Historical Context
The era Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein.
What is Georgian Era?
She was Mary Shelley's mother and a famous women's rights advocate
Who is Mary Wollstonecraft?
What uses formal and poetic words?
What is Romantic Diction?
Elizabeth’s marriage to Victor was planned for her since childhood.
What is an arranged (or expected) marriage?
Her idealized perfection that sets a harsh expectation of who she is.
What is Elizabeth's powerlessness?
True or false: Elizabeth sacrificed her own needs to care for the happiness of others.
What is true?
The adjectives Shelley uses to describe Elizabeth reveal about her role in the novel?
What is Passive?
Focuses on how a character looks rather than what they do, is this over narrative
What is Descriptive?
Words like “told” and “taught” show Elizabeth did not have this in her future.
What is a choice?
A woman who's passive, devoted and is the embodiment of femininity.
What is the "perfect woman" ideal?
What is coverture?
The reason Frankenstein was published without Shelley's name in 1818 Answer.
What is that women's voices weren't taken seriously in the early nineteenth century?
Rather than actual verbs, women are often described in a fixed _______
What is Visual/Image?
Elizabeth focuses on Victor’s happiness instead of her own feelings.
What is putting others before herself (or lack of independence)?
Domestic and emotional being there to support Victor.
What is Elizabeth's symbolic role?
Name at least three qualities of an ideal georgian lady.
What Elizabeth says to Victor despite feeling a presentiment of danger before the wedding
What is "Be happy, my dear Victor"?
While male language is scientific or abstract, female language shifts towards this.
What is Emotion?
Before 1857, women could not easily do this, even in unhappy marriages.
What is get a divorce?
The way Victor perceives Elizabeth that reduces her to something to be protected rather than an equal.
What is objectification?
The reason why Victor discusses Elizabeth's appearance frequently.
What is "women were seen as objects of beauty"?
According to critic Nick Groom, how does Shelley present her female characters, and why is this significant?
As perplexing and inaccessible because their silence is itself Shelley's critique of how women were treated
This specific metaphor explains why a character lacks control over the story.
What is a Puppet?
Although Elizabeth writes the letter, Victor controls how we hear her story.
What is men controlling women’s voices (or lack of female voice/power)?
The contrast between Elizabeth’s imagination and Victor’s scientific thinking highlights this divide.
What is Emotion vs. reason?