Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus
creator(s): Mary Shelley |
medium(s): book | audiobook |
date reviewed: 6 February 2023
rating: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤
I haven’t read this in over a decade, so I recently decided to listen to an audiobook version and see how I liked it this time through. The overall story is excellent! I found particularly compelling the question of scientific (and technological) responsibility, and the creature’s railing against his creator at Chamonix in the middle of the book struck me as almost Job-like. I wasn’t expecting the Chamonix scene to resonate with me as much as the tech allegory, but it will also stay with me, I think. Maybe it’s my modern reader’s eyes (or general familiarity with the book, but I found that this time, I didn’t have a lot of patience for some of the extended expressions of melancholy or the “travelogue” aspects of the book. I also found the nested epistolary structure to sometimes strain my suspension of disbelief. That said, those are ultimately minor complaints!
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The last time I read Frankenstein, I got a kick out of noticing all the Swiss connections. This time, I’m amusing myself by thinking of the title character as a hubristic tech bro.
There’s a great John Finnemore sketch that involves a ridiculous number of nested stories, and I’m thinking of it as I approach the end of Frankenstein (a novel in the form of letters sent by a man recounting conversations with Frankenstein, who quotes other letters, etc.).
I’m sure this is overthinking things, but I have a LOT of linguistic questions about Frankenstein.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤 for Swisstory: The Untold, Bloody, and Absolutely Real History of Switzerland, by Laurie Theurer
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ for Walkaway, by Cory Doctorow
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