Feeling sorry for Frankenstein’s monster is hardly new

In the last couple of days my Twitter feed, always a cheerful place, has been more full of jokes than usual. The source of the mirth is Exeter University academic Nick Groom, and his ex cathedra pronouncements on Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein. According to Groom, it is possible – gasp – to read Frankenstein’s creature as a sympathetic character. Whatever next? Will the Times and the Sun hold the front page while Groom invites us to see Mr Darcy as sexy or, going out on a limb, Oliver Twist as an intensely sympathetic portrayal of an abused and abandoned child?

Journalists have long rubbed their hands in glee at “don states the obvious” stories. Mostly these take down scientific research that, however painstaking, has ended up agreeing with common sense. This time, it’s the opposite. This time, it’s journalists who have swallowed the obvious that’s being stated by an academic, and have given him oodles of free publicity in the process.