“The Frankenstein Character in the Original Book and Films.”
Today, every child knows that Frankenstein is a creation of a mad scientist, assembled from dead body parts and becomes alive by using lightning and electricity. This is one of the most popular images often used in the cinema: 63 films were taken from 1909 to 2007. But actually, Victor Frankenstein is a scientist whose curiosity has played a trick on him. Mary Shelley has described his history in her masterpiece, Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus.
Young student Victor Frankenstein decides to defeat death by reviving a dead body. He secretly collects pieces of unclaimed bodies and even tries to pick up beautiful facial features. In the original book, the creature was not sewn of different colored pieces: the creator carefully picked the pieces of skin with the same color.
The method of recovery (lightning strike and a huge charge of electricity, which launched the heart) is also incorrect. Mary Shelley avoided any mention of the recovery process. Researchers believe that the author ignored this part not because of ignorance. Scientist Viktor studied the works of the famous alchemists: Albert the Great, Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus. Apparently, the author implied that banal electricity did not contribute to the monster creation, but some alchemical processes did.
Finally, the revived monster was not a stupid and submissive executer of its owner’s orders, as in the original book. He had a knowing mind that led to studies and understanding new information very quickly. He understood that society would not tolerate a creature assembled from pieces of the dead. Even Victor admitted that he could not look at his monster, but could not kill him. So he ran away, not bothering to give the name to his creation. But the creature did not put up with this state of affairs; it started to hunt for a student, making him responsible for its existence.
It is believed that German alchemist Johann Conrad Dippel was a prototype of a mad scientist whose ancestral castle was called Frankenstein. He claimed that he had made the elixir of immortality from the blood and bones of animals and particularly oil. Also among his works were discovered notes about boiling pieces to create an artificial human being (homunculus) and attempts to move the soul from one body to another. Sometimes Johann Conrad added Frankenstein to his name that gave reason to suspect Mary in the use of his image.