In a sense, Victor is naive enough to still think that the creature wants to physically demolish him – which is emphasised by his voluntary endeavour to hunt the creature down to the North Pole. Victor perceives this as avenging himself and all that had been killed; but in the eyes of the creature this is a game of his manipulation taking its effect.
In Chapter 5 Victor is dubious about what he sees, “I thought I saw the dreaded spectre glide into the room.” ‘Thought’ emphasises his uncertainty, which grows into a more profound level as the novel progresses.
‘Glide’ forwards this pertaining uncertainty as ‘glide’ means to move fast without effort. Hence this can be linked to the final chapters where Victor chases his creation that watches and leaves deliberate clues for him. Victor feels his presence but fails to locate him. This creates atmosphere because his paranoia follows him until death, gradually draining all his happiness.
His manipulation of Victor can however be interpreted as being ‘justifiably’ evil. Readers often sympathise with him because Victor was his only connection to humanity in-terms of attention and fluent communication; hence why after Victor dies he instantly contemplates suicide in the same cold condition. Victor’s death would fate him to a life, if he chose to live, of eternal loneliness: [Chapter 24] “...for the bitter story of remorse may not cease to rankle in my wounds until death shall close them for ever.” The creature felt the same way Victor did; he did kill and destroy innocence, but however is not the psychopathic monster which humanity perceived him to be.
The novel ends with the creature’s final recital of his tendencies: “My spirit will sleep in peace; or if it thinks, will surely not think thus. Farwell,” during his life-time he had taken a cynical outlook of humanity and thus sees death as his only escape to ‘a place’ more accepting.
A similar word which describes Victor’s psychological isolation is his seeking of ‘asylum’ at “the Church of Ingolstadt”. ‘Asylum’ follows a cruder pattern of ‘refuge’; being an ‘asylum’ is similar to being a ‘refuge’ but it’s to mean more alienated – a criminal would take ‘asylum’ in a church to avoid persecution at that time. It is his method of keeping sane as he feels ‘protected’ inside God’s house.
This is significant because he, prior to this, had labelled the creature as a ‘daemon’ and ‘fiend’: both of which are evil spirits related to the devil thus Victor by seeking ‘asylum’ believes that he is safe from the creature because in Christianity such evil is void of entering the Church.
However all the creature wants is companionship. He had been tolerant and justifiable in his reasoning to Victor before driving himself further to demolishing his happiness. Such justification is shown in Volume 2; Chapter 9:
Did I request thee, Maker, from my day
To mould me man? Did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote me?
The monster through his intelligence learns to read and communicate in a profoundly persuasive manner. He quotes lines from John Milton’s Paradise Lost, paralleling his situation to that of Adam’s in Christianity. The creature is trying to show Victor that Adam may have been banished from all that was good in Paradise but even with such loss can still render happiness - merely because he has the one simple element to say alive for – love; which in comparison, the monster is deprived of.
Therefore the monster, through his intelligence again, learns to deprive Victor of such love and companionship which will likewise inflict a profoundly negative effect on him.
This is seen in Chapter 5 where he instantly recovers from his paranoia as he sees Henry: “In a moment forgot my horror and misfortune; I felt suddenly, and for the first time during many months, calm and serene joy.” Thus by the creature seizing away all his relations, he is seizing away elements of happiness which his life had contained. Hence this makes him pertain to his ‘wretchedly’ character which he had named himself. But Victor, however, knowingly shares similar emotion with his creation: “I passed the night wretchedly.” The verb which Victor uses to describe his action is ‘wretchedly’ which reflects his calling of the monster as a ‘wretch’. ‘Wretchedly’ is used to refer to someone who does an action in a deplorably unhappy manner; it is used in this context as a subtle form of foreshadowing of the trait of unhappiness he shares, and would continue to share in a fluent manner with his creation towards the end of the novel, especially during their mad endeavour towards the North Pole.
