Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
My favorite class-required read. I’m tempted to steal this class copy.
I listened to Frankenstein recently, and I wasn’t very keen on it. For one thing the monster seemed so very eloquent with his speech, which broke my immersion because a being who had no understanding of language at all not so long ago should have language skills that are rudimentary at best. This among other issues. The story just didn’t captivate me.
Dracula, on the other hand, was fantastic.
It’s not that I expected the monster to do not much more than grunt and moan, as is the modern cultural trope for his character, but he should have broken English skills rather than sound fairly well educated. As for the story, it seemed to focus largely from the perspective of Dr. Frankenstein, who is an arrogant jerk to put it mildly.
I suppose Frankenstein just really isn’t a horror novel. It’s tragic. So maybe in part the story just wasn’t what I was expecting. But then it’s not entirely tragic because both Dr. Frankenstein’s terror in general is mostly unjustified, and the monster actually is dangerous despite his protestations to the contrary.