Victor And The Creature Frankenstein Essay

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein contains valuable lessons about the role love plays in providing one with life, liberty and happiness. Shelley portrays Victor and the Creature as products of very different environments who nonetheless end up with similar mindsets in which revenge is thought of as a pact and love is a basic necessity. Victor’s early years are spent with boundless amounts of love, whereas the Creature is spurned from the beginning of his existence. However, at the end of the novel, both Victor and the Creature are driven by a relentless need to take vengeance upon the other. These factors are used to define the characteristics of Victor and the Creature and shape their psychological makeup. The most prominent variation in the development

The Creature sums up his feelings when he states “I will avenge my injuries; If I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear…” (125). Clearly, the Creature’s lack of love drove him to “avenge his injuries,” which consisted of him being denied the right to acceptance and love. Victor continues this cycle of revenge by proceeding to chase the Creature around the world with the intent to kill him. Inversely, the Creature is taking revenge on Victor by forcing him to travel around the brutal environments of the world (“the everlasting ices of the north”) if he wants to exact his revenge and kill the Creature. At this point in the novel, both the Creature and Victor have the same mindset. They both survive for the sole purpose of taking revenge on each other. In addition to being a prominent theme throughout Frankenstein, revenge is almost thought of as a bind or oath. For example, after hearing about the murder of his loved ones, Victor says “Liberty, however, had been a useless gift to me, had I not, as I awakened to reason, at the same time awakened to revenge” (176). In this quote, liberty is referred to as a gift, and just as one’s eyes are blinded by the prospect of something free, Victor’s eyes were blinded by his liberty. Victor’s mindset requires him to exact revenge on the Creature before he can be at peace. Victor reiterates this when he says “revenge

In other words, instead of the Creature’s freedom being bound by Victor, Victor’s liberty becomes bound by the Creature. As mentioned earlier, the Creature longed for love, which pushed him to take revenge on Victor. However, prior to taking vengeance, the Creature requested that Victor make him a partner. At this point in the novel, the Creature still looks up to Victor and respects him as a creator. For instance, the Creature makes his plea to Victor by saying “But on you only had I any claim for pity and redress…” (119). Up until this point in the book, the Creature still holds out hope that he can be loved by somebody, whether it is his creator, or a companion created by Victor . However, after Victor refused to create a companion, the Creature was driven into an uncontrollable rage and need for reparation. After this setback, the Creature was no longer bound by his need for love because he no longer held out hope that he could be loved. This is where the control flip occurs between Victor and the Creature. The Creature has no reason to respect Victor as a creator and has no hope for being happy. Victor on the other hand is in a very fragile state of mind and only has a few people that provide him with love and affection. The Creature is able to exploit this and after killing his family, binds Victor to a path of revenge. Revisiting the quote, “Liberty,