The following (see title above) is an essay from Joseph Gibson, 17, a student at Ogden High School, in Ogden, Utah. It is the completion of a yearlong project, part of his International Baccalaureate high school program. Joseph is the son of Plan9Crunch blogger Doug Gibson
Category 1 - Language and Literature
Word Count [3999]
Contents
- Introduction…
- Investigation
a.
Is a Monster Born or Made?...
b.
Sympathetic Monsters...
c.
Capacity of Monsters For Moral
Growth/Accountability…
d.
Monsters and Predestiny…
3.
Conclusion…
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Introduction
Fiction has the power to provoke readers into questions they might
not otherwise ask in a scenario where it is acceptable to agree or disagree
with anything and experience anything within a surreal sphere. Even so,
audiences can tend to stay most comfortable watching their heroes prevail over
monsters and villains. Though such stories are important, their battles pose an
interesting question: are these conflicts against monsters and villains
equal? When a human is evil enough, he or she is called a monster.
Does that mean that any monster must face the designation of irredeemable
villainy? What even is a monster? What do certain texts indicate
about the morality of monsters? A Student's Dictionary defines “monster”
as “an animal or person with a strange or unusual shape,” and that is a rather
standard explanation. However, this does not fully explain the archetype
of a monster in those traditional stories. It is better to say a monster
is any sole individual that is incompatible with the culture and society
viewing it and one where interactions between that culture and the monster will
lead to a dangerous conflict. Any number of animal species are this to
each other; it almost stands to reason monsters should have no culpability for
their actions if those would follow a separate natural order. Yet, the
most enduring monsters have an intimate relationship with humans, and, as most
authors are human, the texts will take a distinct stance on the culpability,
responsibility and morality of such monsters. It is best to examine two
narratives -- what some consider the original modern monster story: Mary
Shelley’s Frankenstein, specifically the 1831 version, and a novel that
biographizes the Universal Monsters series under the lifespan of the
Wolf-Man: A Werewolf Remembers: The Testament Of Lawrence Stewart Talbot
by Frank Dello Stritto.
The former provides a historical insight to the relatively recent
publication of the latter. The benefit of examining these two texts is
how the texts specifically show two similar character arcs for their monsters
that deserve more specific analysis, which can encompass the following: origin,
sympathy, comparison to other monsters, development, and significant themes to
explore each monster. Another benefit to examining these two texts
specifically is that Mary Shelley’s work, in some ways, defined the genre and
archetype, whereas Dello Stritto, in crafting his work, sought to stick as
close to the movies’ story as possible while repurposing werewolf tropes from
other media to construct his monster story (Dello Stritto, 494). Dello
Stritto’s work has merit over other examples, because his novel charts the
entire lifespan and character evolution of a famous monster. Therefore,
every rhetorical choice these texts make is deliberate; consequently, these are
two of the best texts to examine here.
Are Monsters Born Or
Made?
The question of someone being born a monster or nurtured
accordingly pervades The Monster’s journey in Frankenstein, while tinging the
edges of Talbot’s in his novel. By that earlier definition for monster,
the large frame and watery eyes indicate that he is a monster, but he shows no
deliberate malice or instinct for wanton destruction. Based on the
preconceived notions of monsters in the first definition, The Monster has a
greater potential to be one simply because of his stature (even though Victor
especially designed its extraneous features due to his interpretation of
attractiveness). Similarly, while Talbot’s curse is something he
acquires, one of his mentors, who studies his affliction on page 214, says,
“The moonlight interplays differently with everyone….But it only ignites what
is inside you.” His mentor is not even incorrect in this; Talbot pursues
an engaged woman named Gwen Conliffe at the beginning of his story in a
somewhat predatory manner. The lycanthropic curse only brings to the
surface what is inside of him, just as the later ostracization of The Monster
will awaken its cunning and darker urges. Once again, though, these behaviors
do not spring forth from a vacuum, and there is a very provocative implication
in their origins that warrants further examination. The Monster’s
relationship with his father, Victor Frankenstein, fuels the novel, and Talbot
spends a significant portion of his novel bouncing between alternate father
figures because of a complicated relationship with his own father. These
alternative father figures almost invariably end very poorly, a fact
frighteningly intimate with The Monster’s own experience with the blind
man. Strangely, it does not even end there, as the creation of these
characters excludes women in a significant way.
