When a crime is committed, the blame is usually placed on the criminal. This is because a crime cannot take place without a criminal. However, a lawbreaker generally has reasons for his misdeed. For a crime to occur, a criminal must have incentive. Consequently, the causes of a wrongdoer’s motivation are also responsible for the offence. In addition, crimes can be avoided if the proper precautionary measures are taken. Therefore, anyone who could have stopped a crime from happening is partially accountable for it. In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, a creature created by Victor Frankenstein kills several of Victor’s loved ones. These murders could be blamed on the creature, but he is not solely responsible for them. The root cause of the …show more content…
The enormous difference in the way Victor views the creature before and after its completion shows that he has an altered state of mind while he works on it. As a result of Victor’s secrecy about his creation, he sacrifices his health and happiness to make a creature that disgusts him. Victor endangers people by not warning them about the creature. When Henry Clerval arrives in Ingolstadt, Victor explains his haggard appearance by telling him that he has been too “deeply engaged in one occupation” (88) to allow himself sufficient rest. He does not tell Henry any details about this occupation because he cannot bear to think about his creature. When Victor invites Henry to his apartment, he “[dreads] to behold this monster; but [he fears] still more that Henry should see him” (88). This shows that he is more concerned about Henry finding out how he has been spending his time than he is about his own safety. He does not want to tell his secret to his very close friend. For this reason, Victor makes Henry wait at the bottom of the stairs while he checks his apartment for the creature. Shortly after they enter the apartment, Victor becomes ill. His illness lasts several months. Since he is the only person who knows about the creature’s existence, there is nobody who can search for it while he is ill. During Victor’s illness, William Frankenstein, his youngest brother, is murdered by the monster. Although the
Victor worked continuously on his experiment, obsessed with finding the correct building material. It would seem that after all this arduous work he put into making this Creature, he would be in awe when it was finally finished. Upon the completion of the Creature, he finds himself in shock, explaining in vivid detail about the Creature’s “yellow skin which scarcely covered the works of muscles and arteries underneath” and its “shriveled complexion,” and “straight black lips” (42). In the human nature, it is known that when a person creates something, no matter how ugly, or how deformed it is, the creator is proud of his creation. Although, immediately after he sees his creation, Victor is unable to stare at the “monster” any longer, and paralyzed with fear and guilt, abandons the creature all alone in the world, like a new born baby. Although it might not seem like this, this particular scene conveys a deep sense
In Shelley’s Frankenstein, the monster commits a number of immoral acts out of rage. These actions are directly related to the monsters creation and upbringing. The burden of fault for the monsters actions rests on Victor Frankenstein’s shoulders alone.
Due to Victor’s unwillingness to accept him, the creature was unable to conform to societal norms. From the creature’s very first moments, he is feared by others - the instant his eyes open, his creator cries out in terror and runs to his quarters. If only Victor had stayed and attempted to nurture his creation, instead of having “turned from [him] in disgust” (93), the creature may have enjoyed a gentle, upbringing in which he
The reader can immediately see this because the Monster says, “I am malicious because I am miserable. Am I not shunned and hated by all mankind?” (Shelley 124). He begins to murder members of Victor’s close friends and family. His first victim is William Frankenstein. The Monster has no intentions to kill William, but he says, “Cursed, cursed creator! Why did I live? Why, in that instant, did I not extinguish the spark of existence which you had so wantonly bestowed” (Shelley 116). The Monster shows his frustration with Victor creating him in this way and for making him into an outcast. After Victor breaks his promise of creating a female monster, the Monster murders Henry Clerval. The Monster’s anger continues to build up over time and he believes the only way to face it is by taking the lives of those who have a close relationship with Victor. The Monster kills Elizabeth Lavenza on her wedding night. He takes the lives of the people who are in a close relationship with Victor due to the anger he feels toward him. The violence the Monster uses is his way to try and seek revenge on Victor because he feels that he set him up to fail, to be an outcast, and to be unacceptable to
The theme is clearly outlined by how much hate Victor has for his creature. He is just seeing him fleeing the scene of his dead brother and subconsciously says “Bruh, this is the thing that killed my brother”. He mulls over the fact and almost in disbelief tries to deny the fact. “Could he be (I shuddered at the conception) the murderer of my brother?” (Shelley, 63). He thinks and after a millisecond he knew the creature committed the heinous act. “No sooner did that idea cross my imagination than I became convinced of its truth,” (Shelley, 63). He knew it right away and the anger he felt for the death of his brother became remorse that he is the cause for his brother’s death as he created the
Perhaps Victor had not realized that " the power to create may produce consequences that cannot be foreseen or controlled" (Smolensky 1756). Before Frankenstein created his creature, he had not intended it to be a threat to his friends and family. He had also not realized that evil creates evil (Mellor Mary Shelley 363). In this novel, Victor did not only act in monstrous way toward his creature, but toward his loved ones as well. When he learned that his youngest brother William had been murdered, he knew right away that the murder was committed by his very own creation, but refused to speak up and say anything about his knowledge. He knew that he would be held responsible for the murder because of the fact that he created the monster, and also because the monster killed his
He believed that his Creature murdered his brother and framed Justine, the Frankenstein’s maid, in order to achieve vengeance for Victor abandoning him, but according to Levine, Victor is the cause for this evil, “...evil is a consequence of maltreatment or injustice,” (Levine 31). Victor’s internal flaws and shortcomings prevent him from revealing the truth about his Creation and therefore he is unable to disclose details of Williams death to save Justine. Victor cowers and stands by as the town unjustly convicts and “executes” Justine, (Shelley 117). The cowardly act committed by Victor shows that he does not possess a strong enough moral compass to do the justified act.
