What aspect of the monster terrifies Victor most in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein?
In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, there is a great deal of vivid imagery that helps share Victor's sense of horror when looking at the creature he has brought to life.
...by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open...
Victor then describes how it takes its first breath. In an instant—a moment of epiphany—the pains Victor Frankenstein had taken to construct a creature of beauty are illuminated before him to see, instead, the truth of what he has done: he has made a horrifying mistake, a crime against God and nature—a monstrous looking being.
I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful!—Great God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast to his watery...
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eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips.
Victor flees from his workroom and falls asleep only to waken to the creature reaching toward him, grinning. Once again Victor runs away.
He writes:
I had gazed on him while unfinished; he was ugly then; but when those muscles and joints were rendered capable of motion, it became a thing such as even Dante could not have conceived.
The potent and precise imagery Shelley adopts in describing the monster's appearance, along with Victor's reactions, brings to the reader's mind a sense of horror similar to the creator's. Victor Frankenstein's responses are all based simply upon appearance, which will be one of the creature's criticisms not only of Victor, but also of society in general.
It seems that the creature's looks horrify Victor the most. I can only surmise, but it is perhaps the eyes that would be the most horrific of the things that so chill Victor's heart because as people we often look to a person's eyes to glimpse one's thoughts, intent, emotions, and soul. In this case, it may well have seemed to Victor that the creature's eyes, so bizarre in their color and presentation, would have been most haunting and terrifying.
Why is the monster in Frankenstein considered the villain?
The Creature in Frankenstein could be conceived as the villain by many readers because of his many horrifying deeds, but he could also be considered a dark 'anti-hero.' An anti-hero is a protagonist who lacks most of the good characteristics that most normal heroes would have, like courage, kindness, morality.
The Creature, despite his wicked ways, does strike a sympathetic chord with the reader. He has been neglected and abandoned by his Victor, his creator. The creature has a hideous form, which because of its frightening size and appearance, makes it impossible for him to find any sort of companionship. He is lonely and miserable, and even though he is a terrible creature, he longs for and appreciates beauty.
Despite all of these more sympathetic aspects to the Creature, an objective reader must evaluate his rather long list of bad behavior:
- Killed William, Victor's brother. Then Justine takes the blame because the Creature framed her by planting evidence on her while she slept. She gets a death sentence, so he effectively is responsible for her death as well.
- Kills Elizabeth, Victor's new bride, on their wedding night.
- Kills Victor's best friend, Henry Clerval.
The Creature could definitely be considered a villain for these reasons alone. Elizabeth's murder was completely premeditated and all about vengeance.