Essay: The Plot of Frankenstein

Sample Essay

Words 1,320

The plot of ‘Frankenstein’ is revealed through the literary device of letters an arctic explorer, Captain Walton, writes to his sister back in England. Walton writes of his discovery of Dr. Victor Frankenstein, nearly dead, in a broken sled (Shelley 18). Dr. Frankenstein recalls to him his childhood and his quest to understand nature banish death and give life to lifeless matter (Shelley 34).

For this purpose Dr. Frankenstein would steal into cemeteries late at night and steal body parts from newly deceased corpses. He also conducted torturous experiments on live animals (Shelley 49). Eventually he joined disparate dead body parts from various corpses together and through the application of electricity created a living artificial man, hideous in appearance (Shelley 227).

The monster escaped the laboratory and Dr. Frankenstein got involved in his academic and scientific career till he heard news that his brother William had been murdered. Frankenstein heads home to Geneva where he sees a glimpse of his monster but does not tell anyone about it. A servant girl is accused of the crime and falsely admits to killing William under pressure and is executed (Shelley 85).

Frankenstein then comes upon his monster while hiking in the Alps, the monster tells Frankenstein how he learned to speak and love through his observation of a peasant family. He found Milton’s ‘Paradise Lost’ and learned to read. The monster tells Frankenstein that he is responsible for his wellbeing since he is his creator. He says that his earlier crimes were the result of loneliness, since he is grotesque and his appearance is repulsive to humans, he pleads Frankenstein to provide him with a female mate (Shelley 140).

Frankenstein agrees to this and starts work on a female monster, but then he fear that making a female monster would lead to the unleashing of a race of monsters upon mankind. This fear leads him to destroying all his work (Shelley 163).

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