The Monster’s creation comes solely from man, withholding any
female influence, and Dello Stritto meets this by recycling the other film
roles of Talbot’s actor and Talbot’s father’s actor into more Talbots. He
thereby weaves a family tree that emphasizes the men in the lineage and strips
women of any power by supposing the Talbot lineage bears no women and by
killing off Talbot’s mother early into his life. Thus, the texts
insinuate that monsters are monsters due to complicated family dynamics.
Talbot’s negative qualities are possibly the result of his exploits with other
Talbots he meets in America after his father sends him away there, where his
main Talbot mentor teaches him to read people and treat most conversations as
if they were a complicated game. It is a mindset that informs some of his
thoughts he describes when he was around Gwen. The main maternal insert
for Talbot ends up a gypsy woman Maleva, whose son infected him with
lycanthropy. Their partnership in trying to cure Talbot comes across as
the least ambiguously positive as they travel together between the first few
attempts at cures. She seemingly devotes the rest of her life to helping
him and confirms at one point that he has become a surrogate son. Her
early influence on him could be wholly responsible for the positive traits that
manifest despite his curse. She, also, is his primary tether to humanity for
much of the novel. The Monster lacks this kind of reprieve, any companion
to stay with him through his journey. This lack of any consistent mother
figure or friend in particular outside of the blind man and Frankenstein
himself add to the tragedy and inform The Monster’s fixation on his loneliness
that drives his every action. These interpersonal relationships or lack
thereof generate much sympathy for The Monsters as well as creating them and
forcing their trajectory in a specific way. According to these texts,
monsters lack familial stability and support systems.
Sympathetic Monsters
An audience’s sympathy for a character is triggered for
any number of reasons, but this is a more delicate balance when the character
kills human beings. Indeed, The Monster and Talbot are sympathetic
characters; it can be difficult to understand why without comparing other
monsters. Luckily, Dello Stritto’s text, summarizing the latter half of
the Universal Monsters film series, yields such other monsters: the film
versions of Dracula and The Frankenstein Monster. Meanwhile, the novel
Monster best compares to the literary Dracula, who is essentially the same
character as the movie character with more textual similarities to The
Monster. Talbot meets his versions of The Monster and Dracula in an
afterlife scenario, describing them in this passage. “The Dark One
radiated evil...I could feel his thirst for revenge. He was
plotting...The Big One waited. I watched and remembered” (Dello Stritto,
230-231). Here the intent is the key difference between the appropriate
sympathy levels for these three monsters amidst the result of their similar
crimes. This version of The Monster mostly lacks agency, and Dracula has
always derived pleasure from preying on humans. Talbot’s monster is the
monster within himself, but what makes his character compelling is his eternal
battle with the self. Most of his surrogate father figures are ones he
enlists to cure him of his lycanthropy. He regrets his murders and feels
depression over them and takes responsibility in trying to cure himself.
Evidently, a monster archetype can feel remorse.
Talbot´s testaments absorb other vampires of the times into
Dracula to further color the latter’s resume as a monster and villain, but the
most intelligent scheme the character has enacted is the novel original.
Dracula puts evident thought into his movements in his novel, and here arises
the comparison to The Monster. He abducts and murders a child and
tortures their female caretaker. He meticulously preys on his target’s
mental states through many targeted attacks. He even frames his enemy for
actions necessary for his plan, forcing them to act in ways that benefit him
before that person defies him. In response, he attempts to take away their
new bride. The significance here is that The Monster does all these same
heinous actions in Frankenstein, showing the same level of intelligent
thought and foresight. There is no tangible reason why one should appear
more sympathetic -- and therefore excusable -- than the other except the
audience's understanding of the tragedy of The Monster and the comparative lack
thereof of any nuance to the character of Dracula in either story. The
Monster justifies its motives thusly. “I am content to reason with
you. I am malicious because I am miserable. Am I not shunned and
hated by all mankind?...tell me why I should pity man more than he pities me?”
(Shelley, 104). This demonstrates the importance of the backstory The
Monster has just divulged to Frankenstein and the reader, and Frankenstein
understands it. The Monster asks for Frankenstein to build him a mate so
he is no longer lonely. There is the honest interpretation that had
Frankenstein honored this request, The Monster’s terror would have ceased.
