Heroes and heroism in literature, the 18th century, Frankenstein and Robinson Crusoe.
Is it too simplistic to claim that eighteenth-century writers invented new forms of heroism and new types of hero? Considered in relation to Frankenstein and Robinson Crusoe.
The Key Heroic Archetypes pre-18th century began with the Oral Tradition – figures larger than life who embodied ideals and aspirations of their cultures. Then came the Greek Classical hero – characterized by valour in battle, intelligence and perseverance against formidable odds. Often flawed yet possessing extraordinary abilities that set them apart from mere mortals. They dealt with relationships between gods and humans. Finally, there is the Medieval Knight – defined by courage, loyalty and humility, upholding a code of honour, often torn between duty and personal desire. (Tomiwa 2024) Through examining Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, we can see how these authors built upon these heroic archetypes while introducing innovations that would influence literary heroes for future centuries. While it would be too simplistic to claim that eighteenth-century writers invented entirely new forms of heroism, it is not too extreme to suggest they significantly developed the form.
The classical hero in ancient Greece was one 'favoured by the gods; especially one regarded as semi-divine and immortal' (OED 2025). At first glance, Crusoe appears to fit this archetype extremely well. Despite being shipwrecked on a deserted island, he maintains optimism, noting that whilst he has no clothes, he would be too hot in them anyway, and that although his ship was destroyed, "not one life could be spared but mine", (Defoe 1719) which indicates Crusoe genuinely believes himself to be divinely favoured.
Throughout his time on the island, Crusoe's relationship with God deepens parallel to his practical achievements. As he lives what he considers a good Christian life, God appears to reward his faith (Sugrue 2020). After 'ruling' his island for over twenty years, Crusoe's semi-divine status becomes evident to others: when mutineers and the mutinied arrive, they assume "He must be sent directly from heaven then." (Defoe 1719) To sailors and savages he encounters, Crusoe's superiority - from his elevated status to having guns - makes him seem 'semi-divine'. This progression from feeling 'favoured by god' to achieving 'semi-divine' status in others' perception demonstrates how closely Crusoe aligns with the classical heroic model.
However, Defoe necessarily innovates on the Greek model given his Enlightenment context. Crusoe reaches his status 'primarily through mental, not physical feats' (Sugrue 2020). The expanding world of the enlightenment age, as colonialism spread, made it impossible for the British population to ignore the vastness of the world. This 'rest of the world' was largely unknown, and therefore difficult for 'rational' people to comprehend. Defoe, in having his character follow the evolutionary process and as a result become the “governor” (Defoe 1719) of his island, was reassuring to the British reader of their society's superiority, and therefore their own. Defoe underlines that the enlightenment British man can still reach a classical heroic state in this new world, precisely because of their Britishness - they are what Michael Sugrue (2020) calls 'hero(s) of productivity and prudence'.
James Joyce (1976) agrees telling us 'Robinson Crusoe is a prototype of the British Colonist.’ Highlighting ‘the manly independence, the unconscious cruelty, the persistence, the slow yet efficient intelligence, the sexual apathy.' Therefore, the fact that he reaches an almost divine status, that everything eventually works out for him, was a reassuring message to the enlightenment reader. Edward Said suggests that Crusoe is 'the founder of a new world which he rules and reclaims for Christianity and England', (Mcinelly 2003) reaffirming that Crusoe, who is 'allegorically the typical enlightenment man', naturally will always 'come to dominate nature and natives' (Sugrue 2020). In this way then he is a hero for his time, fitting the oral tradition of a character who 'embodied ideals and aspirations of their culture', (Tomiwa 2024) which allow him to be a classical hero. This combination of archetypes is arguably a development of the form of heroism in the eighteenth century.
Crusoe 'refashions' his island and makes himself governor - arguably tries to make himself creator, himself god. He underlines the British and Christian philosophy that 'master yourself and you master your destiny; master your destiny and you master others; master these and you master the economic contingencies of life' (Mcinelly 2003). His mastering is not scientific or literary, but internal. A rationalist confidence trick aided by faith in his god. With the expanding world, the British wondered whether their rational process would suffice. The fear of the unknown, of the footstep coming into their life and upsetting their worldview was present. Therefore, in underlining how Crusoe conquers all, Defoe 'defused insecurities relating to British colonial endeavours', (Mcinelly 2003) underlining how his new British hero, the very allegorical British everyman, possessed, in a different way, the 'extraordinary abilities' of a classical hero that 'set them apart from mere mortals' (Tomiwa 2024) - a new classical hero, built upon oral traditions of societal representation, for the enlightenment age.
