Frankissstein

“Here I am, in my inadequate skin, goose-fleshed and shivering. A poor specimen of a creature, with no nose of a dog, and no speed of a horse, and no wings like the invisible buzzards whose cries I hear above me like lost souls, and no fins or even a mermaid’s tail for this wrung-out weather. I am not as well-found as that door mouse disappearing into a crack in the rock. I am a poor specimen of a creature, except that I can think.”

This passage foreshadows the transhumanist themes of the text, as Mary thinks about how the human body is not as well-suited to its environment as those of many other creatures. Though humans lack many specialized traits, they have the unique ability to think and adapt to their environment. Much of the novel dwells in intellectualism, which is linked, here, to the human form.

“It is you, sir, who are made from us, Sir. The gentleman laughed at me indulgently. They respect me, up to a point, but we have arrived at that point. We are talking about the animating principle, says Byron, slowly and patiently as if to a child. Not the soil, not the bedding, not the container; The life-spark. The life-spark is male.”

Mary’s repetition of “sir” indicates her indignation at Byron and Polidori’s sexism. Their response, spoken “as if to a child,” shows the lack of respect they have for Mary, simply because she is a woman. Their basic argument, that the “life-spark” is male, provides their justification for this disrespect, as well.

“Memphis and Frankenstein are both two hundred years old. Your point? Tech. AI. Artificial Intelligence. Frankenstein was a vision of how life might be created—the first non-human intelligence. What about angels? (Claire looks at me, serious and certain. I hesitate…What is she saying?)”

Claire’s insistence that angels are a form of non-human intelligence throws Ry off balance, as he was just talking about two real events in human history: the founding of Memphis, Tennessee, and the publication of Frankenstein. To Ry, creatures like angels are mythological, and so they do not belong in a discussion of science.