Frankenstein!

One of my all-time favorite novels is Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and it didn't even become my favorite until about three years ago because I had never read it! Me, the English Teaching wannabe had never read anything by Mary Shelley until then. Crazy, I know. I totally LOVE LOVE LOVE this work. There are so many layers to explore, and then it is still a captivating story when you take it merely at face value.

My favorite quote comes from the part when Victor is facing his choice to neglect family, friends, and his academic studies to pursue his new found passion:

"A human being in perfection ought always to preserve a calm and peaceful mind, and never to allow passion or a transitory desire to disturb his tranquility. I do not think that the pursuit of knowledge is an exception to this rule. If the study to which you apply yourself has a tendency to weaken your affections, and to destroy your taste for those simple pleasures in which no alloy can possibly mix, then that study is certainly unlawful, that is to say, not befitting the human mind. If this rule were always observed; if no man allowed any pursuit whatsoever to interfere with the tranquility of his domestic affections, Greece had not been enslaved; Caesar would have spared his country; America would have been discovered more gradually; and the empires of Mexico and Peru had not been destroyed" (Shelley 33).

The reader can visualize Mary Shelley getting on her soapbox and telling it like it is through Victor Frankenstein. The coolest part about this quote is that it was published in 1818—nearly two hundred years ago—and it rings true to this day.

If you have read Frankenstein, post your favorite quote or section. I would love to see what strikes you.

If you haven't read the book, I highly recommend it. The writing style is fantastic; the story is extremely more in-depth than any of the goofball movies that have been made; and you can learn a few things about how actions speak louder than words.