My first English book, 'Frankenstein'
By Lee Nan-hee
When I go outside these days, I can see lush green leaves in the mountains and hills. At the risk of stating the obvious, summer is here.
As I wrote to you before, I really enjoy growing plants, looking at them quietly. That small thing makes me calm and happy. As I and all human beings are children of Mother Nature, I feel at home with green leaves and fresh air that plants breathe out.
Last week, I wrote about Mary Shelley who was a woman novelist and thinker. One of her most widely known works must be the well-known “Frankenstein.” It is considered the first science fiction work and it has become renowned around the world, as it has been adapted to movies several times. When I read the story ― no, frankly speaking, I searched and looked up content on the internet ― I learned that some of its background and that it was set in Geneva, Switzerland. Because I had been to Switzerland twice, in 2013 and 2017, it reminded me of old memories and triggered recollections. Once I stayed in a 100 year-old house built at the foot of the Swiss Alps and I can't forget the calm, clear, chilly morning air and green grass outside that house.
On top of that, I bought the book “Frankenstein” when I went to the Kyobo bookstore in Seoul's Gwanghwamun. It was just after I was admitted to university at the age of 19. I can't believe it. It was almost 35 years ago. That was probably the first English book that I ever bought. I still remember that day vividly when the weather was cold and gray, when I was quite excited to find various kinds of English books at Kyobo bookstore. The cover page of that novel was the back of a certain man on top of a hill in the snowy winter or glaciers, maybe.
I don't know why I was attracted to that cover picture. Maybe I must have been feeling lonely or a little nervous about the coming days in the new circumstances of university life in Seoul. I had lived in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, until then. In hindsight, so many days and years have passed since that time. So many various ― sometimes arduous, tumultuous ― things happened in my life since then. Of course, I cannot enumerate all of them.
Getting back to the novel, usually literary critics have asserted that the novel “Frankenstein” symbolizes or conveys some weird, bleak, and negative aspects of the working class of the capitalist 18th century in England. But as far as I felt, the novel seems to express some passionate, eager but tragic, bleak aspects of Mary Shelley's personal life experiences. Of course, I can admit the fact that this novel shows us human desire or confidence that human, just like God, can create a new life, creature with developing science and knowledge. This must be corresponding to then-prospering capitalism and explosively developing science and technology in Europe.
To make a long story short, I enjoyed looking into this novel and it gave me some insights into women writers of the past. I could think about and imagine how to interpret this novel in terms of Christian theology. From the beginning, the novel starts with some famous lines from “Paradise Lost” written by John Milton, which reads something like “Did I ask you to create me?” and so on. I could notice again that many Western literary works are full of Christian thoughts and parables. Very intriguing...
Lee Nan-hee studied English in college and theology at Hanshin University.