586717580 |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Images: Photo Album 8. Usage Frequency | 9. Names: Frequency 10. Expressions 11. Expressions: Internet 12. Derivations | 13. Anagrams 14. Orthography 15. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