It is Victor's story that truly exposes the true theme of the story, with him speaking of his days as a child and his first friendship with the girl his parents adopted. He lives a fine life, full of joy and happiness with friend plentiful. When he goes to college he is without friends, but soon befriends one of the professors and engaged in lengthy conversations with him. This isn't the same friendship as before, lacking the real love and companionship of his family, and he soon begins work on his creation. He so overwhelmed by the idea of creating a perfect person he is blinded from the deformity of the creature. When the creature is finished he examines his work and is mortified by it, running and hiding he escapes the creature that soon wanders away. Soon after Victor becomes sick and deathly, he shuns society and people and is almost dead when his friend Clerval arrives at the college. Clerval nurses Victor back to health, but Victor isn't physically sick, he has just
In the story whenever Victor feels like he needs to find himself and gain control of himself he goes out into the nature to find motivation inside himself. Victor has a knack for using the nature to his advantage, he uses it to find himself while in the wild, but he also uses it to create the creature. His drive for success became so great that he went to make a creature that would make him very influential in the scientific world once he proved that he could create life with his bare hands. Victor was successful in creating the creature, but once he had created the creature he was disgusted with his creation and all his work became an eminent failure. He then proceeded to abandon the creature because of how hideous it appeared.
Frankenstein stands as a victim, along with the very people he treasures most, to his own deeds. Victor noted, "For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart" (42). The fruit of his experimentation, his monster, murders many of those close to the scientist. He loses his long time friend, Henry Clerval, as well as his wife, Elizabeth, to his creation. His younger brother William and his beloved servant Justine were also brought to their sad ends at the hands of the creation. The monster brings fear and suffering to all those he meets, if not by cold blooded murder, then by the sheer horror of his corpselike appearance. Though not
Victor, after being convinced to create a female companion for the monster, realizes that this will only create double the amount of destruction, he then makes the choice to discontinue his project to prevent more devastation. Instead of less damage resulting from this choice it only brings more harm to his life and everyone around him. First, his good friend Henry Clerval is murdered by the beast and Victor is accused of this murder, “The human frame could no longer support the agonies that I endured, and I was carried out of the room in strong convulsions.” (Shelley 129). This was Victor’s reaction upon seeing Henry’s corpse and demonstrates how deeply his pursuit for knowledge affects him. Even though he is later released on circumstantial evidence, he will be scarred for life knowing that he responsible for yet another death. Given that Victor destroyed the monster’s only hope of having someone else like him in the world; the monster swears revenge and that he will return on Victor’s wedding night. Victor misinterpreted this warning and instead of the monster attacking Victor, his creation attacked and
Victor created this creature to fill a void in his life. He had other Ideas of what its appearance would look like. The creature being left alone from the beginning of his life shows that Victor didn’t want to receive rejection from his peers. Victor was surprised by his appearance which made him think about how others would view the creature. In the beginning of chapter 5, Victor finishes his creation of the monster and when it comes to life he says “For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished…” As soon as he saw the creature’s physical features, he ran outside hoping to never see it
In the beginning of the novel, Frankenstein, the creation of Dr. Frankenstein becomes isolated from the rejection of his creator and mankind causing hatred and the desire to exact revenge on his creator. The issue that lies with this choice however is that people are not sure if his actions are justified because the monster is indeed able to feel the full range of human emotions, such as guilt and remorse, and also distinguish between right and wrong action. Many people believe that the cause of his actions is his horrible upbringing; being without a true father or a single companion by his side, and therefore can see a hint of justification behind his brutality, however, an anonymous writer from the University of Toronto Mississauga views
For Two years now, Victor has been building a creation or should I say creature. In chapter four, we see Victor become completely obsessed with the way things are alive. Victor isolates himself, determined to figure out how to make non-living things into living things. Although, once he finishes his project and dream, Victors reaction is not what it should seem. In fact, Victor is disgusted with the creature he made.
The action reaches a climax in this chapter: Victor's creation is done and he puts life into it. Victor does not know how to feel although he feels sickened about the creature's appearance. The looks are destroyed by his watery eyes, shriveled complexion and straight black