Erasing women from the Frankenstein culture-text: adapting Elizabeth Lavenza and Justine Moritz

Abstract

The Frankenstein culture-text has been dominated by adaptations of Frankenstein’s women in line with the presumption of heterosexuality. This means that the women of Frankenstein are typically adapted in ways which refocus their character’s narrative around their romantic relationships, usually with Victor. Alternatively, they are completely cut from the narrative, despite being narratively significant in the source text. This results in a silence in the culture-text about the presence of women in this story. Addressing this cultural silence requires not only feminist adaptation practice in the effort to make space for these women in future adaptations but a necessarily queer practice which resists the presumption of heterosexuality.