Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus

The creature finally learns the cottagers’ history. They are the De Laceys, originally from Paris and once affluent. Safie’s father was a Turkish merchant who lived in Paris but “became obnoxious to the government” and was condemned to death (107). It is understood that he was innocent and merely being targeted for his religion.

Felix, who attended the trial of Safie’s father, was outraged by the injustice and sneaked into prison to promise to free him. When Felix fell in love with Safie, her father promised they could marry as soon as he was free. Felix and Safie wrote letters to each other while Felix prepared to free her father. Safie told Felix that her mother was an Arab Christian who had been enslaved before she married Safie’s father. Safie’s mother taught her Christianity.

With Felix’s help, Safie’s father escaped prison, and Felix led him and Safie through France. Safie resolved to stay with her father until he entered Turkey, after which she could marry Felix. Felix stayed with them during this time, and he and Safie grew closer. However, Safie’s father secretly did not want Safie to marry a Christian like Felix and planned to take her with him.

Felix’s plans were discovered by the French government, and his father and sister were imprisoned. He left for Paris with the understanding that if Safie’s father found a convenient time to enter Turkey before he returned, Safie would stay behind and wait for him.

A trial took place, condemning the De Lacey family to exile. They retreated to the cottage in Germany, and Felix learned that Safie’s father took her to Italy. (It was after these events that the creature found the cottagers.)

Felix was distraught not for their poverty but for the betrayal of Safie’s father. Meanwhile, Safie’s father worried that his whereabouts had been discovered and left for Constantinople, entrusting Safie to the care of a servant. Safie and an attendant went to Germany, where the attendant died, and Safie managed to find the cottage with the help of a local woman.

The creature finds a suitcase containing some books that offer him “new images and feelings,” some of which bring joy and others “the lowest dejection” (112). Plutarch’s Lives teaches him of human nature, and he learns of men “governing or massacring their species” (113). He is drawn to those with “virtue” and develops an “abhorrence for vice” (114). He is most affected by Paradise Lost. He realizes he is like Adam because he is the only one of his kind; however, while Adam had a creator who loved him and built him as “a perfect creature,” he himself “[is] wretched, helpless, and alone” (114). He is more like Satan, for he feels “the bitter gall of envy” (114).

The creature discovers papers in the pocket of Frankenstein’s stolen cloak. In reading them, he learns that he was designed to be “odious and loathsome” (115). He condemns Frankenstein for creating a being “so hideous that even [Frankenstein] turned from [the creature] in disgust” (115). He notes that God “made man beautiful and alluring” and that even “Satan had his companions” (115), whereas the creature has no one.

The creature hopes the cottagers will look past his “personal deformity” when they see that he offers “compassion and friendship” (115). He decides to introduce himself. Since his appearance frightens people, he will speak first with De Lacey, who is blind, because his voice “[has] nothing terrible in it” (117).

One day when Safie, Felix, and Agatha go for a walk, the creature knocks on the door and apologizes for the intrusion. De Lacey invites him inside. The creature tells him he is seeking “the protection of some friends” he loves and expresses concern that he will be rejected (118). De Lacey assures him that “the hearts of men, when unprejudiced by any obvious self-interest, are full of brotherly love and charity” (118); therefore, the creature should have hope. He also says that there is something “sincere” in the creature’s voice and that he will help him if he can.

The creature hears the other cottagers approaching and tells De Lacey that the friends he was talking about are the De Lacey family. He begs the blind patriarch not to “desert” him “in the hour of trial” (119). When the cottagers enter, Agatha faints, Safie runs, and Felix attacks him. The creature flees.

At that moment, the creature does not want to live anymore. In the forest that night, he screams “in fearful howlings […] like a wild beast” (121). He decides that he will enact “everlasting war” upon humanity (121). He returns to the hovel and overhears Felix telling his landlord they refuse to live there anymore.

The creature is distraught that “the only link that held [him] to the world” is gone (123). He experiences “feelings of revenge and hatred” when he thinks of their rejection (123). That night, he burns down the cottage. Having learned Frankenstein’s identity from his papers, the creature ventures to find him.

After the creature saves a young woman who accidentally fell into the river, a young man runs to them and hastily takes her away. The creature pursues them, and the man shoots him with a gun. The creature’s gentle nature is replaced with “hellish rage” at this “injustice and ingratitude” (126). He is no longer comforted by nature, for he sees he was “not made for the enjoyment of pleasure” (126).

The creature reaches Geneva. A beautiful child—Frankenstein’s brother William—runs toward him, and he has hope that the child is “unprejudiced.” He wishes to “educate” the child and make him his friend. However, the child screams in fear. When William reveals that his father is M. Frankenstein, the creature kills him. He feels “hellish triumph” in realizing that his “enemy is not invulnerable” (127). He sees the necklace with the portrait of Frankenstein’s mother and enjoys gazing at the beautiful woman’s picture. When it occurs to him that he would never receive love from such a woman, he is angry again. He leaves the necklace in Justine’s dress as she sleeps in the barn, for she, too, “is one of those whose joy-imparting smiles are bestowed on all but [him]” (128).

The creature tells Frankenstein that he is “alone and miserable” (129). He demands that Frankenstein build him a female companion as “deformed and horrible” as he is (129) —the only kind of companion who would accept him.