February 24, 2005
Frankenstein: Exhibit stalks truth behind monster mask
For most people, the mere mention of Frankenstein brings up visions of Boris Karloff in monster makeup. But if you read the 1818 novel by Mary Shelley, you find that Frankenstein isn’t the name of the monster; it’s the name of the scientist who creates him in an effort to gain power over nature itself.
No wonder, then, that Frankenstein has become the subject of an exhibit with the subtitle, “Penetrating the Secrets of Nature” — an exhibit that will be coming to Suzzallo Library March 4–April 13. And it all begins with a visit by Mary Shelley herself.
Of course, the real Shelley died in 1851 and won’t be coming back for the occasion. So storyteller Susan Marie Frontczak will portray the author, inviting us into her parlor (the Suzzallo Reading Room) for tea at 7 p.m. Friday, March 4, “1844.”
“I picked 1844 because I wanted it to be a time when Mary could reflect back on the book and on her life,” Frontczak said. “In my presentation I appear in costume and simply talk to the audience as if they were my visitors.”
The program is just the kickoff to a series of events, including four lectures on campus and a film series at the Seattle Public Library. The exhibit will be in 101 Suzzallo. Sponsored by the National Library of Medicine in collaboration with the American Library Association and the National Endowment for the Humanities, it is described as “90 panels that probe the ambitions, fantasies and fears given form in Mary Shelley’s classic tale, Frankenstein, through literary, scientific, ethical, and historical perspectives.”
Most of us, steeped as we are in the Frankenstein movies, think of it as a simple horror story: Monster goes on rampage and kills people. But according to English Professor Richard Dunn, Shelley’s novel is much more than that.
“It’s a book that is full of ideas,” he said. “It has religious, mythic references. On one level it’s a study of prejudice and rejection — the creature gets rejected because of his appearance — and on another level it’s about how human efforts in science and technology can go wrong.”
In fact, Shelley doubtless drew some of her material from scientific experiments going on in her day. Some scientists, for example, were obtaining the corpses of executed criminals and using electrical stimulation to make their muscles twitch and their eyes open. And blood transfusions had only recently been pioneered on hemorrhaging patients. One portion of the exhibit is devoted to the scientific background of Frankenstein.
But along with the science is the historical background and the literature. Mary Shelley’s life was no less dramatic than her novel. The daughter of two writers and intellectuals — William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft — she eloped at 16 with the poet Percy Shelley, who was already married. By the time she was 24 she had borne five children, only one of whom survived, and had lost her husband (Shelley married her after his wife died) in a sailing accident.
The exhibit explores Shelley’s life and the origins of the novel, which started at the suggestion of another poet, Lord Byron, who was a friend of the Shelleys. While they were all in Switzerland, he proposed that they each write a ghost story. As Mary Shelley struggled to think of something, she had what she called a waking dream of Victor Frankenstein struggling to assemble his creature. The novel was published when she was just 20.
Frontczak studied Shelley’s diaries as well as her other novels in an attempt to bring the author to life. A resident of Colorado, she has been a full-time storyteller for 11 years and previously did a program on the scientist Marie Curie.
“I was invited to create this program by another library that was hosting the exhibit, and at first I found it hard to relate to Mary,” Frontczak said. “In her diaries she comes across as depressed and obsessed with the idea of fate. But when I read her letters and the things that others said about her, I began to get a picture of someone who was gracious and charming, but who carried an inner sadness. And in reading her work I’ve come to admire her greatly.”
Although Frankenstein was instantly popular after its publication and has never been out of print since, it wasn’t always taken seriously, according to Dunn. “When I was in graduate school in the 60s, we didn’t read it,” he said. “What brought it back was the interest in women writers during the feminist movement. Now it’s taught a lot.”
A specialist in 19th century literature, Dunn says he has taught the book about 20 times, most recently a few weeks ago. In his course on the 19th century novel, he begins with Shelley and Jane Austen, then goes through the Brontes to Charles Dickens.
“Students generally like Frankenstein,” he said. “They get intrigued by the various ideas it brings up, like the matter of ‘nature nature’ vs. human nature. But the thing that disturbs them is when they find themselves getting sympathetic toward the creature.”
That was Mary Shelley’s design. By the end of the book it is the scientist Frankenstein who is the monster, not his creation. “She doesn’t hit you over the head with it,” Frontczak said. “She takes you by the hand and helps you consider a different point of view.”
But if the exhibit looks at the serious side of Frankenstein, it doesn’t ignore the more familiar side. One portion of it includes images from some of the nearly 90 films that have been made of the story, including — you guessed it — Boris Karloff in full regalia.
Why did the serious book devolve into lightweight entertainment? Dunn says he doesn’t know, but he notes that a similar thing happened to Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Written as a scary story for adults, with warnings about the dangers of miserliness, that story is now shelved under children’s literature and its productions include some featuring characters like the Muppets and Mr. Magoo.
“My notion,” said Dunn, “is that there’s something in us that wants to laugh at what is too horrible to think of. If we laugh at it, we hope it will be less horrible.”
A complete listing of events connected with the Frankenstein exhibit can be found at http://www.lib.washington.edu/ougl/exhibits/frankenstein/.