Defoe's most significant innovation lies in the space he allows for introspection. Whilst introspection in fiction was not new (Hamlet’s soliloquys), Defoe's setting gives his character more space than many storytellers allowed their heroes. The island and sheer expanse of time are 'conditions for Crusoe to make himself the object of his own reflections, a process that teaches Crusoe how to master himself and prepares him to master his native companion, Friday.' (Levine 1973) Yet, with his lack of desires, is it really so hard for Crusoe to master himself? As Shelley might ask, if he were truly a person, would he not experience the same difficult life that Frankenstein does? His conquering introspection lacks an element of humanity, the element of other humans.
However, this limitation reveals something about Defoe's innovation. Crusoe does not give in to personal desires - to loneliness or love. We might try to suggest he fits Oral, Classical and Medieval hero archetypes, but I think this would be a false assertion. The reason for Crusoe's heroism, under classical and oral models, is his lack of personal desire. He 'doesn't discuss loneliness' and 'all women are peripheral to the novel'. We can read him as Adam Smith's 'Homo economicus' – a person who lives only to consume the fruits of a capitalist society. Crusoe simply steps along the phylogeny path (Sugrue 2020) and is rewarded by god as he does. Whilst he might be an Oral and Classical hero, given his lack of longing, he does not fit the Medieval model because he is not forced to choose between duty and desire.
This creates an interesting paradox in Defoe's heroic innovation. Many call this the first novel because of the detailed attention given to an 'ordinary man' (Mcinelly 2003). I would push back on two fronts. What is Hamlet's uncertainty but his ordinariness, one hundred years before Defoe's work? Some might push back and say Hamlet is royalty, therefore not ordinary. But with the same critique we might ask how normal is it to be stuck on an island alone for twenty years. In my opinion, one is more normal than the other. Furthermore, I would agree with Sugrue that actually Crusoe, with his lack of loneliness, is far from ordinary. Whilst I agree with the significance Ian Watt and others place on this novel, I think to suggest 'ordinaryness' is significant is insufficient to suggest an innovation in heroism given that this 'ordinariness' is referring to the trope of reflecting society and their values, which started in the Oral storytelling tradition of parables. Despite these limitations, Defoe’s extended narrative time for heroic introspection, does prove influential for future development of heroes.
Whilst it would be hard to liken Victor Frankenstein to the Homeric classical heroes of ancient Greece, in his own way, he also comes to 'dominate nature'. Like Crusoe, he attempts to use his brain to solve physical, real world issues, and in his creation of his creature he succeeds under the definition of a hero as having 'extraordinary abilities that set them apart from mere mortals'. (Tomiwa 2024) But there is a reason that in mass culture Frankenstein often has connotations of a mad scientist. Firstly, Victor is far from a 'romantic' hero: far from a good husband to Elizabeth, far from a good father to his creation. Anne Mellor (2019) suggests this is a story about 'what happens when a man tries to have a baby without a woman,' whilst others add that 'Victor lacks the mediation of thought that a female might bring.'
Victor and Crusoe are similar. They succeed in the conquering of nature, which was not the issue for Defoe's Enlightenment readers that it would later become for Romantics like Shelley who lived in an ever more industrialised society. They succeed in reaching a semi-divine state. Walton even points out "What a glorious creature must he have been in the days of his prosperity," … "when he is thus noble and godlike in ruin!" (Shelley 1818). Yet one hero appears to fit two of three heroic archetypes whilst the other is left with negative connotations for many. Why is this?
