What did you do for Valentine’s Day this year? Were you out with your S.O. or did you sit around in your dorm wondering why you were single as a Pringle?

No matter what you did, you missed out on Professor Ray Boisvert’s special Frankenstein themed presentation, “Would He Bring Her Flowers and Candy? All The Creature Wants is a Girlfriend.”

Boisvert argued that the Creature in Frankenstein wasn’t a destructive being, all he wanted was love and affection. This idea is something that all living beings need. His two main arguments were, 1) Everybody needs to be loved, and 2) The lack of touch affects the Creature negatively in Frankenstein.

He discussed how just like the Creature needed touch, people in real life also need touch to feel good. He cited a study in which monkeys were tested with their real mother versus a terrycloth fake monkey mother. The monkeys who were given the fake monkey mother were content with it and enjoyed the comfort and touch from the cloth.

Boisvert believes that through this study we can learn something about how primates act. Since primates need touch to survive, we as humans also need touch to survive. Gestures are not trivial, touch is essential.