19세기 영국소설에 나타난 신체해부학 실험에 대한 연구 - 프랑켄슈타인을 중심으로 -

초록

This study focuses on human and animal anatomy experimentation in literary works like Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Examining the novel together with the historical background reveals a considerable amount of medical and anatomical knowledge in modern European countries. In particular, Frankenstein reflects the development of anatomy and vivisection studies in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. In that period, many medical, chemical, and physiological discoveries—galvanic theory, for example—were made because of scientists’ curiosity about the principles of life. In the development of medical or physiological research on human and animal bodies, dead bodies were stolen, dissected, and violated by the knives of surgeons and the hands of scientists, as depicted so clearly in Frankenstein. Despite laws and acts to prevent cruel and merciless experimentation, some scientists, such as the late 18th century surgeon John Hunter, on whom the character of Victor Frankenstein was partly based, did not stop their anatomical research. The current study found that reviewing Frankenstein from an anatomical perspective can highlight diverse scientific and medical discourses in their historical, social, and cultural contexts.

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