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Book Review: Frankenstein

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Introduction: Frankenstein is a famous 1818 Gothic horror novel by Mary Shelley, often considered one of the first science fiction works, about scientist Victor Frankenstein who creates a sentient being, leading to tragedy, exploring themes of creation, responsibility, and humanity; it's also the name popularly given to the creature, though not in the book, and refers to many adaptations, including recent films. Summary: Robert Walton, who is in charge of a boat going to the North Pole, writes to his sister back in England about his dangerous trip. At first, things are going well, but soon they are stopped by seas full of ice that can't be broken. Walton is now stuck and finds Victor Frankenstein, who was traveling across the ice on a sled pulled by dogs and is very cold. Walton lets him on the boat, helps him get better, and listens to the amazing story of the thing that Frankenstein made. Victor starts by telling about his early life in Geneva. He had a happy childhood with Elizabeth Lavenza (called his cousin in the 1818 version and his adopted sister in the 1831 version) and his friend Henry Clerval, then Victor goes to the University of Ingolstadt to study science and chemistry. There, he becomes very interested in figuring out the secret of life, and after studying for years, he thinks he has done it. Victor, now with the knowledge he worked so hard to get, spends months carefully building a creature out of old body parts. One important night, hidden in his home, he makes his creation alive. But when he sees the ugly thing he has made, he is completely disgusted. After a bad sleep, disturbed by the monster standing over him, he runs into the streets, wandering around upset. Victor runs into Henry, who has come to study at the university, and takes his friend back to his place. Even though the monster is gone, Victor gets very sick with a fever. Disgusted by what he did, Victor gets ready to go back to Geneva, see his family, and try to feel better. But right before he leaves Ingolstadt, he gets a letter from his father, telling him the terrible news that his younger brother, William, has been killed. Very sad, Victor hurries home. As he walks through the woods where William was killed by being choked, he sees the monster and is sure that the creature killed his brother. When Victor gets to Geneva, he learns that Justine Moritz, a kind and gentle young woman who was taken in by the Frankenstein family, is being blamed. Even though she keeps saying she is innocent, she is tried, found guilty, and killed. Victor becomes very sad, knowing that the monster he made is responsible for the deaths of two innocent people he loved. Hoping to make his pain less severe, Victor goes to the mountains for a break. When he is out alone, walking across a very big sheet of ice, the monster comes close to him. The monster admits he killed William but asks for people to understand why. He says he feels alone, unwanted, and very sad, and that he hurt William because he wanted to hurt Victor, who made him without any feeling. The monster begs Victor to make a friend for him, another monster who looks just as strange, to be his only friend. At first, Victor says no because he is scared to make another thing like the first one. But the monster speaks in a way that makes sense, and Victor finally says he will do it. After going back to Geneva, Victor goes to England with Henry as a friend, planning to get the things he needs to build a female monster. Leaving Henry in Scotland, he goes to a lonely island in the Orkneys and unwillingly tries to do as well as he did the first time. One night, feeling unsure if what he is doing is right, Victor sees the monster looking at him through the window with a scary smile. Very afraid of what might happen because of his work, Victor destroys what he has made. Very angry, the monster promises to get even, saying he will be with Victor when he gets married. Later that night, Victor takes a boat to a lake close by and throws the leftover pieces of the second creature into the water. The wind gets stronger, stopping him from getting back to the island. When morning comes, he finds he has been washed up on the shore near a town he does not know. When he gets out of the boat, he is arrested and told he will be on trial for a killing that was found the night before. Victor says he does not know anything about the killing, but when he is shown the dead body, he is very scared to see that it is his friend Henry Clerval, with marks on his neck from the monster’s hands. Victor becomes sick, feeling confused and having a fever, and he stays in jail until he gets better, and then he is found not guilty of the crime. Soon after he and his father got back home to Geneva, Victor and Elizabeth get married. He is scared because of what the monster said he would do and thinks he will be killed on his wedding night. Being careful, he tells Elizabeth to go away and wait for him to come. While he is watching for the monster, he hears Elizabeth scream and knows that the monster had really been planning to kill his new wife, not Victor. Victor returns to his father, who soon dies because he is so sad. Victor promises to spend the rest of his life finding the monster and getting revenge for the people he loved, and he quickly leaves to begin chasing him. Victor chases the monster farther and farther north into a very cold area. While chasing him with a dogsled, Victor almost catches the monster, but the sea under them rises up and the ice breaks, making it impossible for them to get to each other. It is at this point that Walton meets Victor, and the story catches up to when Walton is writing his fourth letter to his sister. Walton tells the rest of the story in more letters to his sister. Victor, who was already sick when the two men met, gets even sicker and then dies a little while later. When Walton goes back, several days later, to the room where the body is, he is shocked to see the monster crying over Victor. The monster tells Walton how much he has been alone, how sad, how angry, and how sorry he feels. He says that because his creator is now dead, he can also end his suffering. The monster then goes to the farthest northern part of the ice to die. Critical analysis: In this book, the major conflict arises: if what Frankenstein did was valid or not? Now taking a tour through Frankenstein's POV. He woke up disconfigured, dazzled with who and what he was. Just because of his ugly looks he was chased out of villages and shot by people whoever saw him. This is a valid reason for a crashout. But his choice of killing a child and all of Victor’s family was just pure evil. But we have also overlooked a major point. He was not human. He was a scientific experiment, a “moster”. Here, Victor is shown to be a brilliant scientist who was able to create life itself but a failed human as he never acknowledged the role he played in creating the chaos and tragedy that ultimately cause the death of several innocent people as well as his. Frankenstein contradicts his hatred of Victor's dead body. Weeping and expressing remorse and self loathing; that suggests that he ultimately became more “human” than his own creator. Conclusion: A true turnover for the science fiction horror genre in the novel sector. A book that sparked such controversies. Having many different versions of the story. Ask yourself, what did you think when you set down this book after completing it? A wondrous book of science fiction or a horror and disgust of being a human who wasn't able to understand his own creation. Such irony. “A human who was more monster than the monster he had created”

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Published on 12/18/2025

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Eshita Lal is a student at Deerwalk Sifal School who loves writing articles, exploring diverse topics, and engaging in creative discussions.

Eshita Lal

Grade 10

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