I entered the room where the corpse lay, and was led up to the coffin. How can I describe my sensations on beholding it? I feel yet parched with horror, nor can I reflect on that terrible moment without shuddering and agony, that faintly reminds me of the anguish of the recognition. The trial, the presence of the magistrate and witnesses, passed like a dream from my memory, when I saw the lifeless form of Henry Clerval stretched before me. I gasped for breath; and, throwing myself on the body, I exclaimed, ‘Have my murderous machinations deprived you also, my dearest Henry of life? Two I have already destroyed; other victims await their destiny: but you, Clerval, my friend, my benefactor’ –
The human frame could no longer support the agonizing suffering that I endured, and I was carried out of the room in strong convulsions.
A fever succeeded to this. I lay for two months on the point of death: my ravings, as I afterwards heard, were frightful; I called myself the murderer of William, of Justine, and of Clerval. Sometimes I entreated my attendants to assist me in the destruction of the fiend by whom I was tormented; and, at others, I felt the fingers of the monster already grasping my neck, and screamed aloud with agony and terror.
Fortunately, as I spoke my native language, Mr. Kirwin alone understood me; but my gestures and bitter cries were sufficient to affright the other witnesses.
Why did I not die? More miserable than man ever was before, why did I not sink into forgetfulness and rest? Death snatches away many blooming children, the only hopes of their doating parents: how many brides and youthful lovers have been one day in the bloom of health and hope, and the next a prey for worms and the decay of the tomb! Of what materials was I made, that I could thus resist so many shocks, which, like the turning of the wheel, continually renewed the torture.
Personally, I think your passage could relate to the the theme of fate that I found present in The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. Do you think your characters believed in fate? Do you think the speaker of this passage wonders whether or not it was fate who caused his companions to die instead of himself?
ReplyDeleteIn addition, when the speaker of this passage asks, “Why did I not die?” I realized a very strong connection to one of the scenes from "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame". At the end of the novel, after Quasimodo has killed Frollo and has seen La Esmeralda hung from the cathedral, he looks up and yells, “Oh! All that I have ever loved!" (Hugo). I see a strong resemblance here between our two characters. Both the speaker of your passage and Quasimodo have lost something the loved and believe it was caused by fate. Two characters that both tried to do good in the world ended up losing the things that they loved most. Do you think it’s possible for our two authors to have had similar experiences in the past that would cause them to write such similar thematic elements? Or do you believe it was more of a cultural influence due to the fact that both "Frankenstein" and "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame" were written around the same time period?
DeleteThe last sentence of this passage mentions "the turning of the wheel, continually renewed the torture". The narrator seems to feel trapped, held back by this constant cycle. Throughout one of the novels that I investigated, "Nights at the Circus" by Angela Carter, the characters are held back by the constant cycle of time. Towards the end of the novel, they become lost, and while doing so lose their sense of time as well; this allows them to escape the boundaries of their former lives and start over. Do you think that if the narrator of this passage somehow found a way to escape this "wheel", he would renew himself, or would he be unable to rid himself of the monster he believes himself to be?
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