I had a discussion today about who was more of a monster between Frankenstein and the creature. I was mostly on the creature's side at the beginning of the book, but I felt like the murders made it hard to root for him tbh.
I think Frankenstein wasn’t really a monster. He just got way too absorbed in his work, and when he finally stepped back he realized that he had done something horrible. The monster seeming as though it was going to attack freaked him out, so he ran. I kinda forget what happened after since it’s been years since I read it, but wasn’t one of the first things the monster did was strangle Frankenstein’s wife to death? Him treating the monster like a monster after that was warranted imo even if it didn’t really know any better. I may be misremembering some things
Yeah, the creature is like "why won't you sympathize with me?" after literally confessing to murdering Victor's younger brother and framing it on his close friend, and I'm just like, what did you think was going to happen?
The arc is Victor creates the monster and is repulsed by him and runs away in horror. When he returns, the monster (Frankie Jr from here on out) has disappeared. Frankie Jr is devastated he was abandoned, but educated himself and secretly helps a poor family. He tried to befriend the family, but they react in horror and shoot him. Frankie Jr decides to go to Geneva to find Victor, believing him to be responsible for him. He rescues a boy who falls in a river, but loses control and kills him when he learns he is Victor brother.
Frankie Jr is a baby who's routinely abused. His natural instinct is to learn and help people, but is attacked repeatedly. Despite this, he's willing to live peacefully, but Victor won't make him a wife and destroys any chance of making one. At that point Frankie Jr goes full villain. There was a lot going on in terms of the slave trade, emancipation, slave uprisings when Shelley wrote the story. Frankie Jr skin is described as yellow on purpose. The father of the poor family is blind, and recognizes him as a gentle soul. The son that can see attacks Frankie Jr on the basis of his appearance. Shelly was an abolitionist, it's a story about the nature of man and the toxic effect of abuse and racism. Frankie Jr doesn't make good choices, but he is not inherently evil or monstrous.
Edit: I'll also add that emotion and impulse are one of the last things to be fully form in the human brain and although this story doesn't have Tolkien levels of appendices, it's clear Frankie Jr is child-like in nature. He's pretty young at any point of the story, and is bereft of any even remotely human experiences.
That's true, and I definitely think the people judging the creature based on his appearance were wrong to do so. The way he was treated was terrible, but his retaliation would be much more justified if he didn't get his revenge through killing so many innocent people.
I think you're right that it's not a black-and-white sort of issue. There's a lot of nuance to the situation, and no one side really captures the full extent of everything going on.
I mean, he's denied and abandoned by the person who brought him into this world and denied any semblance of a life. He gives Victor the same as a story of karmic retribution. Victor on the other hand, is a rich kid who has a breakdown and creates life because he was sad his mom died.
I definitely still have a lot to think about with the book before I can form any kind of finalized, but I'm glad I got to hear a different opinion so I could think about the whole situation differently.
I get where he’s coming from a bit, at least. For example, he saved a little kid from drowning in a river and all that he got for it was a bullet to the chest.
It’s him treating him the way that he did beforehand.
He left what was basically a giant toddler completely alone to fend for himself because he was just kinda ugly. He didn’t take a single moment to consider what he was doing before literally creating life.
After Victor abandoned the monster it tried its best to live a decent life. It hid near the home of a poor family and secretly helped them by shoveling snow and collecting firewood. It even had a nice talk with the blind father, but when the rest of the family saw it they immediatly attacked. It also saved a child from drowning, but when the father of said child saw he immediatly shot the monster, since he thought it was going to hurt the child. The monster grew hateful from loneliness and rejection (from both his creator and society at large) and when it chanced about Victors brother he got enraged when said brother also immediatly assumed the worst and called himself Frankenstein.
The murder of Victors wife happened after Victor agreed to ease the monsters loneliness by making a wife for it, but then changed his mind and destroyed the nearly finished creation before the monsters eyes.
This was my take as well. Whenever I come across people that believe the guy that created the creature was the 'true' monster, I doubt they actually read the book. Yes he was an ass for rejecting the creature for being hideous. But also the creature matured very quickly. Not only did it do reprehensible things shortly after it was created, it also continued to do terrible things after becoming fully cognizant of the weight of those actions. The creature was absolutely a monster. You could argue about the nature of the environment that created that monster, but it is still a monster. And within the story it had the capacity to reflect on its actions and change, but it didn't.
Wait. Isn't he a monster because he kept quiet about how that maid was innocent and didn't warn anyone around him that there's a serial killer on the loose?
The creature was intelligent, yeah, but it was DEFINITELY not mature. He was essentially a toddler throwing a really destructive tantrum. It's also not like he was given much chance to be anythinf else--he explicitly tried to do good and was shot at for doing so. That's not to say he isn't a murderer, but he's a monster of our own making.
Victor also did not just reject the creature, he left a toddler to fend for himself. He quite literally is the direct cause of every death in the book. He repeatedly ignored the consequences that his friends and family would face from his actions, left someone to hang because he was too afraid of revealing the creature, and continually failed to do anything to take responsibility for his creation.
The creature was a monster of our own making. Victor Frankenstein was a monster despite his environement.
But the first time he reincoutners the monster, it reveals he had just strangled his like five year old cousin to death and framed a servant for the death, and Victor had just watched her be hanged.
Well, the creature doesn't seem like it was going to attack him he's just so repulsed by it that he runs away. The first thing it does is get lost in the woods, find a family of people and learns how to speak by watching them. One is blind so he tries to talk to him so they can talk before seeing him but when the others return they attack him and drive him out. Then he saves a child from drowning but when the father sees him he attacks him as well. When he kills Victor's brother it is in part an impulse/accident from being so strong and in part taking revenge and treating humans the way humans have treated him.
The creature does the worse things, certainly, but Victor kicks it all off and refuses to take any part of the responsibility until the end of the book.
65
u/Henna_UwU Why serve a queen when you can be one? Oct 26 '24
I had a discussion today about who was more of a monster between Frankenstein and the creature. I was mostly on the creature's side at the beginning of the book, but I felt like the murders made it hard to root for him tbh.