The Nightmare of Romantic Idealism

"The Nightmare of Romantic Idealism" by Paul Cantor

In this article, the author argues that by ambiguously using myths and their characters the shape her own owns characters of Victor and the Creature, Mary Shelley has made Victor and his Creature "mirror images" of each other, and she creates a myth in which the ideals valued by Romanticism (pursuing greatness and knowledge) the downfall of her characters. The author begins by explaining how both Victor and the monster break the roles that they are supposed to play, since they both display some Satanic characteristics from Paradise Lost, and they both display some characteristics of Prometheus from his myth, which makes Victor and his monster doubles for each other. The author then discusses how Shelley's novel serves as a myth about Romanticism, and that the central conflict is centered around the flaws of humans in Romantic literature. Ambiguity is extremely important here because ambiguity in Shelley's characters also leads to moral ambiguity and a deeper, more complex conflict between the characters. Victor and the monster are not clear-cut or straight-forward characters by any means, which allows for the readers to decide for themselves who the true "hero" or "villain" in this novel are. This aids Shelley's commentary on Romanticism because instead of having her characters be a hero or villain, it is instead the broader spectrum of their pursuit of knowledge and their actions, which reflect Romanticism, that she was commenting on in Frankenstein.