Frankenstein First Half

  The beginning of the novel sets the scene through a few letters written by Robert Walton to his sister while he sails to the North Pole. Through these letters the reader is able to gain some insight about who Walton is and a bit about his journey. Having heard of Frankenstein before, I know some aspects of the story and how Frankenstein was. With this knowledge and the second letter I could see how Walton and Frankenstein’s lives were already in a parallel. With Walton’s second letter he mentions his loneliness and complains of having no one to share his life with. This contributes to Frankenstein's life as he too is, or will be at this point, in search of a friend. 

Through the next few chapters we are taken through the childhood of Victor Frankenstein and his adopted sister and childhood companion Elizabeth Lavenza. It’s apparent that even at a young age, Victor was extremely interested in the wonders of the world and the science that it contains. However, despite his curiosity of the world, he seems as though he is waiting for the “inevitable” doom of life. With this poor mentality already brewing, his mother catches scarlet fever from Elizabeth and ends up passing away right before Victor was headed to a university. From here he ends up simply burrowing his emotions and throwing himself into his studies, and with this entire build up we can assume that at some point he is going to have a mental break.

Being engulfed by his work he starts on a creation to “make new life”, having always been obsessed with the human body and the way it fits together and falls apart. He ends up creating the monster, bringing it to life and immediately being terrified of him; leading him to run from his apartment and into town where he catches up with an old friend Henry. While Victor seemed relieved to finally speak with someone after this amount of time, it felt as though it opened shame on himself as well. Henry’s presence made him realize how alone he has been, and the amount of time he's lost from his work. He also invites Henry to his apartment without mention of the monster, which introduces secrecy in the mix of his shame and regret of wasted time.

Furthering the inevitable doom of Victor's life, he receives a letter from his father that his younger brother was murdered. When he heads for Geneva, where his family lives, he walks along the woods to where his brother's body is found. Here, he ends up seeing the monster he created lurking in the area. He becomes instantly filled with guilt as he thinks that it was his creation that killed his brother, yet he can tell no one. While his sister is blamed and executed for the murder, Victor continues to bottle his feeligns and tells no one of the monster. He now has lost many family members and believes, with most of their deaths, that it is his fault. 

In the next few chapters we learn about the life and learnings of the monster himself for the time he's been alive. He brings Victor to a cave where he expresses his confusion of existence and goes through his emotions he's felt, physical feelings, and the attempt to understand humans around him. The monster's overall lack of sociability coincides with both Victor and Walton, as he struggles to be around others since they fear him. The monster feels as though he is ugly because of people's reactions when they see him, running away before he even gets a chance to speak. Through this conversation between the monster and Victor they share the common realization that knowledge is a powerful and dangerous thing when not monitored carefully.

So far I have found the novel to be much less of a scary story as one's tell it today and more of a coming to understand what life is for. A lot of people in this world feel as though they have no purpose, and I feel as though this novel is able to connect to those that feel this way. I think too that the novel sheds light on the struggle of social norms, and that people are made to feel “ugly” because of the lacking acceptance of others.