Cadernos de apoio

- Engagement:

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- Have you ever heard about Frankenstein? Who is it? What do you know about it?

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Pay attention to the videos your teacher will show you and discover a little bit more about the creature!

 

- Ladies and gentlemen…:

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- Frankenstein allows its readers to perform different readings. It can be both associated with the social problems brought by Industrial Revolution – and their emotional outputs – and to the concept of creation evidencing the creator-creatures´ relationship. Furthermore, it is also considered by some a sample of how mankind perverts the nature and society perverts the pure, without mentioning the warning towards the progress of science and its moral implications.

 

- Read it:

 

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It was on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet. It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs. How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch whom with such infinite pains and care I had endeavoured to form? His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful! Great God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips. The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature. I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. Unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room and continued a long time traversing my bedchamber, unable to compose my mind to sleep. At length lassitude succeeded to the tumult I had before endured, and I threw myself on the bed in my clothes, endeavouring to seek a few moments of forgetfulness. But it was in vain; I slept, indeed, but I was disturbed by the wildest dreams (SHELLEY, 2014, p. 58).

 

- Pay attention to:

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- Afraid of the possible outcomings of his creation, the scientist runs away, being chased by a creature that aims to find its creator due to blaming him for all its misfortunes. What do you think will happen to them?

 

-…As well:

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- About subject and language, what else can you think of?

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- What about today?:

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- Follow your teacher´s instructions and have fun while learning!

 

- LANGUATURE:

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- Pay attention to the following sentences:

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His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful.

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[…] but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished.

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Unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room.

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Very formally written by the scientist, the testimonial allows us to learn two different verb tenses: the Past Perfect and the Past Simple. But what do they mean?

 

Past Perfect

 

had selected

had finished

had created

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Past Simple

 

were

vanished

rushed

 

- Text-web (Read, watch and listen):

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Paradise Lost (John Milton, 1667, epic poem about the creation and falling of men) – three of its verses appear in Frankentstein´s epigraph, and, in the story, is one of the books read by the creature.

 

Of Man’s first disobedience, and the fruit

Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste

Brought death into the World, and all our woe,

With loss of Eden, till one greater Man

Restore us, and regain the blissful seat,

Sing, Heavenly Muse, that, on the secret top

Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire

That shepherd who first taught the chosen seed

In the beginning how the heavens and earth

Rose out of Chaos: or, if Sion hill

Delight thee more, and Siloa’s brook that flowed

Fast by the oracle of God, I thence

Invoke thy aid to my adventurous song,

That with no middle flight intends to soar

Above th’ Aonian mount, while it pursues

Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme.

Who first seduced them to that foul revolt?

Th’ infernal Serpent; he it was whose guile,

Stirred up with envy and revenge, deceived

The mother of mankind, what time his pride

Had cast him out from Heaven, with all his host

Of rebel Angels, by whose aid, aspiring

To set himself in glory above his peers,

He trusted to have equalled the Most High,

If he opposed, and with ambitious aim

Against the throne and monarchy of God,

Raised impious war in Heaven and battle proud,

With vain attempt. Him the Almighty Power

Hurled headlong flaming from th’ ethereal sky,

With hideous ruin and combustion, down

To bottomless perdition, there to dwell

In adamantine chains and penal fire,

Who durst defy th’ Omnipotent to arms.

(MILTON, 2014, p. 2)

 

The myth of Prometheus is also present – remember that the title is “Frankenstein or the modern Prometheus”:

 

The tragic and rebel Titans´descendent Prometheus (whose name means “forethought”) is a Greek myth that has been heavily absorbed by western culture. Prometheus had made a creature from clay, and stole the fire hidden in the Olympus in order to provide life to his creation. As a punishment, Zeus sent him Pandora, a beautiful woman who carried a box containing all evil that could be imagined – and she was supposed to spread this evil through earth. However, Prometheus resisted to Pandora´s charm, what made Zeus decide to chain him on a cliff where an eagle came to devour Prometheu´s liver. The liver reconstituted itself duing the night, and, in the following day, the eagle came one more time in an eternal cycle of horror and pain.

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(Disponível em<http://www.portalsaofrancisco.com.br/historia-geral/prometeu>, acesso em 12 dez. 2017. Tradução nossa).

 

- Many adaptations have been filmed:

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Frankenstein (James Whale, Estados Unidos, 1931). Este filme teve um apelo comercial imenso, gerando sequências que cada vez mais se distanciavam da obra de Mary Shelley e constituíam-se em uma franquia de terror. Destacam-se A noiva de Frankenstein (1935), O filho de Frankenstein (1939, dirigido por Rowland W. Lee), O fantasma de Frankenstein (1942, Erie C. Kenton), Frankenstein encontra o Lobisomen (1943) e A casa de Frankenstein (1944);

Frankenstein de Mary Shelley (Kenneth Branagh, Estados Unidos/Inglaterra, 1994).

 

- Other movies have also been inspired in Frankenstein:

Frankweenie (Tim Burton, Estados Unidos, 2012);

Frankenstein – o monstro das trevas (Roger Corman, Estados Unidos, 1990).