Frankenstein – Consequences of Poor Parenting
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Consequences of Poor Parenting
“Yet you my creator, detest, and spurn me, thy creature, to whom thou art bound by ties only dissoluble by the annihilation of one of us.” (Shelly 121). The creature from the novel Frankenstein expresses his feelings towards his creator and he means that he and his creator are linked until death. His creator, Victor, is obsessed with creating life, which leads him to creating this creature, and failing to take care of his responsibility towards the creature. The responsibilities of a parent like Victor are to provide the role of support and nurturing care and guidance for their offspring. In both the novel Frankenstein and modern times, it is demonstrated that poor parenting leads to negative consequences such as rejection, revenge, and death.
Rejection, revenge, and death are not the only negative results for Victor and his family. As being raised as an only child, it was obvious Victor was extremely spoiled. “I was their plaything and their idol, and something better- their child, the innocent and helpless creature bestowed on them by heaven, whom to bring up to good, and whose future lot it was in their hands to direct to happiness or misery, according as they fulfilled their duties towards me..”(Shelly 41). In this excerpt, Victor explains how his parents treated him and what he felt like their duties as a parent were. When Victor refers to himself being his parents “plaything” it lets readers know his parents were more like a friend than parent towards him. Clearly, spoiling and giving children everything they want isn’t the only responsibility of a parent. In this case it only resulted in Victor becoming out of control and monstrous.
As a result of Victor being out of control, he begins to have an obsession of creating life. Victor had worked tirelessly for nearly two years to give life to his creation. It was from haunting charnel houses, dissecting rooms, and slaughterhouses that Victor obtained the materials from his work. He thought if he could create a new life, he eventually be able to give life back to the dead, also. Sadly, his plan didnt come out exactly how he planned it. Shortly after the birth of his creation, Victor becomes unhappy with what he has created and leaves the creature. Even though, Victors parents showered him with love, he fails to show the same towards his creation failing to fulfil his responsibilities as a parent.
The aftermath of Victor leaving his creation, results in the creature feeling abandoned. Even though, the creature was made from other body parts and humans he still wasn’t mentally ready to be on his own. Leaving his creation to basically take care of himself shows the lack of parenting skills Victor has received from his parents. Without Victor’s guidance he was forced to wander around looking for help and guidance from others. One of the many consequences the creature faces as a result of Victor’s poor parents is rejection.
After Victor abandons the creature, he goes wandering looking for someone to talk to. “My feelings were those of rage and revenge. I could with pleasure have destroyed the cottage and its inhabitants and have glutted myself with their shrieks and misery.”(Shelly 165). In this passage, the creature runs to the Delacy family for guidance but as a result they try to attack him. With the Delacy family rejecting him, just like his creator he becomes filled with revenge. His revenge to the Delacy family is burning their cottages down. After becoming rejected by his creator and society he seeks revenge on his creator.
Once the creator runs into William, Victor’s little brother, he kills him just because his associated with Victor and he knows that it’ll hurt him. The creature gives Victor another attempt to make up for abandoning him, by requesting a female companion or his wife, Elizabeth, will be killed on their wedding night. Once again, Victor fails to do anything whether its to provide support, nurturance, or guidance towards his responsibility, the creature. In response his creator failing to fulfil his request he kills Elizabeth on their wedding night. Poor parenting, won’t only hurt the child in this case, it’ll affect the parent too.
Not only shown in the novel Frankenstein, shown in today poor parenting is still a huge issue. What is seen constantly is parents trying spoiling their children more than