frankenstein

href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistolary_novel" rel="noopener noreferrer">epistolary form. Set in the 18th century, it documents a fictional correspondence between Captain Robert Walton and his sister, Margaret Walton Saville.

Captain Walton introductory narrative

Captain Walton is a failed writer who sets out to explore the North Pole in hopes of expanding scientific knowledge. After departing from Archangel, the ship is trapped by pack ice on the journey across the Arctic Ocean. During this time, the crew spots a dog sled driven by a gigantic figure. A few hours later, the ice splits apart, freeing the ship, and the crew rescues a nearly frozen and emaciated man named Victor Frankenstein from a drifting ice floe. Victor has been in pursuit of the gigantic man observed by Walton's crew. Victor starts to recover from his exertion; he sees in Walton the same obsession that has destroyed him and recounts a story of his life's miseries to Walton as a warning.

Victor Frankenstein's narrative

Born in Naples, Italy, into a wealthy Genevan family, Victor and his younger brothers, Ernest and William, are sons of Alphonse Frankenstein and the former Caroline Beaufort. From a young age, Victor has a strong desire to understand the world. He is obsessed with studying theories of alchemists, though when he is older he realizes that such theories are considerably outdated. When Victor is five years old, his parents adopt Elizabeth Lavenza (the orphaned daughter of an expropriated Italian nobleman) whom Victor calls 'cousin'. Victor's parents later take in another child, Justine Moritz, who becomes William's nanny.Weeks before he leaves for the University of Ingolstadt in Germany, his mother dies of scarlet fever; Victor buries himself in his experiments to deal with the grief. At the university, he excels at chemistry and other sciences, soon developing a secret technique to impart life to non-living matter. He undertakes the creation of a humanoid, but due to the difficulty in replicating the minute parts of the human body, Victor makes the Creature tall, about 8 feet (2.4 m) in height, and proportionally large.

Victor works at gathering the vital organs by pilfering charnel houses, mortuaries and by entrapping and vivisecting feral animals. Despite Victor selecting its features to be beautiful, upon animation the Creature is instead hideous, with dull and watery yellow eyes and yellow skin that barely conceals the muscles and blood vessels underneath. Repulsed by his work, Victor flees. While wandering the streets the next day, he meets his childhood friend, Henry Clerval, and takes Henry back to his apartment, fearful of Henry's reaction if he sees the monster. However, when Victor returns to his laboratory, the Creature is gone.Victor falls ill from the experience and is nursed back to health by Henry. After recovering he forgets about the Creature and goes into Henry's study of Oriental languages, which he considers the happiest time of his academic career.

This is cut short when Victor receives a letter from his father notifying him of the murder of his brother William. Near Geneva, Victor sees a large figure and becomes convinced that his creation is responsible. Justine Moritz, William's nanny, is convicted of the crime after William's locket, which contained a miniature portrait of Caroline, is found in her pocket. Victor knows that no one will believe him if he testifies that it was the doing of the Creature; Justine is executed. Ravaged by grief and guilt, Victor takes up mountain climbing in the Alps. While hiking through Mont Blanc's Mer de Glace, he is suddenly approached by the Creature, who insists that Victor hear his tale.