Elizabeth, to Victor’s relief, got over the illness, but sadly Caroline did not recover, and soon died. Victor prepares to study at the University of Ingolstadt, however his mother, Caroline Beaufort, and Elizabeth become diseased with scarlet fever at this time.

Throughout childhood and adolescence, Victor becomes very interested in the natural world, and inspired by alchemists such as Cornelius Agrippa, Paracelsus and Albertus Magnus. Clerval was Victor’s schoolmate, and their friendship thrived as both grew older. Elizabeth was adopted into the Frankenstein family when both she and Victor were young, so they felt more like siblings.

His early chapters describe his childhood, and his family, with particular interest in his “cousin”, Elizabeth Lavenza, and his best friend Henry Clerval. However, Walton and his team find Victor Frankenstein’s body floating in the sea, and when Victor wakes, his tale of how he came to the ship commences.Īfter Walton’s letters, Victor takes over the narrative.

When first reading this it seems, admittedly, irrelevant to how Frankenstein is typically known. The novel begins with Robert Walton’s letters to his sister, Margaret, about his journey to the Arctic. To those who have not read or understood the novel, here is a summary: It is, arguably, a difficult read for the uncovered eye, but when we look deeper, in between the lines of the text, the narrative is almost simple. Therefore, he is not truly a monster.This gothic novel, written in the Romantic period, is positively ghastly with its imminent symbols throughout the lexis. Without the influence of human society, the creature would remain as innocent as he was at conception. Moreover, he subsides entirely on vegetation until he is chased by Victor and forced to kill to keep him alive. All men fled, all men disowned.' It is following the DeLacey chapters in which the creature is spurned his first real chance at human companionship that he becomes violent, destroying the cabin. However, in the creature's narrative, it is revealed that ' saw and heard of none like. You are my creator, but I am your master -obey!' This would seem to indicate that Victor is correct in his assumptions and that monstrosity merely lay dormant or that his reasoning was merely a front for self-gain. However, as time progresses and Victor delays the creation of a second female creature as companion, he embodies the archetype of demonic creation: 'you believe yourself miserable, but I can make you so wretched that the light of day will be hateful to you. Oh, praise the eternal justice of man!' This is the tone at which he first approaches Victor. His story, although filtered through two layers of unreliable narrator, endeavours to disrupt the preconceptions of both Victor and the reader by returning voice to the unvoiced.īy the creature's account, man is the real monster: 'You accuse me of murder and yet you would, with a satisfied conscience, destroy your own creature. How dare you sport thus with life?' In the Russian nesting doll-shaped plot, in which stories are told within stories (Victor's being conveyed through Walton's, the Creature conveying that of the DeLacey family to Victor), the Creature's narration is central.

Not only is the creature intelligent and articulate, his first words being 'I expected this reception,' but emotionally and morally charged: 'how, then, must I be hated, who am miserable beyond all living things! You purpose to kill me. However, as the creature appears, his assumptions are challenged. While in Victor's eyes the creature is most certainly a monster, describing him frequently as 'fiend' and immediately fleeing the scene once the creature is brought to life in disgust: 'how can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch I had endeavored to form?' As the majority of narration is his, it would be easy to assume the creature's inherent evil as, from the moment of his conception, he is demonised.

Frankenstein annotations conscience