Slaughterhouse Five & Frankenstein

How the differences in vision come about can be explained partly by the difference in prevailing world views of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. But what Shelley and Vonnegut share is an uneasiness with the notion of progress. The heroic adventure of the ancient Prometheus is one thing; the adventure of the modern Prometheus is quite another, and what it is is not heroic. For Shelley, the Enlightenment notion of the perfectibility of man, and the popularity of the view that the world can be improved by scientific progress is attached to the universal law of unintended consequences. Shelley's story demonstrates consequence of scientific action that leads to emotional and psychological isolation on the part of human beings connected with it. In seeking to create life, Victor seeks to play God by way of science, even though he is slightly disgusted by the corpse that h

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critique of emergent industrialization, which irrevocably transformed the whole of humanity, and which Shelley appears to understand is at best a mixed blessing for humankind. The moral dilemma created by "progress" that outgrows its creator and inevitably develops as it were a life of its own constitutes as well the development of Victor's character. On this view, the novel is a cautionary tale and by implication a critique of the culture (and perhaps decisive, irrevocable victory) of industrialism or more exactly of the encounter of the bleak ambiguities of modern industrialization with residue of sensibilities about right and wrong. In Slaughterhouse Five, Vonnegut raises the philosophical stakes and consequences of scientific progress enormously, presenting a condemnation of humanity's ultimate expression of horrific scientism, war. Importantly, the war that Vonnegut describes is highly technological and impersonal in nature. The firestorm at Dresden was of course experienced directly on the ground, but those who dropped the bombs or in some manner contributed to the bombing raid are well insulated from the horror. The impersonality of perfected scientific horror is conveyed most strongly in the sequence in which Billy views
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1476
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page)