Victor Frankenstein’s creation-Briana Estrada
Further into Mary Shelley’s novel, we see the creation and coming to life of Frankenstein’s actual creature; I find it so interesting how the birth of the creature is so described such like a human childbirth. The monster explains his experiences about his birth in around chapter 11; he says how he felt the sensations of “light, dark, hunger, thirst and cold”. For humans this is similar in childbirth, but I think the abandonment by Victor is cowardly and not what is supposed to be endured in birth; the monster didn’t ask to be created, he’s essentially an innocent creation. Victor cannot not face what he has created because he’s basically scared of the monster due to his ugliness. This ultimately shows again how Victor has this disconnect to his emotions. Also liked what we’ve discussed in class he has this sort of resentment and anger towards women. Victor wants to have to the power of bringing a life into the world just like a woman has power to bring a child in the world, but would
When we start seeing the coming to life of the monster in chapter 11, I think we view him differently after he stays with the De lacy family who show eachother affection and care about one another despite being poor; I think this creates human emotions for Frankenstein the creature because he appreciates the De Lacy family and feels guilty for eating from them so he helps out in gathering wood for them. This side of the monster makes us have so much sympathy for him because it shows a side of pure/ inocence in him when he doesn’t seem to understand how people can be so cruel to eachother. After these chapters we start to move away from sympathizing with Victor’s character and have those reciprocated feelings towards the monster.
I agree as Victor seamed to lack the emotional connect that most people have to anyrhing, or anyone even the creature whom is basically his son he callously tossed aside due to his own innabition to act like a human, and show some emotion besides overwhelming narccicism. Because of this the creature now has the bulk of the sympathy, dispite the horrendous deeds it has done, you cannot feel astrong sense of rage towards Victor for doing making his creation suffer like this.
I think it is really interesting that among the many reasons, the creature is an outcast from society, and we consider this to be bad. However the reality of the situation is that outside of companionship which he could not find among the people anyway the creature does not really loose much. The point being that the world of man is fundamentally bad and the irony that we consider the creature wicked is laughable
I’m glad that you pointed that out, I had almost passed this part of the novel without giving it much thought. Victor in a way did abandon his child,by neglecting to raise it and give it any further assistance. The way that the creature reacts to the De Lacy family shows that he began as a kind creature, rather than the threatening monster that we later see.