Chapter Summaries Volume 2 - Frankenstein

·         Victor again shuns his family and friends due to the overwhelming feeling of guilt

·         He is tempted by suicide though doesn’t fulfil it because he is scared to leave those whom he loves to the vengeance of the creature

·         Elizabeth has changed , having lost faith in the essential goodness of humankind

·         Victor attempts to forget his sorrows and sets off for the valley of Chamounix

·         Victor initially receives some comfort from the sublime and magnificent natural world, but as the weather changes so does his mood

·         He climbs to the top of Montanvert where the figure of a man approaches him at superhuman speed – we find out this to be the creature

·         Victor rejects the Creature again

·         The Creature responds by complaining of being abandoned and his struggles to find out who and what he is – this is where he claims that misery turned him into a fiend; “I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend”

·         The Creature manage to convince Victor to let him tell his story

·         The two proceed back to a hut where the Creature has been staying in order for the Creature to tell his tale

·         The narrative voice changes to the Creature as he begins to tell his story

·         He describes how he has vague memories of his first consciousness and the discovery of sensations

·         He also tell Victor how he sought refuge in a forest and managed to discover the use of fire and how people he encountered react fearfully towards him

·         The Creature also details how, in the forest, he comes across the De Lacey’s cottage and makes an adjoining hovel his home

·         The Creature begins to learn language from the De Laceys

·         He observes their poverty and decides to help them with their chores such as collecting and chopping firewood

·         He catches sight of himself in a pool of water and is filled with shame to view his deformities compared to the De Laceys

·         The gentleness of the De Laceys leads him to hope that they may receive him with kindness

·         Safie arrives and is welcomed by the De Laceys – furthering the Creature’s hope to also be received well

·         The Creature listens as Safie is taught English by the family

·         From the De Laceys teaching Safie, the Creature learns about History, Politics and Religion

·         The Creature describes to Victor the history of the De Lacey family and of Safie

·         Safie: her father was a Turkish merchant in Paris and was condemned to death for a minor crime. Felix De Lacey planned the escape of Safie’s father and fell in love with the merchant’s daughter – Safie

·         Felix’s plot was discovered and he, his father and Agatha De Lacey (Felix’s sister), were thrown in prison

·         Upon their release, they took refuge in Germany and Sadie eventually made her way to their home

·         The Creature discovers three books in the forest when he goes out looking for firewood. The books are ‘Paradise Lost’, a volume of Plutarch’s ‘Parallel Lives’ and Goethe’s the ‘Sorrows of Werter’

·         As well as finding the books, the Creature also discovers Victor’s journal in the pocket of the cloak he took from the laboratory

·         He learns that Victor is repulsed by him and curses Victor for abandoning him

·         The Creature decides that he will approach the blind father of the De Lacey father when he is alone in the cottage

·         The Creature and De Lacey get on well until Agatha, Felix and Safie return home: they are all repulsed by the Creature and Felix attacks him and so he returns to his hovel

·         The De Laceys leave their cottage and then the Creature burns it down

·         He starts on his journey to Geneva, determined to confront Victor

·         Whilst making the journey, the Creature saves a young girl from drowning but is shot by a man as a result for saving her

·         He finally makes it to Geneva and falls asleep in the fields outside

·         He woken by a young boy whom he seizes and plan to make him his companion

·         The Creature learns that the boys name is William and strangles him in an attempt to get revenge for his rejection

·         He takes the miniature of Caroline Frankenstein (Victor and William’s mother) from William and plants it on Justine Moritz when she is sleeping

·         The Creature then returns to the present day and demands that Victor make him a female companion to eradicate his solitude

·         Here is where the Creature’s narrative ends