HOW FAUSTUS BECOMES VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN: EUROPEAN MAGIC AND SCIENCE
Journal Title: Наукові праці. Серія "Філологія. Літературознавство" - Year 2016, Vol 271, Issue 259
Abstract
The article refers to the inherent connection between European magic and scientific thinking and the impact, which this phenomenon has on the development of the literature of modernity. In the Renaissance period within the esoteric culture emerged a purely European phenomenon known as Hermeticism, which prompted the development of European experimental science. At the same time under the influence of Hermetic tradition in English drama formed a specific Renaissance/Baroque magic code – a set of themes, plot twists, characters and settings possessing stable characteristics. This code was most strikingly realized in three plays with a mage as the protagonist – Ch. Marlowe’s «The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus», Shakespeare’s «The Tempest» and Jonson’s «The Alchemist»). In these plays were formed three versions or subcodes (Faustian, Prosperian and Subtlian – after the names of the protagonists) of this code that continued to influence literature of subsequent periods. Thus in Romanticism with its significant surge of interest in the occult and esoteric culture and a growing tendency to associate the old occult knowledge with new scientific findings Faustian subcode becomes the most influential. This subcode structures such an outstanding work of the era as «Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus» by Mary Shelley. In this work magic Faustian subcode transforms into a science fiction Frantensteinian code. Since that moment this Frankensteinian code has structured numerous literary and cinematographic works with the scientist protagonist being now a revealing the common origin of most important English magic and science fiction stories.
Authors and Affiliations
А. Filonenko,
Keywords
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