Origins
Originally I was going to start this with “The Monster Story begins with Frankenstein” but with a little more thought I realized something. It might actually start with Gulliver’s Travels (1726) by Jonathan Swift. In that satiric book, Lemuel Gulliver gets to experience personally what it is like to be a monster. First he is a giant among the Lilliputians, then he is a tiny person among the Brobdingnagians and at the end of the book, he is simply a human, or Yahoo, a much less wonderful creature than a Houyhnhnms. (This last part may have been an inspiration for Pierre Boulle’s The Planet of the Apes (1963).
Gulliver and his amazing journeys certainly inspired many Science Fiction and Fantasy stories. But, despite the fun and satiric side, it was not the inspiration of the Monster Story plot. You guessed it. That was Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818). To really see this, we need to define what a “Monster Story” is.
What is a Monster Story?
As opposed to a Horror story, which many of us would associate it with, a Monster tale is a story in which the central figure is a monster. The purpose of this kind of story is not the “cold frisson” of a weird tale (to use Lovecraft’s preferred term. His “The Dunwich Horror” (Weird Tales, April 1929) qualifies as a monster story as do others). This is why some Monster stories aren’t even Horror. Monsters can be found in Science Fiction and Fantasy as well. Monsters are as old as literature. The Epic of Gilgamesh has at least two: Humbaba and the Scorpion People. A Science Fiction story like “Who Goes There?” by John W. Campbell also features a monster, and J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings is full of them.
Let’s take an old tale like Beowulf for example. That tale has three monsters: Grendel, Grendel’s Mother and a dragon. The point of the story is that Beowulf defeats them, proving he is a good king. That is why the title of the story is Beowulf not Grendel, His Mom and a Dragon. Modern writers have turned this on its head by re-writing stories from the monster’s POV, such as John Gardner’s Grendel (1971). In a tale like Beowulf, there are monsters, but it is not a monster story any more than the tales of Gilgamesh, Theseus or Hercules are.
Frankenstein
To be a Monster Story, the creature must be most important or at least equally as important as the humans involved. This would be the Frankenstein scenario. The title of Shelley’s book actually refers to the human creator, Victor Frankenstein. Often the name is mistakenly given to the creature, Adam. Why is this? Because in Shelley’s book, the monster gets equal time to his creator. When the creature ventures out into the world and meets the blind man, we are investing ourselves in its existence. If the book was truly about the creator only, we would never spend any time away from Victor and his flip-floppy obsession and regret. The creature is more relatable. How many of us have had burning obsessions that proved to be hubris-worthy in quality? Not many. But how many of us had to navigate a strange world as a child? All of us.
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Another example of this dual screen-time is The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886) by Robert Louis Stevenson. The hero is the villain, and both sides of Jekyll get equal billing. The structure of the book is such that it is supposed to keep you from realizing the truth for as long as possible, so Hyde doesn’t get as close an examination, but he remains equally important. Too much time in Hyde’s skin would be rather repulsive, I think. (Despite that, many serial killer books seem to give us a Hydian look at the world.)
Dracula
A better example of title-worthiness is Dracula (1897) by Bram Stoker. The famous vampire has only four major scenes in the book but still gets the title. Why? Stoker could have called it Harker. Or Van Helsing. Or Four Men Who Slay Vampires in England and Abroad. All the men opposed to Dracula are replaceable, but Dracula can not be switched out. He is central and gets the title. (John Polidori wrote The Vampyre (1819) at the same time as Shelley’s Frankenstein. They were vacationing together with Lord Byron and Percy Shelly at Lake Diodati in the summer of 1816. Lord Byron proposed a ghost story writing contest. Polidori’s short novel follows a similar pattern, with a titular villain-hero and sets the stage for Stoker’s novel.)
The Plot is the Thing
The typical Monster Story plot is:
- a monster is created either intentionally or by accident
- the monster kills its creator or escape his (rarely her) control
- the monster explores the world, finding it cruel and uninviting
- the monster goes on a rampage
- the monster is destroyed
- Or is it? (the inevitable sequel)
This plot is a skeleton of Frankenstein, which set the mold. Add a jungle discovery at the beginning and it is King Kong. It is Godzilla, Them, Tarantula, Q, interestingly it is also the film version of Food of the Gods even though the book is something else. The Fifty-Foot Woman, The Incredible Melting Man, Reptilicus, Dinosaurus, The Blob, and I could go on and on.