The importance of friendships is further highlighted by the way he actually felt uneasy during his experiment; he was obsessed and did not genuinely enjoy what he was doing: “first time during many months” and he felt both ‘calm’ and ‘serene’ seeing Henry – such words indulge peace into one, which is contrasting with the whole experimental scenario.
The significance of his creation is further emphasised, “The form of the monster whom I had bestowed existence was for ever before my eyes.” ‘For ever’ elaborates on the monster’s significance because it means for eternity, Victor will always seem him; ‘before my eyes’ is effective because it reinforces that Victor will feel the monster’s presence before or without seeing him.
In Chapter 5, Victor describes the monster in a way which will inevitably repulse and frighten any human-being: “A mummy endued with animation could not be as hideous as that wretch”. The way Victor compares his creation to ‘a mummy endued with animation’ is striking, conjuring a beyond-frightful image of what the monster must look like.
This image of the monster is further elaborated on in, “Oh! no mortal could support the horror of that countenance”; “it became a thing that even Dante could not have conceived.” The way Victor says ‘no mortal’ reinforces that no living thing, in this case human, could even bear to look at him – the inference to Dante emphasises how the creature has surpassed the human connotations of the word ‘hideous’. This is because Dante, especially his death mask, is one of the most controversially hideous architectural figures of History to people, both contemporarily and at that time. Dante had also written Italian Poetry (subsequently translated to other languages) which includes emotions which the monster felt such as Loneliness and exile in Paradiso.
This puts an emphasis on the creature’s loneliness, showing how nothing prior to his creation had trodden upon this Earth, thus nothing currently resembles him – and without Victor’s help of creating him a partner – nothing ever will. He is lonely to a degree where he struggles to answer the most fundamental questions of identity and personal History.
Foreshadowing is used to highlight dramatic scenes such as Elizabeth’s death later in the novel: “but as I imprinted the first kiss on her [Elizabeth] lips they became livid with the hue of death.” Victor imagines these images during his anguish sleep, the night his creation is summoned to life.
Readers automatically presume the worst which creates atmosphere as Victor prior to this was ‘Delighted and surprised’ which is another horrifying contrast used by Shelley, directly referring to their wedding night later in the novel.
The reference of death is further elaborated but with another character who is killed in a similar manner later in the novel: Henry. Victor, as Henry soon enters his house, returns to his unfit state: “a wildness in my eyes which he [Henry] could not account; and loud, unrestrained, heartless laughter, frightened and astonished him.” This is the way in which the monster vows revenge against humanity after being forsaken by the cottagers. The way Shelley reflects the monster’s attributes on him directly links him to the cause of his friend’s and family’s deaths.
Science is not the only method of helping humanity. In Chapter 6, during Elizabeth’s letter to Victor, there is a hidden moral message. It speaks about the way in which one can ‘safely’ help humanity: “it is certainly more creditable to cultivate the earth for the sustenance of man.” Whilst this does not directly address Victor, it shows that when Science will not ultimately help man; but the basic processes such as farming make the big difference.
Whilst Victor wants to re-live death, such that of his mother, he does not understand that being alive is a quest which does not necessarily equate to happiness, such as that of the his creation.
His former predicted outcome turns into a lesson of ongoing misery. He calls the product of his experiment as “the beginning of infinite pains”. This can foreshadow his future sufferings until death whilst the use of plural can reflect both his mental and physical states.
Thus Victor after his experiment begins to learn what a life of hard-ship is really like. His arrogance and consistent review of every action he commits eventually drives him deeper to his fate, by his own creation whom he “so miserably given life to.” Initially Victor felt ‘miserably’ towards his own creation; making a prejudiced assumption that, because of his hideous appearance, he is dysfunctional thus undeserving of life.
Despite succeeding in his initial goal, which is to re-live dead material (‘inanimate bodies’), he has not thought about the after-math of how his creature may feel or adapt to this world without the necessary nurture which every parent provides to their child. In a more practical context, Victor is not the gifted scientist who he showed himself to be; but ironically a feeble minded person. Readers cannot comprehend how Victor can forsake his creation merely due to its appearance, especially as the gifted scientist which he has been portrayed as; this is because scientists, especially at his level, tend to critically reason every judgement and it is feeble-minded of Victor to adhere to such an irrational superficial view of the monster.
