Frankenstein Monster

Frankenstein Monster is a male literary character who features in Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.

Biography

"The Creature" or sometimes simply "The Monster," was the creation of the Swiss medical prodigy Victor Frankenstein. Victor's studies while at university delved into the secrets of life and death, and he decided to try and give life to something that had never been truly alive. He fashioned a human body by stitching together parts from multiple corpses. Telling his story to Captain Robert Walton, Victor refused to explain precisely how he'd brought the body to life, fearing that Walton would try and repeat his experiment.

The Monster was a very large, physically ugly man. While he worked on it, Victor had been so blinded by his obsession he'd refused to see how ugly his creation actually was. Only after the elation of his successful experiment wore off did he realize the horrifying truth, and fled his laboratory, and fell asleep on his bed. The Monster, possessing a childlike personality initially, came into the room and approached his "father." Wakening, Victor fled in horror, abandoning his creation. When he returned later with Henry Clerval, the Monster was gone, having taken the only clothing to hand, Victor's coat, and gone out into the world.

He was shunned wherever he went for his ugliness. Even when he saved a child from drowning in a river, he was shot in the shoulder by her terrified father, and forced to flee. He found a brief friendship with a blind man named De Lacey, and lived near him and his family, often doing kind deeds for them. Spying on the family, he learned English because De Lacey's son Felix's wife Safie was Turkish; as her in-laws taught her English, the eavesdropping Monster learned it, too. When he actually approached the family to make friends, they fled in terror from him. Enraged, he burned down their house.

By now, the Monster had found Victor's notebook of his experiments in the pocket of the coat he'd taken from Victor's house. He taught himself to read, and, consulting the notebook, learned of how he was created and also Victor's name. He sought Victor out and argued with him, expressing outrage at his creator abandoning him to an uncaring and hostile world, and demanded Victor make a mate for him, someone like him, who wouldn't find him ugly. At first, Victor agreed. But when the Monster visited his laboratory to check on his progress, he reneged and tore up the half-finished body of the female creature. The Monster vowed revenge.

He took his revenge, murdering Victor's younger brother William and framing Justine Moritz for the crime, for which she was hanged. He also strangled Henry Clerval to death, a crime for which Victor himself was nearly condemned, and finally, on Victor's wedding night, he killed his creator's new wife Elizabeth. This indirectly also led to the death of Victor's father of a broken heart. His revenge complete, the Monster fled to the arctic. His enraged creator pursued him, and eventually died.

By now feeling guilty for his campaign of vengeance, the Monster slipped aboard Captain Walton's ship to see the dead Victor's body. Walton came in and confronted him, but the Monster assured Walton he would work no more evil. He would commit suicide. Before Walton could stop him, he jumped overboard and was carried away into the darkness on an ice floe. An undetermined amount of time later, he built a funeral pyre and burned himself alive.

Overview

Personality and attributes

In appearance, Frankenstein's Monster was a humanoid with yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath, flowing hair that was of a lustrous black, and teeth of a pearly whiteness. The monster came to note about himself that, "I ought to be thy Adam". Meanwhile, Frankenstein referred to his creation as 'creature', 'fiend', 'spectre', 'the dæmon', 'wretch', 'devil', 'thing', 'being', and 'ogre'.

Notes

• Frankenstein's Monster was created by Mary Shelley where he featured in the setting of the Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus universe.

In other media

Films

• In Frankenstein, Frankstein's Monster appeared in the setting of the 1931 live-action film where he was portrayed by actor Boris Karloff. This version of the monster had his body sewn together by Henry Frankenstein from pieces of dead bodies and brought to life using electricity. However, Frankenstein's assistant Fritz retrieved an abnormal "criminal" brain instead of a normal one making the creature more hostile and less intelligent. In the first two films, the Monster turns to violence only after being abused by Fritz and rejected by others. In the third film, Son of Frankenstein however, the Monster lost the powers of speech he had gained in the previous entry, and had gained a companion named Ygor. Ygor used the Monster as a tool in his plan of revenge against the eight villagers who voted for his execution, which was botched. This plan was thwarted by Wolf von Frankenstein. In the next film, Ygor manipulated Wolf's brother Ludwig into placing his brain into the Monster's body. However, Ygor's blood type did not match that of the Monster, and he went blind. The Monster was intended to speak in Ygor's voice in Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman, but studio executives, who did not like the effect, cut all of the Monster's lines. For the rest of the series, the Monster was depicted as a shambling and mute idiot by former stuntman Glenn Strange. The Monster met its apparent death in Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein, when the dock he is standing on is set on fire.
• In I, Frankenstein, an alternate version of the character named Adam Frankenstein appeared in the setting of the 2014 live-action film where he was portrayed by actor Aaron Eckhart.

Comics

• In Detective Comics v1 #135 (1948), Frankenstein appeared in DC Comics where he was created by Edmond Hamilton and Bob Kane.
• In Menace v1 #7 (1953), Frankenstein appeared in Marvel Comics where he was created by Stan Lee and Joe Maneely.
• In Hellboy: House of the Living Dead v1 #1 (2011), Frankenstein appeared in Dark Horse Comics where he was created by Mike Mignola.

Appearances

• Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus:

External Links

• Wikipedia Entry

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