Research and analysis views of Lines written above Tintern

In chapter 18 Shelley uses a well-known poem written by Wordsworth. Shelley used the poem to establish nature as a therapy, she must have been familiar with the idea as a result of readings for Wordsworth and Coleridge, and Percy probably influenced her as well. In Tintern Abbey, nature is also used as a restorative agent for the speaker of the poem:

While Wordsworth comments on the scene and reflects on the natural setting of his being, Shelley uses this nature as Victor’s personal practitioner. Shelley quotes “Tintern Abbey” at the point in the story when Victor Frankenstein is traveling home with his father after recovering from the illness that overcame him upon learning upon Henry Clerval’s death. If we look at this inter-related texts we can see common similarities, One such similarity is that both contain explicit and detailed descriptions of nature. Both Shelley and Wordsworth use these descriptions to invite the reader in, allowing the reader to enter into the worlds that they have created. If we look deeper into the poem we can see a common similarity between Victor and the narrator of lines written above “Tintern Abbey”. Like Victor, the narrator of “Tintern Abbey” is chased by the fact of something he has done. However, the thing that is chasing him is his wasting his “hour of thoughtless youth” upon the aspects of nature that could be observed visually, and not upon those that required mental examination.  The narrator further professes the impact that his youth spent in nature has had upon his life. While this section of the poem is not actually included in Frankenstein, we can see how it relates to Victor’s story. Even at the end of his life, Victor carries the memories of the people whose lives his creation has impacted or ended. Even through their absence, he has not forgotten them, and he carries them very close to his heart.

But the most common theme between these two stories is romanticism. Although Wordsworths poem was created before Shelleys story, they both were created during the romantic era. This is evident in Victors walk through the woods the passage embodies the emotions that were shown by Wordsworths poems. She expands on the emotion that rage through as Victor takes his walk. These very same emotions are evident in “Lines written above Tintern Abbey”.

One famous line from the poem: “Nature never did betray the heart that loved her” speaks about a lover of nature being safe is his surroundings, however, the Creature, even being a lover of nature, is never safe in the world.

    While reading Mary Shelley’s 1818 edition of Frankenstein, several things stood out. One interesting thing to note is that Frankenstein’s creator was vegetarian. When the Creature firsts gets outside and feels hunger, he eats berries instead of trying to kill anything for meat. It is also apparent that he loves nature in the way he describes birds and their songs. if we took Wordsworth’s line as definite truth, the Creature should be safe and sound in the forest and countryside living out his days in peace. 

Lonely and the Doctor.

The Winesburg connection- 

You see, the interesting thing about loneliness and alienation is that we as humans can truly understand the feeling that the characters feel inside the book. In "Paper pills" for instance, we can truly understand the hope that the beautiful wife gave him, he was able to open an entire world filled with his thoughts, his emotions, and his problems. I believe we can compare this to people in our lives who give us the strength and power to open up. The main character in Paper pills is known as Doctor Reefy, he is a doctor who helps people that are dying... in the mean time he writes his thoughts that are "little pyramids of truth" on scraps of paper, I feel like these little pieces of paper are our problems, the struggles that we have to tell with every day. These little scraps of paper represent the hardship and the pain and the suffering that each individual human has to deal with while taking care of those who are dying, ourselves. The beautiful woman, the magnificent, the wonderful woman represents the person that is willing to let you open all those scraps of paper, all the hardship and pain and suffering. And when Doctor Reefy lost that person, he became more desolate than anyone could have imagined.... because now he has to live with those scraps of paper, he has to live with the unbearable truth, the truth that he lives with everyday... the truth that we live with everyday. The fact that human nature is inherently awful, that we are selfish and loathing and jealous, that we are all dying the moment. Once we have lost that person we feel just as Reefy did... alone. His inability to communicate with anyone else is conveyed not only by the paper pills but also by Anderson's description of him sitting all day by a cobweb-covered window in his empty office. Anderson says, suggestively, "He never opened the window. Once on a hot day in August he tried but found it stuck fast and after that he forgot all about it." We will notice throughout Winesburg that many characters seem imprisoned in their rooms. 

I think that by our current society and its expectations... we will all be imprisoned in our rooms, we focus on jobs and money and impressing people... we praise people who do things that we consider rebellious and wrong, yet we forget to chase the most important thing, happiness. You see, the sad thing about Reefy is that he had love for a little, he got the chance to feel that open world, that sadness and pain being lifted off of him. Yet, he knows that he will never taste it again, because death is inevitable, and after losing someone like that,

so is loneliness.

Themes of frankenstein studied

I looked up some extra information on themes of Frankenstein and came up with some interesting conclusions and things I did not necessarily see before

The consistent search for knowledge is the underlying theme and perhaps the greatest theme of the novel Frankenstein, which occurs as Frankenstein crosses normal human lines and takes on the character of God. Walton also tries to cross previous human exploration by trying to reach the North Pole. This relentless pursuit of knowledge of light and fire proves very dangerous, as the created creature breathes on he kills all the loved ones near Frankenstein, throwing him into isolation. The same goes for Walton who is trapped between sheets of ice. Where Victors obsession and hate of the creature ultimately kills him, Walton withdraws from his idiotic mission and learns from Victors mistake that knowledge is truly dangerous.

