For Friday: Shelley, Frankenstein, Chapter VIII (8) to Book 3, Chapter VI (6) (pp.148-202) & Handout

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: When Victor bids farewell to Elizabeth (after planning to marry her), the 1831 text says that she “acquiesced; but she was filled with disquiet at the idea of my suffering, away from her, the inroads of misery and grief...she bade me a tearful, silent farewell.” However, our version of the novel reads: “Elizabeth approved of the reasons of my departure, and only regretted that she had not the same opportunities of enlarging her experience, and cultivating her understanding...We all, said she, depend upon you; and if you are miserable, what must be our feelings?” (164). What does the original text seem to communicate about Elizabeth’s experience that the 1831 version wipes away?

Q2: Why does Victor renege on creating a companion mate for the Creature? Particularly when, after a long debate with the creature in Chapter IX (Book 2), Victor finally muses, “I was moved. I shuddered when I thought of the possible consequences of my consent; but I felt that there was some justice in his argument” (157). Are we supposed to applaud his last-minute heroics? Or does this show us his true identity as a murderer (of women, especially)?

Q3: When Victor finds Elizabeth slain by the Creature, he “rushed toward her, and embraced her with ardour” (198). Note that this is the first time he describes showing her any real affection, much less passion. Her also spends quite some time in describing her body as left flung lifelessly across the bed. Does this bring to mind certain passages of The Eve of St. Agnes?

Q4: After the death of Clerval, when Victor is languishing in an Irish prison, he reflects, “The whole series of my life appeared to be as a dream; I sometimes doubted if indeed it were all true, for it never presented itself to my mind with the force of reality” (149-150). How does Shelley complicate the matter of Victor’s innocence or guilt in the final chapters? Is their more evidence for his crimes—or the Creature’s existence?

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ALSO, below is the handout I gave to the class from Mary Shelley's Journal. The bibliographic information follows in case you ever want to use it in a paper assignmen:

Shelley, Mary. The Journals of Mary Shelley 1814-1844. ed. Paul R. Feldman & Diana Scott-Kilvert. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1995. 

From The Journals of Mary Shelley (1814-1844)

Monday 6^th [March 1815]

Find my baby dead….It was perfectly well when I went to bed—I awoke in the night to give it suck [and] it appeared to be sleeping so quietly that I would not awake it—it was dead then but we did not found that out till morning—from its appearance it evidently died of convulsions.

Thursday 9^th  & Monday 13th

Read & talk—still think about my little baby—‘tis hard indeed for a mother to lose a child…Shelley, Hogg & Clary go to town—stay at home & think of my little dead baby—this is foolish I suppose yet whenever I am left alone to my own thoughts & do not read to divert them they always come back to the same point—that I was a mother & am so no longer.

Saturday 19^th

Dream that my little baby came to life again—that it had been cold & that we rubbed it by the fire & it lived—I awake & find no baby—I think about the little thing all day—not in good spirits—Shelley is very unwell.

Monday 20^th

Dream again about my baby ------------------------ (passage marked out)

Wednesday 24^th  [July 1816] * compare to pages 115-117 of Frankenstein

Shelley and I begin our journey in Montanvert—Nothing can be more desolate than the ascent of this mountain—the trees in many places have been torn away by avalanches and some half leaning over, others intermingling with stones present the appearance of vast & dreadful desolation—It began to rain almost as soon as we left our inn—when we had mounted considerably we turned to look on the scene—a vast dense white mist covered the vale & the tops of the scattered pines peeping above were the only objects that presented themselves—The rain continued in torrents—we were wetted to the skin so that when we had ascended more than half way we resolved to turn back—Shelley went before and tripping he fell upon his knee—this added to the weakness occasioned by a blow on his ascent—he fainted & was for some minutes incapacitated from continuing his route…This is the most desolate place in the world—iced mountains surround it—no sign of vegetation appears except on the place from which we view the scene—It is traversed by irregular crevices whose side of ice appear blue while the surface is of a dirty white…We arrive at the inn at six fatigued by our days journey but pleased and astonished by the world of ice that was opened to our view.

I write my story [Frankenstein].