Shelley seems to be implying, then, that monsters can have emotional
motivations like humans. Frankenstein’s abortion of his Bride project
incurs some of The Monster’s more malicious actions and evaluates The Monster
as the monster that man makes as opposed to the monster whose nature is to prey
on man. In these ways as related to these other monsters, the texts
clarify the instances where monster archetypes are sympathetic.
Capacity of Monsters for
Moral Growth and Accountability
Sympathy is important for audience engagement, but growth
and change -- if at all possible redemption -- has a more lasting impact and
justifies the sympathy. Talbot´s novel repeats a motif that directly
links to his curse. "Even a man who's pure in heart And says his
prayers by night, May become a wolf when the wolf bane blooms And the autumn
moon is bright." At first, it seems like a condemnation and a resignation
to his curse, but it transforms into much more with the realization that Talbot
was not pure in heart at the beginning of his journey and later grows into a
man who is pure in heart because of his affliction. Talbot´s actions and
attitudes in similar situations shift over the course of the novel. In
the beginning, he struggles and gives into his impulses to hunt Gwen and,
later, Elsa Frankenstein with comparative ease. By the time the narrative
reaches this relationship with the gypsy woman Illonka, though, there is a
difference. Dello Stritto had set up a scenario to foreshadow this turn
in Talbot’s early years with a woman named Consuela. At first, he goes
along with the woman’s advances immediately, but he is a lot more wary of
Illonka and how he could hurt her or how her attraction to him may be a result
of her unsettled internal issues (Dello Stritto, 298). It is not as if he
is suddenly immune to his beast self’s fantasies about her or his own
overwhelming attraction to her, but he recognizes the underlying circumstances
in the situation and handles the situation with more maturity and care.
This level of self awareness from a monster is a specific choice to underline
his growth in the narrative. Still, he wants nothing more than to be
cured, and she becomes a part of that fantasy. Another important
byproduct of this relationship is Talbot’s scheme to rescue her from his
“beast-self” by drugging her and locking her in a room when his murderous
impulses battle him over her. Notwithstanding that he still ends up
killing her the next day, this marks immense growth for the man. Where he
was previously powerless to his impulses and role as a monster, he is able to
fight effectively against himself. However, for the narrative to still
focus on monsters, the redemption cannot be to a state of total humanity, and
it can be to any degree of subtlety. Talbot is a tragic character
fundamentally that is cursed to lose control and kill, but he changes along the
way to combat this. He powerlessly follows his impulses to later seek
death and after, a better life, deliberately battling his darker half.
Talbot further evolves with his later hunt of Dracula, learning to use the full
scope of his abilities toward a good end.
At the end of Frankenstein, The Monster outlives his
creator in a worldwide hunt that provides a catalyst for a change. The
Monster has likely already understood that without his creator, he is nothing
,and that has likely been an underlying motive. In that regard, The
Monster’s resolution to end his miserable life is not a surprise. The more
important realization for The Monster is that what he did was wrong with his
apology to Walton. This is significant. The monsters of the animal
kingdom -- what the cat is to the mouse -- have no responsibility to do
anything less than what they do to each other. They do what they do to
survive with no real morality. On the surface, a monster like Dracula is
the same, and it becomes hard to disprove the sentiment that monsters are
wholly incompatible with humans and human society, doomed to villainy.
But the texts surrounding Frankenstein’s Monster and Larry Talbot offer a more
nuanced perspective through the respective growth in accountability and
limiting the impact of their actions. It can never be a perfect
redemption for them as society will not allow The Monster a place nor his creator
allow him a mate. Similarly, the final successful curing of Talbot´s
condition only lasts for under a year, but this is a redemption of their
characters that demonstrates the standards and responsibilities of even
monsters. Their remembrance is as monsters, but that only drags them down
so far, as monsters can have the agency and intellect required to grow and
change as a human. Or, perhaps given their close proximity to humankind
and aforementioned evolution and character development, the core of these
texts’ representation of monsters is to imply that they are indeed human in
terms of functionality.
