Frankenstein - Analysis of Volume 3 Chapter 3

Plot Summary

Victor has nearly completed creating the female when he reflects on the negative impact it may have on society – “she might become ten thousand times more malignant than her mate”. He sees the creature at the window and in a fit of rage destroys the female creature. The creature confronts him hours later and threatens him. Victor refuses to create a female and the creature leaves him with the threat of revenge: “I will be with you on your wedding-night.” Victor believes that this will be the day that the creature will kill him. He receives a letter from Clerval, who asks him to return to him before he embarks on his voyage to India. Victor spends two days tidying his chemical instruments and packing away the remains of the female creature, before getting on a boat and sailing back towards the mainland. He dumps the remains into the sea during the night-time voyage. He falls asleep and upon awakening doesn’t know where he is. He believes he is going to die when he sees “a line of high land towards the south”. He sails towards it and upon docking is greeted rudely by a crowd of people. He discovers he is in Ireland and is accused of murdering a “gentleman” whose corpse they had found the previous evening. Victor is taken to the Magistrate.

At this point Victor tells Walton that he “must pause” his narrative as “it requires all [of his] fortitude to recall the memory” of “the calamity that was in a few moments to…