Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus
Palketto Stage
9th April 2011
Prof.ssa Elisabetta Scala
SCENE 1
Captain Walton, and explorer who is trying to find a passage to the North Pole, sees a man on the ice. He comes on board.
SCENE 2
Victor is feverish.
SCENE 3
The man, Victor Frankenstein, says he is followed by a “thing” that wants to kill him. He decides to tell his story to the captain, because he wants to convince him that it is not worthwhile to dedicate one’s life to the pursue of knowledge.
SCENE 4
Victor tells his story: he grew up in Geneva. He had a brother, William, a best friend, Henry, and Elizabeth, his father’s best friend’s daughter, who lived with the Frankensteins since she was 9. They had a governess, Justine. Victor has been fascinated by lightening since he was a child.
SCENE 5
Victor’s mother dies of scarlet fever. Victor is upset with fate. He decides to go to Ingolstadt, Germany, to study physics, chemistry, biology.
SCENE 6
At University Victor wants to discover the basis of life. He thinks there must be some force which keeps us alive. He is fascinated by Galvani’s frog. He wants to find the secret of life. He thinks that, to examine the causes of life, we
must study death.
SCENE 7
Victor goes to graveyards to get some dead bodies. He is helped by two grave-diggers. He finds a secret laboratory.
SCENE 8
The creature is complete. During a thunderstorm, the creature comes to life. Victor realizes he is horrible and he runs away. The laboratory is on fire.
SCENE 9
Victor is feverish. Henry, Elizabeth and Justine come to be next to him.
SCENE 10
Victor has a nightmare: he dreams the creature who tells him what difficult life he has had because of his aspect.
SCENE 11
Elizabeth goes back home. Victor stays with Henry.
SCENE 12
Victor learns that William is dead.
SCENE 13
Victor is at home, it’s William’s funeral. He learns that Justine is accused of William’s death.
SCENE 14
Victor visits Justine, who thinks she killed William because she is crazy. Victor doesn’t think so, and he realizes that the monster’s alive.
SCENE 15
Victor goes to Switzerland.
SCENE 16
Victor meets the creature for the first time. He confesses he has killed William, but he didn’t want to. The creature tells his story.
SCENE 17
He learnt to read and speak from a family who lived in the woods. They were brother, sister and an old blind man. One day the creature shows himself, but he is rejected. He kills all the people in the family in revenge.
SCENE 18
The creature asks Victor for a wife, like him. Victor agrees..
SCENE 19
Victor makes another monster, a woman. When she comes to life, Victor is horrified, and he decides to destroy her. The creature kills Henry, while he tries to protect Victor, and promises to kill Victor’s wife.
SCENE 20
Victor marries Elizabeth.
SCENE 21
On the wedding night, the creature kills Elizabeth. Victor’s father dies too. The creature is happy because Victor is as sad as him. Victor chases after the monster. They get near the North Pole, where Victor meets Walton.
SCENE 22
Victor is very weak. The ship is surrounded by ice. They are in danger. The creature arrives and he asks for forgiveness. Walton arrives and he decides to let the monster go. He also decides to give up his quest. He returns home, while the creature disappears in a fire.
The plot of Frankenstein is quite simple: Robert Walton, an explorer that wants to arrive to the North Pole, stopped by mountains of ice, meets Victor Frankenstein, a scientist who seems exhausted and near death. Walton helps Frankenstein. They become friends, and when the explorer reveals his dreams to the scientist, Frankenstein becomes sad and tells his history in order to convince Walton to abandon his projects. He begins his history: Frankenstein is from a good-family of Switzerland, interested in science and in the causes of natural events. During his stay at university of Ingolstadt, he achieves to discover the secret of life, and uses it to make a giant man from parts of dead bodies. But when he realizes that he creates an ugly monster, he refuses him. The monster, which is essentially good, after a period of learning in the forest near Ingolstadt, tries to become part of the society, but he is expulsed from a village. So he finds refuge in a poor home in the forest, where, standing hidden, he learns to speak and to read. He realizes that the family is good, and so he tries to reveal himself, but he is again attacked. He escapes, and achieves to save a girl from drowning, but a man, seeing the monster near to the girl, fires against him. The monster becomes so bad. Arrived in Switzerland, he kills the young brother of Dr. Frankenstein and causes the death of Justine Moritz, a Frankenstein family’s friend. Then he asks to his creator help, in order to obtain a companion. At first Dr. Frankenstein agrees, and goes to England and then to Scotland, flowed by the monster, but after he destroys his second creation because he considers the presence of two monsters very dangerous for mankind. So the monster kills Henry Clerval, Dr. Frankenstein’s best friend, and Elizabeth, Frankenstein’s wife. The scientist’s father dies for the ache, while Frankenstein becomes mad for the pain, and when he settles down, he swears his revenge against the monster. The monster is satisfied of this, and so it begins a long hunt, that takes Frankenstein and the monster away from the world, toward the North Pole. Dr. Frankenstein ends his tale. After a few days he dies. One evening, when Walton is writing a letter to his sister, he hears sounds, and he meets the monster, that is crying near Dr.Frankenstein’s lifeless body. He cries because he has lost his creator and he cannot asks forgiveness for his acts. Then, after a brief speech with Walton, he jumps out of the ship and disappears forever.