Victor's Suffering In Frankenstein Essay

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The desire to succeed interferes with being happy. A person can get lost in the process of solving a problem so intently that they forget those around them, to eat and even where they are. In Mary Shelley's horrific Frankenstein an example is the character of Victor, whose unnatural pursuit of knowledge, of discovering how to create the perfect being, is so extreme that he loses himself in his creation. Frankenstein follows the story of the brilliant Victor and his many achievements, which go astray after he brings to life a creature in order to sate his own curiosity about the "mysteries" of life. It becomes difficult to picture Victor as a human being because he attains in-human qualities like the ability to go countless hours without eating…show more content…
Freud argues on behalf of the monster because he interprets Victor's refusal to let the monster have a companion as a part of being mildly content. Victor convinces the real monster that he's going to build this new "companion" for him yet decides not to after considering reasoned ramifications at the costs of the lives of others he loves. Freud argues, "When any situation that is desired by the pleasure principle is prolonged, it only produces a feeling of mild contentment" (Freud 25). Victor is a monster in that he let's his own family die at the hands of the monster in order to make himself not look foolish after refusing to build the monster a woman-monster and to content himself with what is just in his eyes. Victor even travels for some time with his friend Clerval, ignoring his promised task to the monster in order to avoid further suffering. He seeks happiness with Elizabeth but doesn't realize his own creation's cunning. He's correct in blaming himself because he could have warned his family about the monster but it was his desire for the orderly or Freud's principle of delaying suffering that kept him from informing
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