As a myth about procreation, the maternal imagery in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is clear, evident, pervasive. Yet, while the novel suffers no shortage of mother figures, Shelley’s interpretation of the maternal archetype in her seminal work is unique in its focus. The theme of the maternal finds itself in a paradox wherein its absence becomes evidence for its ubiquity; it is everywhere in that it is nowhere. One can therefore conclude that the concept of motherhood in Frankenstein does not require a mother, but only demands the notion that there was once a maternal presence where there is now none. By promptly abandoning his role as his monster’s creator, Victor seems to have perfectly complied with Shelley’s aforementioned definition of the maternal archetype. Still, some argue that the fact of Victor’s sex precludes him from ever fulfilling the theme of motherhood in Frankenstein. Victor is a man; the evident conclusion would be to declare Victor a paternal force in his creation’s …show more content…
Indeed - whether implicitly or explicitly stated - every maternal character in her seminal work is conspicuously absent. The knowledge that Victor’s mother, Elizabeth, and Justine are all orphans implies the existence of a maternal absence in their lives. Where the three women once had a mother, they now have no one. Conversely, Victor’s mother (Caroline Frankenstein) is the only mother whose absence is explicitly stated in the novel: the beginning of the third chapter is dedicated to her untimely death. This explicit loss of a mother figure is perhaps most notable in Caroline’s request that Elizabeth “…supply my place to my younger children” (Shelley 44). The exchange between the true mother and the mere substitute serves as Shelley’s acknowledgement that a maternal role will soon be essentially unoccupied; a substitute mother does not satisfy the absence of an authentic