Monsters and Predestiny
As aforementioned, there is a cure for Talbot at one
point in the novel, though temporary. This is because the film series had
the penultimate installment approach that angle and the final one completely
ignore that ending. Yet, Dello Stritto illustrates another undercurrent of his
interpretation of Talbot’s journey through this. This is the idea of
destiny. The framing device of the novel initially is Talbot writing his
memoirs, cured and about to marry his fiancee. The story progresses to
that point from his beginning into his curse and search for viable long-term
cures. Amidst all of that, there are implications of a rigid fate. On
the hands of his victims, there is always a pentagram to mark his hunt for
them. Maleva insinuates predestiny in her eulogies and lamentations she
recites at certain intervals throughout the novel. She turns out to be
vindicated. After each of his deaths, he finds himself in a place he
calls “The Deep Darkness” with Frankenstein's Monster and Dracula. The
souls of the dead pass through that place into the afterlife, and Talbot,
Dracula and this interpretation of The Monster are unique in that they are
stuck to that place. While Mannering’s machine could functionally drain
the life energy of both him and The Monster, there is no indication that their
afterlife connection is due to anything other than the supernatural. A
gypsy named Bela infects Talbot with lycanthropy, and Talbot, in turn, infects
a couple of people, who infect more. The story never mentions any of
these werewolves being trapped in The Deep Darkness beyond Talbot’s questions
about it. They did not have the same destiny. Furthermore, Talbot’s
travails in this novel join him with several mad scientists who would, in their
respective films, create beings similar to The Wolf-Man and The Monster that
never gain any mention in The Deep Darkness either. Therefore, these
three do have a specific fate to necessitate their presence up to a certain
point. It is provable, because the story does end with circumstances that
satisfy whatever is keeping them there as they never reappear again despite
incurring deaths that were tame compared to their previous ones. Destiny
leads him to Edelmann, (Dello Stritto, 317), the man ultimately responsible for
finding a cure for Talbot´s condition. Talbot is cured and The Monster
and Dracula die once more, but that is still not enough to keep them
retired. Destiny and his own character arc demand Talbot find Edelmann,
receive his cure, fall in love again, and kill a Dracula-corrupted
Edelmann. Around page three hundred comes a major turning point as the
appearance of Dracula coincides with the reappearance of his “beast-self”,
serving to obliterate the ideal life he had finally achieved. Dracula
seduces Talbot´s fiancee into one of his own Brides, and The Wolf-Man has to
destroy her. After that point, Talbot’s drive is not to live a human life
but to end the unnatural life and legacy of Dracula. This is Talbot’s
ultimate fate, and it is his arc but also destiny that leads to this (Dello
Stritto, 483). Talbot’s experiences made him into a monster able to exact
a deadly force, and his struggle against his impulses after revival made him a
better man. His evolution in romantic circumstances makes him able to
court Miliza Morelle. Losing her and the remains of his normal human life
as a Talbot is essential for completing his destiny. A werewolf with
nothing left to lose and no more illusions about regaining humanity is
Dracula’s most permanent nemesis. Talbot understands and cooperates with
the Wolf-Man inside himself in detecting Dracula’s victims through
scents. The text is demonstrating that Talbot has the required abilities
for an ultimate destiny of ridding the world of evil. Evidently, monsters
can be used for good in the grand scheme of things. Talbot had
soliloquized about being “permitted to die” (Dello Stritto, 179), which reaches
its natural conclusion when the Wolf-Man’s murder of Dracula appeared to end
both permanently, as well as The Monster, who he rescues from Dracula’s
influence. Talbot could not find permanent peace from the monster inside
of man through anything except joining with that monster to end the reign of
the monster that exclusively preyed on mankind and rescuing The Monster that
man made. The text portrays a divine, predestination streak.
The Monster in Frankenstein exists in an opposite
sphere. The novel more prevalently concerns itself with the debate of
nature and nurture. Whereas destiny had a role that nobody can define in
the fall and redemption of Lawrence Talbot, in his travels, The Monster
encounters situations where the nurture of people around him warps his
nature. This harkens back to the earlier proposed working definition for
a monster that is fundamentally contingent upon the society viewing it.
