Thus not the tenderness of friendship, nor the beauty of earth, nor of heaven, could redeem my soul from woe; the very accents of love were ineffectual.Not producing the effect that was intended. Elizabeth’s love is real and her words are kind; they simply cannot reach what is wrong.
Frankenstein
Chapter 9
Mary Shelley · Mountaineers 10th–12th
Copywork
Thus not the tenderness of friendship, nor the beauty of earth, nor of heaven, could redeem my soul from woe; the very accents of love were ineffectual. I was encompassed by a cloud which no beneficial influence could penetrate. The wounded deer dragging its fainting limbs to some untrodden brake, there to gaze upon the arrow which had pierced it, and to die, was but a type of me.
The same lulling sounds acted as a lullaby to my too keen sensations; when I placed my head upon my pillow, sleep crept over me; I felt it as it came and blessed the giver of oblivion.
Read the first passage aloud. Twice, a sentence makes you wait for its point. First you wait through three comforts, then through the whole wounded deer. What does the wait do to the point when it comes?
Discussion
Narration Tell the chapter back from the “dead calmness” after Justine’s death to Victor falling asleep at Chamounix.
- His father asks Victor to keep his grief from showing. Instead, Victor hides himself from his father. Why can he hide himself but not his grief? Character
- On calm nights, “when all was at peace around me”, Victor is tempted to drown. Why would the peace pull him toward the water? Inference
- Victor avoids “the face of man”. Yet he wants to see the creature again. Why that face? Character
Make a Connection Think of a story, a poem, or a time you know of when someone went somewhere wild to get away from something. What did the place do for them, and did it last?
Vocabulary
- ineffectual
- immoderate
but is it not a duty to the survivors that we should refrain from augmenting their unhappiness by an appearance of immoderate grief?
Going beyond a reasonable limit. His father uses it for grief that has gone too far; a page later Victor’s hatred bursts “all bounds of moderation.”- impetuous
Ruined castles hanging on the precipices of piny mountains, the impetuous Arve, and cottages every here and there peeping forth from among the trees formed a scene of singular beauty.
Rushing ahead with force, without stopping to think. Here it describes the river, but it fits the “whirlwind passions” that drive Victor out of his home.- desponding
Elizabeth was sad and desponding; she no longer took delight in her ordinary occupations;
Losing heart; giving up hope. It names Elizabeth’s state before she speaks, so her brave words come from someone who is struggling too.- abhorrence
My abhorrence of this fiend cannot be conceived.
A deep hatred mixed with disgust. It is stronger than dislike: Victor cannot bear to think of the creature without rage.- untrodden
The wounded deer dragging its fainting limbs to some untrodden brake, there to gaze upon the arrow which had pierced it, and to die, was but a type of me.
Never walked on; far from any path people use. The deer seeks an untrodden thicket (a “brake”) to die in, and a few lines later Victor turns toward the wild Alpine valleys.
Critical thinking
- Elizabeth says the murderer walks free, and that she “would not change places with such a wretch”. Victor is listening. Is he that wretch?
- Elizabeth’s love cannot reach Victor. For a while, the mountains do. What can they give him that she cannot?
- Victor rides into the Alps hoping “to forget myself”. Is the journey a way of healing or a way of hiding?