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Analysis Of Mary Shelley 's ' Frankenstein '

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Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein begins with a series of letters Captain Robert Walton has written to his sister Margaret Saville. The letters express Walton’s aspirations for his upcoming voyage to the North Pole. Throughout four messages, Walton describes his frustrations and triumphs leading to his impending journey. His most heart wrenching grievance is his inability to find companionship. In each letter, Walton is progressively farther along in his journey, and, in the fourth and final letter, Walton and his men have been trapped in ice for several days when they encounter a stranger stranded at sea. The men welcome the stranger aboard the ship, and Walton personally sees to the man’s recovery. As the two men spend time together, Walton …show more content…

Painstaking loneliness is, ultimately, the root cause of the creature’s acts of aggression, need for revenge, and desperateness for companionship. A bulk of Frankenstein illustrates the life of Frankenstein’s creation after Victor turns away from him. The creature traverses the German countryside completely isolated from humanity and society. His journey leads him to the DeLacey family where he spends his days observing and assisting the family by doing tasks such as collecting wood (Shelley 99). There, his intelligence expands to new lengths. Living ignorantly in bliss, he is left to his own devices to understand and develop language. The creature is soon able to read well and speak eloquently, overcoming his abandonment. After the creature develops the ability to read, he is capable of interpreting the journal of his creator, Victor Frankenstein. Through the journal he finds tucked in the cloak he was wearing when he escaped Victor’s laboratory, the creature is made aware of his creation process and the intentions behind it (Shelley 117). It is through these writings that the creature discovers the cause of his loneliness. It is revealed to him that his creator, the one whom he most expected to accept his hideousness, has rejected him and deprived him of companionship. Even prior to his discovery of Victor’s journal the creature becomes aware of his loneliness and says, “But where were my friends and relations? No father had watched

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