Victor's Journey In Frankenstein

Alexa Correa
Cowan

When individuals are faced with complex situations, is the way that they react determined by what others expect of them, or by their true nature? In Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus”, she expands on this question through the main characters of her novel, Victor Frankenstein and his creature. The protagonist and antagonist of this story represented the human journey, and how people can change as a result of the events they experience. Throughout “Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus”, Victor and the creature have a complicated relationship with each other which changes the course of both of their lives. Victor being the creature's creator and the monster essentially being his child, they both

After losing basically every person who was close to him as a result of something that he created, Victor’s mental health takes a huge toll. He turns into a completely different person than he was before. His misery and loneliness completely takes over him, he drives himself crazy by feeding off this sadness he´s feeling. He expresses when he says “More miserable than man ever was before, why did I not sink into forgetfulness and rest” (Shelley 21). Victor’s depression is a driving force of the way he thinks and behaves in the novel, he sees himself as the most miserable person to have ever existed.. He doesn’t see how his sadness is caused by the actions he took, he's blinded with self-pity and misery. Since Victor is so focused on his own anguish it prevents him from feeling sympathy for anyone other than himself, specifically the creature. At the loss of his brother William, Victor is so engrossed in feeling sorry for himself that he doesn acklowegde the pain that his family is also going through. His father calls him out on his self-indulgence when he confronts him by saying “Do you think, Victor..that I do not suffer also?...It is also a duty owed to yourself, for excessive sorrow prevents improvement or enjoyment, or even the discharge of daily usefulness, without which no man is fit for society” (Shelley 9). Victor´s misery

His strive to fulfill hs loneliness as an outsider is displayed through the acts of kindness, along with the violence, that he commits. The monster’s ambition is rooted in his desire to be a part of human society and be accepted into a community. He attempts to form these human connections. but is unable to do so in all of his attempts. He’s immediately rejected by every individual that he encounters. After realizing that there's no possibility for him to be accepted by society, he changes his goal to creating a companion for himself to combat his loneliness. He demands this from Victor as a form of reparations, he tells Victor “I demand a creature of another sex, but as hideous as myself… it is all that I can receive, and it shall content me” (Shelley 17). The creature begs Victor to create a female counterpart for himself, so he could stop the actions of malice he did out of the isolation he felt. He was convinced that this would be the solution for all the pain he has gone through. The monster is so desperate to have some sort of companion that he’s willing to isolate himself, as well as his potential partener from the rest of the world if it meant that he had at least one person by his side. This was the monster's last hope to find partnership in a world that despises him, he would do whatever it took to be able to accomplish this.