Self-Educational Similarities Between Mary Shelley and Her Monster

The subject of identity and creating a vision of oneself are primary thematic ideals in "Frankenstein" Mary Shelley's experiences with self-education come at a consistent connection and similarities to the experiences of her monster. These similarities are investigated through the Lacanian principles of the mirror stage and mimicry as well as Greenblatt's New Historicism approach. This is first analyzed in a historical sense where Shelley may have felt a desire to write and the great expectations that were put onto her, as she came from such a well-established literary and philosophically minded family. Then transition into more textual evidence within "Frankenstein" which further exacerbate the similarities in experiences between both Shelley and her monster. This self-education is brought on in Shelley and the monster by a desire to become closer to, respected, and mimic the idea of the abandoned mother, for which Shelley feels obligated to do as her birth caused her mother's death.