Exclusive Inclusion

The life movement and the bio-power stalking (Giorgio Agamben and Mary Shelley)

Abstract

This article analyzes the possible dialogues between the thought of Giorgio Agamben and the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. Thus, the Italian philosopher describes central aspects that investigate the ways in which biopower captures the life. Indeed, through the concept of the machine –the anthropological, the language and the governmental– the devices capable of returning the power of life to the calculations of power are described. On the other hand, Frankenstein constructs a series of scenes in which the voice of the Thing challenges its creator, Victor Frankenstein, in an ethical dimension due to his negligence and lack of care. The interpellation is directed at a character but, in Agamben's terms, Víctor Frankenstein is part of a larger machine of which he himself ends up being a victim. The fiction also makes explicit the failure of the biopolitical machinery inasmuch as its protagonist affirms himself in life trying to find possible meanings of existence.