Horror Movies vs Monster Movies
Watching a Monster movie is not the same as watching a Horror movie. There is a kind of thrill ride, with scares and creep outs, but the whole thing is ultimately different than a film like The Exorcist. (Which is named for the priest and not the possessed.) We watch Ymir from Twenty Million Miles to Earth as he goes through the Harryhausen-speed motions of arrival to death and we are entertained, but never really frightened. There is a form of catharsis that happens in the movement of the Monster Story plot. We feel excited but also a little cleansed because the monster is defeated (though probably not destroyed because it will be back again and again.)
Famous Monsters of Filmland
To illustrate this a little, I look to the first issue of Famous Monsters of Filmland (1958). Here is a publication that loves monsters, not necessarily horror. The films featured in this first issue include Ape Girl, Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The Phantom of the Opera, The Mummy, The Ape, El Vampiro, I Was a Teenage Werewolf, Frankenstein Meets the Werewolf, Teenage Frankenstein, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Robot Monster, King Kong, This Island Earth, etc. The titles all feature the monster involved.
Readers of Famous Monsters wanted what the magazine’s title promises. They are not looking for deep penetrating psychological angst, quite the oppose. Giant bugs caused by radiation are put down and the viewer feels that radioactive death of nuclear war will be defeated. We will conquer the horrors our technology creates. There is a hopefulness in watching scientists destroy the monsters they make. Things for Victor Frankenstein didn’t end so well. He froze to death in the Arctic chasing his monster after it strangled his fiancee. Most monster stories offer more hope. Shelley wrote the first novel that warned of the dangers of technology (though it is a much older tale). She set the model for all these other monster stories.
Wells, Matheson
After her, it was H. G. Wells who supplied the intelligent ants, the giant bats, the killer squid, the Martians, invisible men and beast men. Wells is so much deeper than mere monster stories but he still reigns as the King of Monsters (not Godzilla). Looking through a list of monster films, his influence is obvious in at least one third of all titles. Like Mary Shelley, he was no roses-and-sunshine Jules Verne type. After Wells, the author who uses the monster story to do more than the basic Frankenstein plot, is Richard Matheson. His I Am Legend (1954) examines the monster idea forwards and backwards. It is a rich piece of literature, worthy of reading by everyone, not just fan boys like myself.
Today’s Monsters
What about in recent times? Monsters have become so much a part of our reality that they show up everywhere. The entire Twilight YA craze used monsters to tell a romantic story. Better is Joss Whedon’s Buffyverse, which does it as well, but with more creativity. The Zombie craze with The Walking Dead, World War Z, 28 Days Later, etc. feeds a need to know that even if things get worse (political unrest, global warming, etc.) that humans will survive. Take the film version of Max Brooks’ World War Z. It follows the basic Frankenstein plot if you think of the zombie plague as the monster. Watching people get munched by dinosaurs in Jurassic Park movies is the same thrill. (Steven Spielberg acknowledged this in the second film when he unleashes the T. rex Godzilla-style on San Diego.) As Ian Malcolm says in the first film: “God creates dinosaurs, God destroys dinosaurs. God creates Man, man destroys God. Man creates dinosaurs…” and enjoys watching them on the big screen.
Conclusion
Will the Monster Story change as the 21st century rips along? It might but to be honest, I doubt it. The basic format hasn’t changed in 202 years. There is a modern need for stories centered around monsters. Victorian Gothic novels, Pulp stories, 1950s drive-in movies, modern television shows, there has been no real change since Victor and his Adam stood under the lightning and reanimated dead flesh. “It’s alive!” and it isn’t going anywhere.
Plenty of new authors are writing new monster novels, such as David Wellington, Brian Keene, Eric S. Brown, Willie Meikle, to name just a few. But are they creating something we haven’t seen before. I doubt it. (That isn’t to say they aren’t entertaining. Buy their books!) Until the basic human Yahoo changes, the Monster Story will go on satisfying that weird need in all of us.