Even after meeting his creation, listening intently to him as he eagerly recites his story and after being emotionally involved, refuses to grant his one wish due to his cynical view of the monster’s desires.
However Victor was not the only person who upheld such superficiality and this is elaborated further in Elizabeth’s letter when she speaks about Justine Mortise, “[Justine] she looked so frank-hearted and happy.” ‘Looked’ does not necessarily equate to ‘is’ and because Justine had merely looked happy, was granted an exceptional education (which the creature is deprived of): “My aunt conceived for her, by which she was induced to give her a better education superior to that she had first intended.” The two things, ‘education’ and looking ‘frank-hearted’ are completely independent. People during the late 18th/early 19th century generally did not judge one by their actual ability to do something, as shown in Justine’s case – “I [Elizabeth] do not mean she had made any profession” – but made their decision by judging one by their outer disposition; because Justine ‘looked it’ was given a “superior” education and was not harshly condemned, in the end, for not making anything out of it.
However the creature had the potential of making good use of such education, and even when he was not proposed the chance literally devoured anything intellectual (like listening intently to the cottagers speaking French) but because of his ‘hideous’ outer disposition was seen as an outcast.
Victor however did attempt to plan his experiment in a way so that his creation does not suffer: “His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful.” The way Victor has selected his creation’s features ‘as beautiful’ emphasises his superficiality – bringing dead matter back to life has toppled off his top priority, he now wants his creation to be beautiful, and he is greedy to achieve this. His concentration being diverted from his main goal of creating a normal being to this one minor feature had rendered him the opposite result as everything was combined: “but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes.” This can be linked to the contemporary uses associated with Plastic Surgery. One who thinks of undergoing plastic surgery would choose to select the ‘best’ possible features; but, as learned from Victor’s experiment, these features when combined can give the ugliest overall look and therefore other features may work better: everybody is different and compatible to different things.
Shelley uses paradox to emphasise the dominance of religion during that period, “Beautiful! – Great God!” Despite Victor ‘playing God’ by creating life, which is condemned in Christianity, he still subconsciously refers to him during his ‘moment of tragedy’. Referring to God when troubled was second nature.
Another way in which Science which Victor undertakes can be dangerous is shown when he says, “I became as cheerful as before I was attacked by the fatal passion.” ‘Fatal passion’ is another form of foreshadowing. His passion is shown by wanting to create life (which he had succeed with), but this life haunts him; killing off all happiness he had, hence it is ‘fatal’.
This is reinforced by the moral lesson which is subtlety taught by Shelley via Elizabeth’s letter in the consecutive chapter. It informs “not to meddle with the dark-side of human nature.” Victor has ‘meddled with the nature of his being by depriving him, and breaking his vowed promise. Victor by ‘meddling’ with his ‘dark-side’ can be held responsible for the deaths of his relations, which is paradoxical; but through his paranoiac affliction, Victor misinterprets everything.
Readers learn by the end that the creature had misinterpreted Victor: “If thou wert yet alive, and yet cherished a desire of revenge against me; it would be better satiated in my life than in my destruction.” ‘It would be better satiated in my life than in my destruction’ means that the creature thinks that Victor wants him to live on – thus wants him to suffer. This reinforces that the creature’s life was not happy. Therefore the monster was merely following Victor’s ‘intentions’ and living under his tyrannical presence. He was faithful in the misinterpreted sense.
Victor elaborates on the way which he thinks of his creation by naming it a ‘demonical corpse’. ‘Corpse’ can foreshadow his later death in the novel; it can also interpret to show how he had underestimated his creation’s power – as ‘corpse’ connotes to mean something which is no-longer viable or has thought.
