3.1.4

Mutability & Tintern Abbey

Test yourself

Mutability

The text makes reference to many other texts. The main sources are The Prometheus myth, Paradise Lost, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Tintern Abbey and Mutability.

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Mutability

  • Shelley uses an extract from her husband’s poem Mutability, from his 1816 collection Alastor; or the Spirit of Solitude and other poems.
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Mutability

  • ‘We rest. – A dream has power to poison sleep;
    We rise. – One wandering thought pollutes the day;
    We feel, conceive or reason, laugh or weep;
    Embrace fond woe, or cast our cares away:
    It is the same! For, be it joy or sorrow,
    The path of its departure still is free:
    Man's yesterday may ne'er be like his morrow;
    Nought may endure but Mutability.’
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Nature and change

  • This is all about the inevitability of change within the life of humans.
  • It is ironic as when Victor references this poem, feeling utterly at ease in nature, he is moments away from his first meeting with the Monster, changing from peace to chaos.
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Subconsciousness

  • The extract from the poem Shelley has chosen focuses upon the concept that man is never truly free, as even when he sleeps, he cannot control his subconscious.
  • Perhaps we are to view the Monster as Victor’s subconscious?

Tintern Abbey

The text makes reference to many other texts. The main sources are The Prometheus myth, Paradise Lost, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Tintern Abbey and Mutability.

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Tintern Abbey

  • Shelley also includes six lines from one of the most famous Romantic poems, Tintern Abbey, by William Wordsworth.
  • This focuses on the sublime power of nature and how it can touch the human soul.
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Tintern Abbey

  • “The sounding cataract
    Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock,
    The mountain, and the deep gloomy wood,
    Their colours and their forms, were then to me
    And appetite; a feeling and a love,
    That had no need of a remoter charm,
    By thought supplied, nor any interest
    Unborrow’d from the eye.”
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Nature versus science

  • Victor remembers these lines when thinking about his friend Henry Clerval, who the reader finds out, in a cataphoric reference/ prolepsis, is now dead.
  • By paralleling Clerval with nature, it places Victor as the antithesis, as Man or Science in the Nature versus Science/ Man dichotomy.
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Clerval

  • Victor laments the beauty of nature and the virtuous character of Clerval, yet doesn’t seem to fully accept that he is the agent for the destruction of his best friend or the nature he is in awe of.

Jump to other topics

1Narrative Structure

1.1Narrative Structure

1.1.1Narrative Structure

1.1.2Narrative Distancing

1.1.3End of Topic Test - Narrative Structure

2Character Summaries

2.1Walton & Frankenstein

2.1.1Walton

2.1.2Victor Frankenstein

2.1.3End of Topic Test - Walton & Frankenstein

2.2The Monster

2.2.1The Monster

2.2.2The Monster 2

2.2.3End of Topic Test - The Monster

2.3Elizabeth, Justine & Henry

2.3.1Elizabeth Lavenza

2.3.2Justine Moritz

2.3.3Henry Clerval

2.3.4End of Topic Test - Elizabeth, Justine & Henry

2.4Families & Other Characters

2.4.1The Frankenstein Family

2.4.2The De Lacey Family

2.4.3Other Characters

2.4.4End of Topic Test - Families & Other Characters

3Intertextuality & Allusions

3.1Intertextual References

3.1.1The Modern Prometheus

3.1.2The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

3.1.3The Bible

3.1.4Mutability & Tintern Abbey

3.1.5End of Topic Test - Intertextual References

3.2Philosophical & Scientific Theories

3.2.1Edmund Burke

3.2.2Thomas Paine

3.2.3John Locke

3.2.4Jean-Jacques Rousseau

3.2.5Historical Figures

3.2.6End of Topic Test - Philosophy & Science Theories

4Biographic Context

4.1Biographic Context

4.1.1Shelley's Parents

4.1.2Loss & Maternal Anxiety

4.1.3Literary Legend

4.1.4End of Topic Test - Biographical Context

5Chapter Summaries

5.1Letters

5.1.1Letters 1 & 2

5.1.2Letters 3 & 4

5.1.3End of Topic Test - Letters

5.2Chapters

5.2.1Chapters 1-2

5.2.2Chapters 3-4

5.2.3Chapters 5-6

5.2.4Chapters 7-9

5.2.5Chapters 10-11

5.2.6Chapters 12-15

5.2.7Chapters 16-19

5.2.8Chapters 20-23

5.2.9Chapter 24 & Walton’s Last Letters

5.2.10End of Topic Test - Chapters 1-6

5.2.11End of Topic Test - Chapters 7-15

5.2.12End of Topic Test - Chapters 16-23

5.2.13End of Topic Test - Chapter 24 & Walton's Letters

6Key Themes

6.1Key Themes

6.1.1Curiosity & Knowledge

6.1.2Science & Society

6.1.3Loss & Companionship

6.1.4Connection to Nature

6.1.5Injustice

6.2Key Locations

6.2.1Extreme Landscapes

6.2.2Industrialised University Cities

6.2.3End of Topic Test - Key Themes & Locations

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The Bible

End of Topic Test - Intertextual References