I think it is because Shelley underlines that her hero is not divine. Victor is human, and does have human emotions and desires. Victor does not choose duty over personal desires, as a Medieval Knight must. In not fitting easily with these previous major models of hero, Shelley arguably 'does not look back … but forwards to realistic books like Crime and Punishment.' (Levine 1976)
Some suggest 'Frankenstein is one of the first in a long tradition of fictional overreachers'. (Levine 1976) I disagree. Macbeth has a Hamartia of ambition. I would suggest Frankenstein doesn't fit into this 'overreacher' tradition so cleanly. It is his lack of ambition (to take over the world), his lack of desire to 'master', or to father, his creation that, in my opinion, causes his 'downfall'. He tells us: 'in a fit of enthusiastic madness I created a rational creature, and was bound towards him, to assure, as far as was in my power, his happiness and well-being. This was my duty; but there was another still paramount to that. My duties towards the beings of my own species had greater claims to my attention, because they included a greater proportion of happiness or misery.' (Shelley 1818)
I think it is a stretch to suggest Shelley - so heavily involved in scientific discussion from a young age as her father hosted meetings of prominent thinkers - is anti-scientific progress. I think it is incorrect to assert that the reason Victor seems to fail to fit into classical heroic models is because of his scientific ambition. Rather, I believe it is the pushing away of friends, family, lovers and children (creatures) that leads to an eventual crash and burn cycle. Shelley highlights the importance of maintaining relationships - for maintaining ourselves (and those we love). In effect, then Shelley argues against Defoe, suggesting that by ourselves we would fail to conquer, or give a home to creations, creatures or savages. A less rationalist but arguably more realistic perspective from a gothic novel which many suggest fits as the first science fiction novel.
Victor attempts to rationalize his actions, but in turning away from his responsibility towards his creation, he has been labelled by some critics as 'the original agent of evil' (Levine 1976) - an anti-hero whose behaviour some suggest makes him a typical gothic hero villain. In some ways the ‘Byronic’ hero. (Palfy 2016) While Victor's treatment of the Creature certainly fits a villainous stereotype, he transcends the conventional gothic trope in ways that become clear. In trying to 'return to the’ amiableness of domestic affection Victor becomes the 'passive' hero (Levine 1976). He discovers it is 'impossible to return to the womb', (Mellor 2019) knowledge which Mary Shelley, whose mother died post childbirth, would have sadly known all too well.
However, Shelley's most significant innovation lies in how Victor's moral failure creates space for a different kind of heroism to emerge. His abandonment of his responsibilities to educate and nurture the creature allows the creature to assume a new heroic role within the story. A hero being 'the central character or protagonist… whom the reader is intended to support' (OED 2025) is perhaps the most accurate modern description of a hero. A description that the creature comes to inhabit instead. This is a different kind of hero, one without the education of Crusoe (who has 'British self-assurance in a landscape that could easily overpower him'(Mcinelly 2003)). Whilst Crusoe embodies economic and evolutionary arguments that uphold Britain's superiority, the Creature exemplifies prevalent debates about monstrosity, with the Peasant class of the French revolution being deemed monstrous by many.
The creature is called a 'wretch'. Mary Wollstoncraft (1972) said woman are made wretched by their education'. South Sermons agrees, saying we 'sometimes read of monstrous births, but we may often see a greater monstrosity in educations'. Similarly, for Shakespeare, 'monstrosity is… a way of defining moral wrongs', as in King Lear: 'her offence must be of such unnatural degree/ that monsters it', (Johnson 1755) turning monster from noun into a verb, such that a monster is 'a moral advertisement'. The creature embodies this moral aspect. If Victor is an anti-hero who shapes beings that encounter him into one like his own flawed self, then the creature is a new kind of tragic hero, aware of his surroundings, articulate, 'as a verbal creation he is the very opposite of monstrous' (Brooks 1993), and yet alienated. 'The monster must be seen as both Adam and Satan, Frankenstein as both creator and fallen angel' (Levine 1976).
I read Crusoe, at times, as an accidental anti-hero, who to modern readers reflects the good, and the bad traits of enlightenment era Britain. He too could be read as creator and fallen angel. Crusoe's 'refashioning' of his island and himself as governor, alongside his killing and eating of animals, their playing with the bear later for fun, the fact that 'how can I own it' seems to be one of his primary questions (Sugrue 2020), and his selling of a man he does not even 'own', in my opinion, blurs the boundary between him and the savages. If we define savage as being unnecessarily cruel, unnecessarily exploitative.
The creature also comes to be good and bad. He comes to mirror Victor's own dark side, his lack of place in society, his isolation. Whilst Friday comes to be like Crusoe. Both authors place within their primary heroes a desire to shape one like themselves. This represents another step towards being a hero under the classical model. If we can recreate ourselves, what are we if not immortal?
