Why does Mary Shelley's Frankenstein's structure important?

Question

Mary Shelly, in her novel, Frankenstein, uses a structure where Walten narrates Frakenstein's story, who himself narrates the monster's story. Why is this important and what significance does it have towards author's intent?

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

Wow, its been a while since I read Frankenstein. Shelley uses the literary device called a Frame Story (the structure you are refering to). This means its a story within a story. I found the opinion below on this website: http://www.stanford.edu/~steener/su02/english132/shelley.htm.

It is definitely a logical explanation, but I'm sure its not the only one. I remember discussing this in my high school english class, but I can't remember the reason we came up with then. I am actually getting ready to read Frankenstein again for one of my college classes so maybe in a few weeks I could answer your question better.

"By telling the story with all these personal narratives (all written, sometimes written accounts of entire spoken conversation), Mary Shelley seems to completely do away with the notion of an otherworldly, all-knowing narrator. In Sense and Sensibility, Austen lets us know when a character is objectively unlikable. Here, there is no way to tell bias through the thoughts of the characters. Only through our judgement of their actions can we form an opinion.
It's sort of like the original Blair Witch Project...all we know of the horror situation is this collection of 'source' material of personal accounts."