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Victor's progeny: Premonition of a bioengineered age
, Karmakar M.
Published in Johns Hopkins University Press
2018
Volume: 36
   
Issue: 2
Pages: 337 - 355
Abstract

This essay examines Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein as a piece of literature that captures an epistemic transition in biomedical practices from healing a diseased body to controlling and engineering a human body, anticipating the modern medical practices of our bioengineered era. The process of artificially engineering a bioscientific creature by gathering materials from anonymous sources, and Victor Frankenstein’s ability to pre-select the physical features of the Creature, anticipate the baby-making procedures practiced in the domain of artificial reproductive technology (ART). This essay aims to foreground how the novel offers a fictional engagement with bioethical crises triggered by ART developments that have problematized our bionormative notion of the family as a heterosexual unit.

About the journal
JournalLiterature and Medicine
PublisherJohns Hopkins University Press
ISSN02789671
Open AccessNo