Yet this desire for doubling also reveals something darker. Some suggest that doubles represent death: there I am, not here, therefore perhaps you are dead already. Repetition gives the original a hollowness - Hamlet's famous 'words, words, words'. At the very least, the desire to double oneself suggests an emptiness, indicative of a belief that being yourself is not enough. Whilst some might claim Victor is the original point of evil, we have to wonder more about the 'silken cord of childhood' (Shelley 1818) given the 'unattainable idea of domestic tranquillity' prevalent in his, and Shelley's own life - uprooted from birth and then with a man with whom she had a relationship that was far from simple. Similarly, from a Marxist standpoint, when we read Crusoe as an allegory of capitalist society's development, we can see a hollowness it can leave society with - consumers without any desire for domestic affection. We notice how the authors have created heroes who can be simultaneously attacked, questioned, rebuffed, or rejoiced.
The structural innovations of both authors ultimately advance heroic forms significantly. In Frankenstein, the narrative/literary setting is arguably even more important to the development of heroes than the physical. The length and attention Crusoe is allowed is where Defoe's innovation in terms of heroism appears. In Frankenstein, the structure allows for the anti-hero. Victor can be seen as one – Barbara Johnson (1992) tells us - 'not just because of his treatment of the creature but because of all those he engages within his narrative.' She suggests the frame narrative is 'a form of seduction', underlining how we readers are also pulled in. Each frame is autobiographical. The autobiographical desire is to teach about your own life, to teach others what you know (through story), to, in effect, create a being like oneself, which, she suggests, is the 'central transgression' of Shelley's novel. 'It is not merely Frankenstein in this novel who becomes disenchanted: each major character learns something of the nature of his own illusions', Levine (1976) tells us. This is why I disagree with critics' assessment of Victor as a typical gothic hero villain. His character, be it hero or villain, extends across frames and, Johnson (1992) suggests, even to us, shaping others and us more subtly than a typical gothic figure.
Character in Frankenstein has to be proven by plot. Medieval Knights proved their worthiness to be heroes through 'dilemmas between duty and personal desires', (Tomiwa 2024) but as I have pointed out, Defoe seems to miss this step. Characters having to make difficult choices is how we demonstrate morals, even in modern day storytelling. Justine is executed because she asks to be judged on her character, not her story (Newman 1986). She is not a hero but is a martyr who dies to teach us something: the importance of story over character, the importance of story to prove character. Whilst Crusoe's introspection in such a unique setting is an innovation, it results in a hero that fits a classical and oral archetype – which we could argue is two steps back. And one that misses the debate between duty and desire almost completely.
Nevertheless, what is key for both author’s heroes is that they represent something bigger than themselves - a choice, or ideas. With their ever-changing worlds, both writers do develop heroes that espouse and represent the world around them. Moving from Enlightenment England to the Romantic period, we see how the new form of rational, thinking hero that Defoe develops for his time, is built upon by Shelley such that the thoughts, and the characters become more real, and less perfect, and arguably more relatable. Both utilise multiple models of the hero in the same story. Shelley specifically foreshadows the theme of multiple protagonists, multiple heroes that will become extremely popular in modern literature.
Shelley's Frankenstein also teaches us that a hero doesn't need acts of heroism to be one. An empathetic narrator, a seductive frame narrative, can make even an amoral, or passive protagonist someone we perceive as a hero, foreshadowing the modern and postmodern heroes to come. Shelley shows us that 'within every hero there is a Frankenstein, or his monster, waiting to get out' (Levine 1976).
Therefore, whilst I do think it is too simplistic to claim that these individual eighteenth-century writers invented entirely new forms of heroism, I do not think it is too simplistic to suggest they advanced the form. Defoe's allowing for the sheer amount of time with his hero, even if that hero himself is not entirely new, is an innovation. And in her intertwined frame narrative, Shelley too has given complex characters space that underlines the complexity of heroism itself. Through their innovations in characterization and structure both Defoe and Shelley advanced the heroic form, helping shape models which writers would use to create the morally ambiguous heroes of modern and postmodern literature.
3228 words.
Bibliography
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Notes:
I use the Gutenberg editions for some books - which do not have page numbers. If you wish to find the quote please use the find function on your computer (control F) and this should instantly take you to the correct section.