Though, the way which calls his creation ‘demonical’, despite not knowing at this points in the novel its true nature, is prejudicial. He unjustifiably compares it to an evil spirit, which is crude as he had created its design in this way, “I gazed on him whilst unfinished: he was ugly then.” He thus knew what the potential result may be. It was not a total coincidence.
This can link to the way that he felt the “greatest agitation.” He loses control after the experiment. His plan to create was extensive but did not contain information beyond the scope of the results.
In fact Victor feels powerless, “unable to endure the being I had created”, in spite of being the creator who endowed life to previously inexistent material - he has no control over him. This contrasts to the power God possesses in Christianity; He creates everybody differently, He can end his creation and, most importantly, sticks with what He created.
Further elaboration on Victor’s immoral act, which may be a sign summoned by God, is emphasised by nature, “Wetted by the rain, which poured from a black and comfortless sky.” This creates atmosphere as the word ‘comfortless’ can symbolise his creation’s spirit wanting revenge. However ‘black’ can subtlety reinforces the idea of this revenge by killing. This is because as the creature kills Victor’s relations, he leaves a black smear on each victim to indicate that it is him: [Volume 3; Chapter 5] “the black murderous mark of the fiend’s grasp was on her [Elizabeth] neck.”
Prometheus was punished in a grotesque manner for enlightening people with the knowledge of fire. The Greek wanted to be in ruling thus wanted everything in secrecy.
There is a similar scenario in Frankenstein. Shelley devices irony in order to show how Victor was ‘the Greek’ in the ‘Prometheus’ in the age of science; as he, like the Greeks, kept his knowledge in secrecy.
The first paragraph of Chapter 5 creates gloomy atmosphere which inevitably implants concern into the reader, “It was a dreary night of November.” ‘Dreary night’ is ironic in terms of the earlier context in the novel; because such accomplishment (for finally completing his creation) should come with a triumph.
However, there is a conjuring imagery of light which follows, “my candle was nearly burnt out”; “by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light”. This props up as the creature is about to be given life.
The distinguishing light can symbolise that the most vital touch of his experiment, which is giving life, will remain in secrecy for the most-part. However the little glimmer of light can show that, eventually, others will be informed of his ‘secret’; and this is evident when he tells Walter as he recites his story.
Shelley was inspired by this Promethean possibility of bringing things alive since Philosophers such as Erasmus Darwin and Chemists like Humphry Davy had conceived such ideas as being possible by the use of electricity. [Chapter 1] “I eagerly inquired of my father the nature of thunder and lightning. He replied ‘Electricity’”. Both Shelley’s and Victor’s characters parallel – like Shelley was inspired by her political-thinking radical father; Victor was inspired by his father, who is a scientist, of such possibilities.
Nurture does play a role in this Prometheus secrecy because Victor is like his natural philosopher, M.Krempe, who is “an uncouth man, but deeply imbued in the secrets of science.” His professor – who had forwarded and researched this scientific phenomenon – was, too, secret in his discoveries.
The significance of the light symbolism is emphasised by its introduction in Walton’s first letter, “What may not be expected in a country of eternal light.” Light in Frankenstein is used in a scientific context, thus in saying this Walter is referring to the pleasant, ‘warm’ light, the one which clarifies concepts. However as this degree of knowledge increases, so does the intensity of the light. When this light reaches an exceptionally high-degree, outside our reach, it becomes dangerous – as with anything. When Walton pursues his endeavour through the North Pole, in spite of the sailors’ warnings to him that they may commit mutiny, Victor warns him about “how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge.”
In conclusion, Chapter 5 in Frankenstein creates atmosphere by introducing the themes which ultimately link to the tragedy that is seem by the end of the novel.
Using these themes Shelley leaves clues which may foreshadow later sections of the novel. Obvious foreshadowing is shown during Victor’s disturbed dream as he sees Elizabeth’s death during their wedding night; other more subtle foreshadowing/clues have been left for the more witty readers such as the change in the weather, adding to the sinister atmosphere, and what connotation this has.
Techniques such as this thus intrigue the reader and in most case inevitably influence them to read on in order to decipher the puzzle that is presented.
