Trauma and Guilt in S. T. Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein

Abstract

S. T. Coleridge’s poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein represent the trauma of guilt caused by protagonists’ own actions. These respective texts include guilt-related references of the main characters’ activity, which the characters tell in the form of tales. The Ancient Mariner in the poem and Victor Frankenstein in the novel have been suffering from the guilt of trauma caused by their own deeds. Their guilt allegorizes the colonial guilt and regret for the violation of nature’s course and their unethical act. All of the characters narrate those incidents, deeds and experiences in order to overcome from their guilt of trauma, which show how people overcome it. This dissertation endeavors to demonstrate, through a close reading of both of the texts in the light of trauma theory, how there is trauma of guilt, and it finally uncovers that both of the writers have used narrativization as means of healing the trauma.