Frankenstein´s Monster appears too large and grotesque to his European
beholders. They instinctively view him as a loathsome and lesser creature
and pass fierce judgements. This is similar to the novel Dracula, wherein
the viewpoint characters, mostly contemporary Western Europeans or highly
respected and scientifically minded people, pass a series of judgements and
assumptions on the motivations of Dracula and his brides, their morality and on
the natives to the community Harker travels through on his way to Dracula’s
castle. It is human nature but also highlights another nuance that the
definition of strange is subject to all sorts of preexisting bias. In
that respect, the nature and nurture of The Monster take more meaning as a
self-fulfilling prophecy. The Monster learns beautiful and eloquent
language skills from the blind man and also of the kindness of man among each
other through the blind man’s family. He introduces a nature to help
people in need when he helps them, but they will not repay him with kindness
and generosity when they can see him. As aforementioned, people such as
Felix and William view The Monster as vile and hideous and do not allow him to
prove otherwise, first meeting him with violence and fear. It is easy to
understand why he then sinks into vile schemes. Once again, The Monster’s
primary motivation is still loneliness, and his hunt with his creator is mired
in desire for that creator to accept him or create him someone who can.
Terrorizing Frankenstein´s life is all The Monster has and all anyone has
allowed him to have in their society. The predestination of The Monster
is through human biases and actions, rather than some divine aim, but his final
action allows him to somewhat escape the prewritten.
Conclusion
To conclude, Frankenstein and A Werewolf
Remembers: The Testament Of Lawrence Stewart Talbot, challenge perceptions
of the monster archetype through telling two similar stories comprising the
birth, life and death of two famous monsters. These texts examine a
monster’s morality. Though Talbot and The Monster are ultimately monsters
and will not be able to function within the confines of human society without
heavy casualties, they are still beings that have the capacity for growth and
change and self-awareness and self-discovery and can accomplish good, or end
bad, if they choose it. Other monsters can show the other lane to that
choice, a senseless, unprovoked and well thought out crime. It is the
same choice every human has; thus, it lends understanding to the notion of
terrible people being monsters. This is remarkably a rectangular relationship,
for these novels also prove not every monster is a terrible man and that
becoming a monster and redemption are not mutually exclusive terms.
Still, this analysis has left several persisting questions however. In
the event where monsters do not have to be the villains, in what place does
that put man in their stories, especially in being responsible for The Monster
and ambition? Until the turning point near the end of the novel, Talbot
considers the closest thing to a villain in his story to be Dr. Frank
Mannering. Mannering is the first of a few to propose a solution to cure
Talbot of The Wolf-Man. He is also the first of a few that Talbot
recognizes the obsession start to form with reviving The Monster. Doctors
Niemann and Edelmann follow in this pursuit. The latter ultimately
debates with an assistant if humans have any responsibility to The Monster or
to their fellow selves. The obsession and fixation that seems to infect
those doctors has some roots possibly in Frankenstein, where the title character
has the same feeling toward his construction of The Monster. What is
interesting is that Walton too bears that toward his own exploits and that
Frankenstein must tell him not to indulge his ambition. Mannering also
masters the secrets of eternal youth through Frankenstein’s notes rather than
the destiny that Talbot has to die and return at intervals. It would be
warranted to compare Elizabeth Lavenza and Miliza Morelle, the respective main
love interests for each book that suffer unpleasant ends and to compare also
what they accomplish, as characters, beyond furthering the protagonists’ and
antagonists’ characters and rivalry in their stories. Another
questionable consideration is how much Victor Frankenstein himself qualifies as
a monster through sheer comparison to Talbot and his own monster, given several
similarities in personality and lifestyle with Lawrence Talbot. The open
sexuality of Talbot´s book deserves analysis, as many monster books, especially
the older ones, aim more for a celibate outlook or otherwise comment on
restrictive sexuality. Dracula, in particular, has an interesting
exploration on its culture’s sexuality through Lucy and Mina that seem to
contrast with Talbot´s experiences.
Works cited:
Dello Stritto, Frank J., A Werewolf Remembers: The Testament of Lawrence Stewart Talbot. Cult Movies Press, 644 East 7 1/2 Street, Houston, Texas 77007, 2017
Shelley, Mary, Frankenstein, 1831, London, Dover, 1994.
Stoker, Abraham, Dracula, 1897, London, Barnes & Noble Inc. 122 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10011, 2011.
Dictionary Project, Inc. A Student's Dictionary & Gazetteer, 21st edition ed., USA, 2013, p. 209.
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