Viewing iDr Victor Frankenstein's profile | Profiles v1

About

He is the son of Alphonse Frankenstein and Caroline Beaufort, who died of scarlet fever when Victor was young. Victor has two younger brothers — William, the youngest, who is killed by Victor's creation, and Ernest, the middle child, who wants to join the Foreign Service like a "true Genevese". Victor falls in love with Elizabeth, who became his adoptive "cousin."

As a young man, Frankenstein is interested in the works in alchemists such as Cornelius Agrippa, Paracelsus, and Albertus Magnus, and he longs to discover the fabled elixir of life. He loses interest in both these pursuits and in science as a whole after seeing the remains of a tree struck by lightning. However, at the University of Ingolstadt, Frankenstein develops a fondness for chemistry, and becomes obsessed with the idea of creating life in inanimate matter through artificial means, leaving university to pursue this goal for the next two years.

Assembling a humanoid creature perhaps by the use of a chemical, apparatus or a combination of both (he avoids the question three times when asked), Frankenstein successfully brings it to life only to be repulsed by its monstrous ugliness. He abandons and flees his creation, who disappears and soon embarks upon a journey of vengeance that results in the death of his younger brother, William. The creature approaches Frankenstein and begs him to create a female companion for him; Frankenstein agrees, but ultimately destroys this creation, aghast at the idea of a race of monsters. Enraged, the creature swears revenge and, on Frankenstein's wedding night, kills Elizabeth (his creator's new bride), as well as his best friend Henry Clerval.

Frankenstein pursues the "fiend" or "daemon" (as he calls his creation) to the Arctic with the intent of destroying it; he ultimately fails in his mission, however, when he falls through an ice flow and contracts severe pneumonia. He is rescued by a passing freighter, but dies after relating his tale to the ship's captain. His creature, upon discovering the death of its creator, is overcome by sorrow and vows to commit suicide by burning himself alive in "the Northernmost extremity of the globe"; he then disappears, never to be seen or heard from again.