Frankenstein

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein opens with Robert Walton's ship surrounded in ice, and Robert Walton watching, along with his crew, as a huge, malformed "traveller" on a dog sled vanished across the ice. The next morning, the fog lifted and the ice separated and they found a man, that was almost frozen lying on a slab of floating ice. By giving him hot soup and rubbing his body with brandy, the crew restored him to his health. A few days later he was able to speak and the stranger, Victor Frankenstein, seemed distressed to learn that a sled had been sighted prior to his rescue from the ice. Then he began to tell his story.

Frankenstein said that he had been an only child and during a expedition with his parents, his mother found a peasant and his wife with five hungry babies. The peasant's children were dark-skinned, except for one little girl. Frankenstein's mother decided to adopt the little girl. Victor and his adopted sister, Elizabeth, came to love one another, even though they were very different in temperament and nature. Elizabeth "busied herself with following the aerial creations of poets," while Frankenstein preferred scientific knowledge "it was the secrets of heaven and earth that I desired to learn ... the physical secrets of the world." After the death of his mother when he was seventeen, Frankenstein departed for the University of Inglostadt. Frankenstein grew intensely interested in the phenomena of the human body and he explored the processes of death and decay, and became infatuated with the idea of creating human life itself.

After several days and nights of laboring, he "succeeded in discovering the cause of generation and life; nay, more, I became myself capable of bestowing animation upon lifeless matter." Frankenstein set out to create a superior living being, hoping to eventually discover a formula for eternal life. In his research Frankenstein determinedly collected human remains from charnel-houses and cemeteries. Then, "on a dreary night of November ... I beheld the accomplishment of my toils": an eight-foot monster. Applying electricity to the "lifeless matter" before him, Frankenstein saw "the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and convulsive motion agitated its limbs." And at the result of his creation coming to life, Frankenstein was appalled. "Breathless horror and disgust filled my heart." He thought that he had created a freak. Exhausted, Frankenstein fell into a deep sleep, seeking a "few moments of forgetfulness." But, as he tossed in bed, a cold draft woke Frankenstein and "I beheld the wretch ... his eyes ... fixed on me." The 'monster' was looking directly at him and he shrieked in horror, scaring the monster away, and then escaped downstairs.

A long illness followed this incident, and Frankenstein slowly began to recover. But, soon after his recovery, he received terrible news from his father: His brother William had been strangled, and his murderer remained on the rampage. "Come dearest Victor; you alone can console Elizabeth," his father said and Frankenstein returned to Geneva during a terrible storm. As he tread wearily along, he "perceived in the gloom a figure," and knew instantly that it was "the filthy demon to whom I had given life." Then a horrifying thought dawned upon him: this monster might be his brother's murderer. But when Frankenstein arrived at his home, he was told that William's killer had already been

unmasked. Justine, the family's long-time servant, had been found in ownership of a locket that contained a picture of their mother, taken from William during the murder. Poor Justine seemed to verify her own guilt "by her extreme confusion of manner"; and, though Frankenstein believed Justine was innocent, he was reluctant to confess his fears that his creation had killed his brother because he felt the story of his monster was too unbelievable to be taken seriously. Justine was hanged, and Frankenstein, "seized by remorse and a sense of guilt," took a journey to Mont Blanc and during the hike up a mountain path he saw a strange, nimble figure - his own creation - coming towards him "with superhuman speed.", Be gone, vile insect," Frankenstein commanded. But the monster answered: " . . . You, my creator, detest and spurn me, thy creature .... How dare you sport thus with life?" The creature and the creator quarreled back and forth until the monster convinced Frankenstein to hear his story.

Life for the intelligent and hypersensitive creature had always been difficult. "I saw, felt, heard, and smelt at the same time. . . " he said. He meandered, existing on berries and stream water until he found a fire left that had been left by drifters, and learned to how to keep himself warm. When his food supply had grown scarce he approached a village; but due to his hideous features, some of the townspeople fled, some attacked him until he was badly bruised by stones and then he escaped to the open country. He ultimately made his home in an abandoned hovel adjoining a cottage. In the cottage lived an old, underprivileged, poor, blind man with a son and a daughter. The creature learned the essentials of verbal language by listening to their conversations. After several months passed, the monster gathered his courage and conversed with the blind

man while he was alone and told the blind

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