Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus

At the magistrate’s office, Frankenstein listens as a man relates how he and his family had been fishing when they came across the dead body of a handsome young man. Upon bringing him to a cottage, they saw marks on his throat as if he had been strangled. Someone had seen a boat not far from shore, one that looked like the boat in which Frankenstein arrived. When Frankenstein is shown the body, he sees that it is Clerval. He cries, “Have my murderous machinations deprived you also, my dearest Henry, of life?” (161).

Frankenstein descends into a fever that lasts two months. In that time, he raves that he is “the murderer of William, of Justine, and of Clerval” (161) and asks for help destroying the creature. He also imagines the creature is strangling him. When he awakens, he is in prison. The nurse and doctor treat him unkindly, and he laments that no one comforts him “with the gentle voice of love” (162). Though the magistrate, Mr. Kirwin, feels sympathy for him, he does not visit often. Frankenstein is often in a state of hysteria from loneliness and guilt.

One day, Frankenstein is contemplating confessing, so he can die and be free of misery, when Mr.