Type
Text
Type
Thesis
Advisor
Manning, Peter | Scheckel, Susan
Date
2015-12-01
Keywords
British and Irish literature
Department
Department of English.
Language
en_US
Source
This work is sponsored by the Stony Brook University Graduate School in compliance with the requirements for completion of degree.
Identifier
http://hdl.handle.net/11401/77587
Publisher
The Graduate School, Stony Brook University: Stony Brook, NY.
Format
application/pdf
Abstract
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus, is rarely classified as an epistolary novel. Many readers actually forget that the novel begins as a series of letters between an arctic explorer and his sister. The framing device of the letter used by Shelley cites the revered history of the epistolary novel in the previous century, most notably those of Samuel Richardson. Richardson used the epistolary form in his novels to create what Ian Watt refers to as “formal realism†. Richardson presents his novels as truth objects by employing the epistolary frame, but Shelley uses the form to reject the claims made by the domestic novels of Richardson and the empirical formulations of the Enlightenment. Shelley places the genre of the epistolary novel into constant conflict with both her characters, and the other genres, constantly emerging throughout the text. Shelley uses this conflict to provide a more intricate interiority to her characters where she may analyze masculine anxiety towards domestic space. | 39 pages
Recommended Citation
Walsh, Peter, "Address to the Letter: Frankenstein, Pamela, and the Epistolary Novel" (2015). Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions). 3387.
https://commons.library.stonybrook.edu/stony-brook-theses-and-dissertations-collection/3387