Another theme that goes well with another is secrecy. Yet I connected Frankenstein's secrecy with one of my own. When I was a kid I found an old playing card in my house that was particularly rare, I had no idea how it got there, but the next day my best friend complained about his favorite rare card and I immediately knew it was his, but I kept it a secret that I had it because of its value, I knew it was wrong but the feeling of having the card felt so good that I had to keep it. Eventually he came over again and found the card in my room, immensely angry and feeling betrayed he no longer wanted to be friends, and our friendship took a backseat for a considerable while. Victor’s entire obsession with creating life is shrouded in secrecy, and his obsession with destroying the monster remains equally secret until Walton hears his tale.Whereas Victor continues in his secrecy out of shame and guilt, the monster is forced into seclusion by his grotesque appearance. Walton serves as the final confessor for both, and their tragic relationship becomes immortalized in Walton’s letters. In confessing all just before he dies, Victor escapes the stifling secrecy that has ruined his life; likewise, the monster takes advantage of Walton’s presence to forge a human connection, hoping desperately that at last someone will understand, and empathize with, his miserable existence.

Hints of abortion which also appeared throughout amazed me. Such as When Victor destroys his work on the female monster, he aborts his act of creation, preventing the female monster from coming alive. Abortion occurs in Victor’s description of natural philosophy: “I at once gave up my former occupations; set down natural history and all its progeny as a deformed and abortive creation; and entertained the greatest disdain for a would-be science, which could never even step within the threshold of real knowledge.” As with the monster, Victor becomes dissatisfied with natural philosophy and shuns it not only as unhelpful but also as intellectually bad.

Anabel Lee

I recently read one of my favorite poems of all time by one of my favorite poets of all time. Edgar Allan Poe with his Annabel lee.

It was many and many a year ago,

   In a kingdom by the sea,

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

   By the name of Annabel Lee;

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

   Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,

   In this kingdom by the sea,

But we loved with a love that was more than love—

   I and my Annabel Lee—

With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven

   Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,

   In this kingdom by the sea,

A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling

   My beautiful Annabel Lee;

So that her highborn kinsmen came

   And bore her away from me,

To shut her up in a sepulchre

   In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,

   Went envying her and me—

Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,

   In this kingdom by the sea)

That the wind came out of the cloud by night,

   Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love

   Of those who were older than we—

   Of many far wiser than we—

And neither the angels in Heaven above

   Nor the demons down under the sea

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul

   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams

   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes

   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side

   Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,

   In her sepulchre there by the sea—

   In her tomb by the sounding sea.

The way I see the poem could be vastly different for some people, but the way I see it is that Annabel Lee loved the narrator. Annabel Lee got very sick and it was the angels that killed her because she was so pretty, but their love was way to strong to be killed by angels. Everything reminds the narrator of the beautiful Annabel lee.

The man is of course still addicted to their love, sleeping by her tomb at night by the sea, which I find very creepy but even more beautiful in an odd gothic sense. 

The poem has a repetition of the word L especially taken after Annabel lee’s last name is said. Words such as SouL, Lie DarLing Life.

Overall I have always liked this poem and the felt the immense love and obsession behind it, I believe the poem was about someone of Poes life and perhaps his wife who had died.

Rhime of the ancient mariner

Rhime of the ancient mariner was in the first edition of lyrical ballads by Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Wordsworth. The story is about a mariners ship who gets hit by a storm and is driven south. Yet an albatross appears and leads the ship to safety, but the mariner shoots the albatross and angers the crew. Later the ship comes on a ghost ship which contains "death" and "Night mare life in death". This work influenced Mary Shelley and had similar themes. Coleridge and Shelly both emphasize the immense power that nature has over men as well as its natural beauty. Both have religious themes. In an attempt to prove that the albatross is a physical being and not spiritual  he shoots it down. More Illusions to religion with the prayer and kindness and respect to creatures also exist. Another three themes are imprisonment, retribution and act of story telling. Like victor the mariner goes against nature and is disrespectful towards it. Parallelism between Walton and victor is evident, both are about knowledge Victor is addicted to it and knowledge destroy both the mariner and victor. This brings up Prometheus because both went further than humans should go... which lead to their desolation. The actual passage put into Frankenstein is listed below“Like one who, on a lonely road,
Doth walk in fear and dread,
And, having once turned round, walks on,
And turns no more his head;
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.”
-Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”
During both points in the story both are ruined in desolation... Victor had just created the creature and is confused about what to do. He cannot even sleep because he is so distraught about what to do. The ancient mariner is on a ship the is floating through south Atlantic over creatures the mariner is believed in the water. He knows he is alone and is in an emotional state of turmoil.
This brings up an interesting theme Victor is lost in an emotional state and in his mind while that mariner is literally lost in the southern Atlantic
Monsters are surrounding both people, Victors monster is following him around wherever he goes... these monsters also peek at the DeLacey family. The mariner feels that the monsters in the ocean are following him. Victor sort of runs away because he doesn't want to see his monster "creation". Just as the mariner does not want to look back to see the monsters in the water. This, in conclusion, is a slight description of the similarity.
The main base between them that I loved dearly was isolation and desolation. Both went against natures flow and suffered from it, Nature, whether you believe in the creator or not, is the ultimate decider of our fate. A lot of people argue nature vs nurture, but it is a seemingly impossible question. Like chicken and the egg it can be argued both ways.

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