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Rather than expressing any kind of paternal (or maternal) love for his creation, Frankenstein recoils, as "breathless horror and disgust filled [his] heart" (Shelley 43). One can quite reasonably view Frankenstein's desire to create life as a kind of twisted mourning, and the fact that his attempts to give birth without any kind of mother reveals the novel's position regarding the absence of a mother.
In short, the novel views the mother as necessary not only for continuing procreation through her blessing regarding future marriage, but also through the mediating role she seems to play in the creation of life. Without a mother present, Frankenstein recoils from creation and abandons it to its fate, and the rest of the plot seems to suggest that the monster would have been able to grow up reasonably well adjusted if only he had been granted the encouraging, caring support of a mother. Essentially, Frankenstein transfers his own lack of a mother (and its attendant neuroses) to the monster, such that most of the tragedies of the story can be attributed to Frankenstein's mother's death. Her absence encourages Frankenstein to work towards creating life asexually, and the ultimate absence of a mother at the monster's birth ensures that it will...
Frankenstein's mother's death simultaneously sets Frankenstein on his path towards creating a monster and Elizabeth on her path towards death at the monster's hands. Her dying wish is for Frankenstein and Elizabeth to marry, and although this wish comes true, it does so in the absence of a mother and so is ultimately perverted and destroyed. Similarly, the monster is created without a mother, and thus is left to its own devices as Frankenstein is unable to handle the responsibilities of his own creation. Without the mediating, nurturing force of the mother, the monster grows up resentful and vengeful, as there is no one who accepts him for what he is. Ultimately, the novel Frankenstein argues that procreation without a mother results in disaster, because only the mother is able to offer the kind of support and nurturing that prevents humanity from acting on its worst impulses.
Works Cited
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. Boston: Cornhill Publishing Company, 1922.
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Thus Shelley's novel provides a third solution of sorts, an acknowledgement of the imperfect and estranged nature of humanity that is not comforting, but seems more realistic to modern readers, perhaps, as the monster seems like a modern anti-hero, from a 21st century point-of-view. Even to 19th century readers, Shelley's ambiguous views of science and religion were likely to resonate. The analogies of creator and created are deliberately ambiguous in
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