Frankenstein - Justice

"It was the secrets of heaven and earth that I desired to learn...Meanwhile Clerval occupied himself, so to speak, with the moral relations of things." p. 37

This wonderful blog post is brought to you by the letter T, for Theme, and the number 3, which looks a bit like a backwards E, for Education. The theme of education in Frankenstein, hahaha #triestoohard

Education is extremely important to the characterization of most of the major characters, particularly Victor and Henry, and even Robert Walton. These people's education essentially ends up defining their characters, as seen in the quote above. Victor is a man of science: he pursues an understanding of the universe which can only be learned through observation and experimentation. He has little concern for what to do with said discovery, and ultimately doesn't care about the implications of his research. His focus is solely on the process of realization. Henry, on the other hand, is a man of language. He cares not so much for the knowledge or discovery itself but what it means to people. This is evident from his concern with morality (the should I? as opposed to the can I?). Thus, the two are foils to each other. Victor, before making The Creature and bringing it to life, becomes obsessed with the question of Can I? After much work he finally discovers that He Can, but sadly he never asked Should I? However, as soon as The Creature comes to life, he gets his answer of Heck no, Vick, ya shouldn'ta done that.

So that's not really a theme, is it? Well, the theme of education, the great big truth that Shelley is trying to convey here is that what one studies, the aspects of life that interest a person, be they science or language, is a huge part of ones personality. Our understanding of Victor and Henry comes directly from our knowledge of what interests them and the fields that they pursued in their education.