“Even now my blood boils at the recollection of this injustice. But it is true that I am a wretch. I have murdered the lovely and the helpless; I have strangled the innocent as they slept and grasped to death his throat who never injured me or any other living thing…You hate me, but your abhorrence cannot equal that with which I regard myself.”
-p 210
While mulling over the denouement of Shelley’s Frankenstein, I was finding it incredibly difficult to place sympathy with either Victor or his creation. Both are flawed in nature and morality; neither one is truly heroic. Victor is primarily driven by his senses of ambition and pride. He selfishly risks all those dear to him in favor of accomplishing his goals first. In the end, it is this obsession with ambition and pride which leads to the demises of his loved ones and, ultimately, of himself. The monster, on the other hand, seems to be benevolent at first. However, he becomes hardened by rejection and self-loathing. While this would initially evoke sympathy, his murderous acts of revenge turn off any possible sympathy that could have been devoted to him. In the end, the audience can only look on, shaking their heads as both beings blindly succumb to their tragic flaws in a vicious cycle of destruction that only ends in their mutual demises.
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