Chapter 24

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

Many loose ends are tied up in the last few pages of the novel. At the core is the resolution of nature vs. nurture. The creature, standing over his creator's dead body, states that "My heart was fashioned to be susceptible of love and sympathy; and when wrenched by misery to vice and hatred, it did not endure the violence of the change, without torture such as you cannot even imagine," (Shelley, 164). The creature here brings to light Shelley's point that the true tendencies of man are innate. She is saying that every part of creation is fashioned with a capability for love, and it is only by experiencing the miseries of life the people resort to the cruelty and brutality displayed by both the creature and Victor. We are good beings by nature, and nurtured through our path of life.
Another important point in the story is Walton's decision to return to England. I think his return is a direct result of the demise of Victor. As he witnesses the fall of the man so driven by things similar to him, he becomes fearful, whether consciously or not, and turns away from this path before it destroys him too.

Chapters 22-23

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

Rule number one about marriage: don't go into it with giant secrets. In Victor's case the secret is literally a giant. When the creature makes good on his threat to be with Victor on his wedding night and murders Elizabeth, you almost sympathize with the creature. Victor took his bride, therefore, he thinks he has the right to take Victor's lover. Finally, the creature's goal in destroying Victor is achieved with every member of his family dead. Then, the tables are turned, Victor's psychological strength snaps and he flips on the creature, swearing his demise as the creature once swore to him. The creature runs away from Victor, taunting him in the same way he was taunted: by consistently pulling away from him what he wants. The creature wanted a companion and Victor took it away from him, now, Victor wants revenge and the creature keeps taking the opportunity away from him. There is nothing but animosity between them now. Victor claims that "Liberty, however, had been a useless gift to me had I not, as I awakened to reason, at the same time awakened to revenge," (Shelley, 147) stating that his sole purpose is against the creature is violence.
Both creatures (Victor and the creation) are moving away from sanity in their own ways. They both curse the powers that put them where they are. Victor calling destiny the reason for his fate, still refusing to take responsibility for his actions.

Chapters 19-21

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley


At the beginning of chapter 18, the reader feels a sense of de ja vu as Victor claims that "...in Clerval I saw the image of my former self; he was inquisitive, and anxious to gain experience and instruction," (Shelley, 115). This scene mirrors Walton's scene with Victor on the boat in the first few chapters. While this may simply be Shelley's running out of foil characters to use, I think that the importance of this scene matching a previous one is to show the reader that there are many people out there who are like Victor, obsessed with their work and driven by a curiosity that is not satisfied with things merely of this world. Later, in chapter 20, as Victor works on the second creature, he is haunted by the words of the original creature calling him a "slave." In many ways, he has become slave to his own unfulfilled desires. The creature's statements are a possible foreshadowing to things that Walton and Clerval will do if they fall slave to their potential obsession also.

Chapters 16-18

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

The trial for William's murder ends with Justine being wrongly accused and executed. Victor immediately assumes that the creature has committed the crime, but out of innate guilt and fear for himself, Victor says nothing even as the girl is led away to be killed and he assures Elizabeth of her innocence. The creature's predictions have come true of Victor: he will never accept his creation because he knows that everything the creature does he is responsible for. The blood of William and Justine are simultaneously on his hands and the creature's because, had Victor not created him, he would not have committed the crimes out of his frustration. The creature reminds Victor, "My vices are the children of a forced solitude that I abhor," (Shelley, 106). Victor displays an unattractive cowardliness as he refuses to speak up for the truth or own up to his actions because of how it will make him look. Victor is allowing this cycle of destruction to continue. In these chapters, the creature asks one thing of Victor to save him and his family: to create for him a companion like everyone around him has. Here Victor has a chance to make things temporarily right, to create a life in exchange for taking many.

Chapters 13-15

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

In these chapters, the creature learns through observation about the previous world civilizations. His education reveals to the reader the importance of history to human nature. We are consistently defined by our past. Cultures, customs, and traditions are the product of human nature's way of holding on to history. The creature realizes that he has no history, and therefore struggles with his identity. His problems with being solitary are augmented by his lack of origins and it drives him further to make connections with the family. Other books that he finds in the woods teach him about emotion and finally he can no longer stand being hidden from the the family. When he is rejected by Felix and the women, the creature swears revenge on the one person responsible for his lack of origin: his creator Victor. "But where was mine? (Creator) He had abandoned me, and in the bitterness of my heart I cursed him," (Shelley, 94). The creature expresses so much hatred towards Victor, but keeps coming back to him in thoughts and traveling. I think he seeks out Victor not entirely driven by rage, but still by the longing to make a connection with someone. He feels closest to Victor, as he thinks of him as a father, and may still hold on to the slight possibility that Victor may accept his creation because it is a part of him.

Chapters 10-12

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

Chapters nine through twelve begin the second phase of the frame story. This time, Victor's creation is given the change to tell his story. He explains his life after the creation and loss of his creator. In his lonliness and confusion, he runs away and hides in the woods, later coming upon a house where he observes a family and learns how to imitate their gestures. As noted previously in the novel, the creature, though full size, acts like a baby in his acumulation of knowledge and learning how to function. He describes traveling through each stage of early development as children do. At one point, he finds himself invincible telling Victor, "I now found that I could wander on at liberty, with no obstacles which I could not either surmount or avoid," (Shelley, 71). Much later, with the discovery of the family, he learns how to understand emotion and reciprocates acts of kindness. I think that Shelley's point in allowing the creation to feel emotion and making him capable of good and evil is what makes this a horror novel. The creature is not the cut-and-dry stereotypical monster that is only made for evil and is mostly one-dimensional; Frankenstein's creation qualifies as horror in our minds because it questions where emotion and compassion come from. If this monster is capable of compassion, then where does it originate?

Chapters 7-9

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

At the beginning of these chapters, Victor is informed in a letter that his younger brother, William, has been murdered. This comes as a blow to Victor who has been busy recovering and surprisingly not caring about where his creation is or what it is doing. Victor returns home and is drawn to the spot where they found William; there, he sees what he believes to be the creature he created. In fully understanding the situation, he becomes fearful of that which he created which he identifies as a part of his soul, "I considered the being whom I had cast among mankind, and endowed with the will and power to effect purposes of my horror...my own spirit let loose from the grave, and forced to destroy all that was dear to me," (Shelley, 51). How often are we "killed" by our creations, the creations of our vices. It seems that the things we hold onto most closely are those that eventually bring us down.