FREE ESSAY ON FRANKENSTEIN AND SCHIZOPRENIA

FRANKENSTEIN AND SCHIZOPRENIA

In a psychoanalytic view of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Robert Walton develops, during a
"dreadfully severe" trip through the Arctic, a type of schizophrenia; this mental
condition enables him to create a seemingly physical being representing each his superego
and his id (9). In his mind, Walton creates Victor as his very own superego and the
monster as his id. The superego and the id battle throughout the story to produce the
final result: Walton, the ego. 
Many of the qualities Walton develops during his trip are symptoms of schizophrenia. His
letters exude an aura of depression, loneliness, In his second letter, Walton emphasizes
an obsession with his aspiration to lose his loneliness. He "desires the company of a man
who could sympathize with [him]" (Shelley 7). According to Merrell Dow, 
Preoccupations...are fixed ideas, not necessarily false (like delusions) but overvalued.
They take on extraordinary importance and take up an ordinate amount of thought time. One
idea often returns and returns...Characteristically, the worry grows and becomes
unrealistic (par 16).
Walton reiterates his loneliness; even though he is surrounded by people on his ship, he
"[has] no friend" (Shelley 7-8). Contributing to this feeling of isolation, Walton uses a
tone of depression in his letters, a recurring feeling he experiences. He hints in nearly
every letter clues indicating his fear of death. He wants his sister to "remember [him]
with affection; should [she] never hear from [him] again" (Shelley 10). By constantly
mentioning the possibility of his own death in his letters, Shelley stresses Walton's
overvalued worry of dying. Walton longs to see his sister; his mental condition leads him
to even consider himself abandoned. Walton admits that success during this mission will
lead to "many, many months, perhaps years" before they would meet again; however, failure
results in either quick departure for home, or death (Shelley 6). Whether he succeeds or
fails, he will have negative results. These constant recurrences emphasize the validity
of his mental illness. As he develops the mental disease, Walton creates a world that
makes sense in his mind, and his mind alone; he "[lives] in a Paradise of [his] own
creation" with characters whom spawn from his own psyche (Shelley 5). 
Once schizophrenia becomes severe, Walton develops two seemingly real characters in his
imagination. Walton's mental condition and obsessive longing for someone to connect with
leads him to separate himself mentally from his superego and id. In Walton's mind,
Shelley introduces the monster, Walton's id, as his first mental creation; when something
is first born, its natural inclinations coincide with the primitive and self-concerning,
yet natural, inclinations exhibited by an id. For this reason, Shelley introduces the
monster as the first character of Walton's mental creation. Walton only sees this id from
far away at first, and in his mind, this structure has yet to solidify enough to be
active and influential in his life. The monster becomes more active as Walton's condition
enhances into a state of complete separation between his id and superego and development
of the monster and Victor. 
His second mental creation, superego Victor, holds the qualities that Walton feels that
he should possess himself. Victor holds morality very vital during his contact with
Walton; he refuses to board the ship when found, even in his state of near death, until
he knows the ship has good intentions on its mission. A pure superego could never expose
itself to any being with a wicked purpose. Walton personally takes care of Victor; in
reality, he must care for him because he does not really exist physically to the other
shipmates. Walton claims that Victor intrigues the other shipmates, but actually, the
sides of himself that Walton express due to his disorder intrigue the men. He believes
the men aboard the ship adore Victor in the same respect as he adores Victor; of course,
he would believe this--no one could dislike such a noble heart. Walton loves Victor; he
fills the void that Walton longs to have filled. This superego side of his own persona,
Walton believes of Victor, "is so cultivated" (Shelley 16). "[Victor's] constant and deep
grief fills [Walton] with sympathy and compassion," and Walton finally feels as if he
belongs to a true friendship (Shelley 16). In all actuality, this seems very upsetting
because the only person he can find to relate to and befriend resides within the
boundaries of his own imagination.
The superego and the id must constantly battle in order to keep Walton alive on this
voyage. Walton may not return to sanity until the superego and id leave as for Walton's
beliefs the monster and Victor, without either overpowering the other. If one were to
overpower the other, Walton would change forever into the direction of the victor, if he
would survive. While residing on the ship, Victor refers to the monster as "the d?mon", a
quite appropriate term for an archenemy (Shelley 15). When asked to make the monster a
female counterpart, Victor refuses. If Victor did make a mate for him, the superego would
be succumbing to the id, and Walton would change from ego to pure id, because the
superego did not balance everything. The monster destroys Frankenstein's entire family.
Family and society forces the ideals for Victor's life upon him. The family represents
forced, yet unwanted, things in Walton's life. In the story, Victor's mother raises him
to marry Elizabeth. His mother's dying wish clamps Victor into having no choice as to
whom he may marry. Victor, who represents Walton before the birth of the monster, is a
victim of society. As a child, Victor has a violent temper and vehement passions, but
society forces him to control his emotions (Shelley 28). Society also drives Victor to
change his dreams; his professors discourage his interest in alchemy and other mystical
sciences. The birth of the monster parallels the development of Walton's schizophrenia,
and the division between evil and good. Victor's monster destroyed things forced onto
him, such as the marriage of his sister. As a balanced ego, Walton cannot rid himself of
these things; his separated id only possessed the immorality to proceed. The monster
never kills Victor as a superego--he merely tortures him. If the monster had successfully
killed Victor, Walton would have become pure id, if his mortal body could withstand the
change. Because Victor does not die at the hands of the monster, Walton does not run the
risk of permanent damage at the hands of his own id. 
With approximately one percent of the human race affected by this disease, one can see
how the pressures of Walton's situation drove his mental state to a point of
schizophrenia. Walton's mental battle between good and evil leads the reader to a better
understanding of the dangers of intellectual solitude. Shelley warns us throughout this
novel not to let the worst of things get the best of us. 
Bibliography
Works Cited
Bettelheim, Bruno. Freud & Man's Soul. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1982.
Dow, Merrell. "Understanding and Responding to Symptoms of Schizophrenia."
http://salmon.psy.plym.ac.uk/year2/schizophrenia/symptoms.htm
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. New York: Barnes & Noble, Inc., 1993.
Weiss, Joseph. How Psychotherapy Works. New York: The Guilford Press, 1993.