Preface & Letters

Frankenstein

Novel opens with a preface, signed by Mary Shelley but commonly supposed not have been written by her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley.

States that the novel was begun during a summer vacation in the Swiss Alps, when rainy weather and nights spent reading German ghost stories inspired the author and her friends (also writers) to have a ghost story writing contest.

It was during this contest that Mary came up with the idea for Frankenstein.

Preface

To his sister Margaret Saville

The Letters

A story within a story.

Frame Narrative

Walton’s Letters

Victor Narrates Ch 1-10

The Monster NarratesCh 11-16

Victor Narrates Ch 17-24

Walton’s Letters

Walton is in St. Petersburg, RussiaDecember 11, 17--He is a captain of a ship headed on a

dangerous voyage to the North Pole.He talks of his preparations for his voyage.He has the desire burning in him to

accomplish “some great purpose” – discovering a northern passage to the Pacific.

He wants to find the “secret to the magnet”, or simply setting foot on undiscovered land.

Letter 1

“My courage and my resolution is firm; but my hopes fluctuate and my spirits are often depressed. I am about to proceed on a long voyage…”

“This is the most favourable period for travelling in Russia. They [dogs] fly quickly over the snow in their sledges…”\

“I do not intend to sail until the month of June.”

Walton is in Archangel, March 28th, 17—He’s upset over his lack of friends. He feels lonely & isolated, too sophisticated

to find comfort in his shipmates and too uneducated to find a sensitive soul with whom to share his dreams.

Letter 2

“…I have one want which I never yet have been able to satisfy; and the absence of the object of which I now feel as a most severe evil. I have no friend…”

“I desire the company of a man who can sympathise with me.”

“ I have no one near me, gentle yet courageous, possessed of a cultivated as well as of a capacious (large) mind, whose tastes are like my own…”

He is a 28 year old self-educated manWalton says that the safety of those on the ship are

important to himHe calls the place where they are traveling “the

land of the mist and snow”He compares himself to the book “Ancient

Mariner”“There is something at work in my soul… there is a

love for the marvellous, a belief in the marvellous, intertwined in all my projects, which hurries me out of the common pathways of men, even to the wild sea and unvisited regions I am about to explore.”

In the end of the letter, he tells his sister to remember the good times of him if he doesn’t return home.

July 7th, 17—His journey has begun“But success shall crown my endeavours.”He assures his sister they are being safe.

Letter 3

August 5th, 17—“…an accident has happened to us…”“…nearly surrounded by ice…”The crew saw something strange out in the

distance on the ice: what appeared to be a gigantic man on a sledge pulled by dogs.

Their ship was finally freed: the ice broke.

Letter 4

In the morning, there was a sledge “…Only one dog remained alive; but there was a human being within it, whom the sailors were persuading to enter the vessel.”

This man was European.The man refuses to board the ship until

Walton tells him they are headed north.“His limbs were nearly frozen, and his body

dreadfully emaciated by fatigue and suffering. I never saw a man in so wretched a condition.”

The man passes out.

The stranger spent 2 days recovering.Walton moves the man to his private cabin.“I never saw a more interesting creature…”The lieutenant asks the stranger, “Why were

you out there?”The stranger: “To seek the one who fled from

me.”Walton then tells the stranger that they saw

the man he is looking for.This information seemed to put life back in to

the stranger.

Walton tells Margaret, “I begin to love him as a brother…”

“…I have found a man who, before his spirit had been broken by misery, I should have been happy to have possessed as the brother of my heart.”

August 13th, 17—The stranger’s name is Victor.Victor begins telling Walton to not continue

down this “path”.Victor warns Walton that he will end up

sacrificing his fortune, his existence, and his hope just to further his enterprise.

“Unhappy man! Do you share my madness? Have you drank also of the intoxicating draught? Hear me – let me reveal my tale, and you will dash the cup from your lips!”

Victor says, “You have hope, and the world before you, and have no cause for despair. But I – I have lost everything, and cannot begin life anew.”

August 19th, 17-- Victor says, “I had determined, at one time, that

the memory of these evils should die with me; but you have won me to alter my determination. You seek for knowledge and wisdom, as I once did…”

Victor feels that Walton is going down the same path and he wants Walton to try to learn from his story/mistakes.

Victor does not want Walton’s sympathy. He says that his fate is nearly fulfilled. “I wait but for one event, and then I shall repose in peace.”

Walton’s framing narrative ends and Victor’s story/narration begins.