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History

During the later years of the Eighteenth Century, Victor Frankenstein, a brilliant student in chemistry and the biological sciences at the Univer-sity of Ingolstadt and the heir to a Swiss barony, embarked on experi-ments to create artificial life. Frank-enstein hoped thus to create a new species of humanoid life, and, by doing so, to learn how to reanimate the dead and thus discover a means for human immortality. Frankenstein succeeded in piecing together a giant humanoid form from various parts of different fresh human corpses. Frankenstein's extraordi-nary genius enabled him to discover a means of preventing cellular dete-rioration in the body parts he used, and to overcome the human body's tendency to reject parts transplanted from another. Finally, using means that remain unrevealed, Franken-stein brought his creation to life. Ter-rified and revolted by the grotesque creature once he had come to life, Frankenstein abandoned him.

The bewildered monster wander-ed off. Although the monster's brain had once belonged to a living human, the monster had none of that human's memories, and at first was as ignorant as an infant. However, the monster was highly intelligent, and not only learned to survive on its own, but also rapidly learned human language through secretly observing people. Within months the monster could speak as intelligently as any human being.

Alas, the monster was anguished over the fact that his repellent physi-cal appearance isolated him from the human race. His attempts to befriend people were met with fear, hatred, and violence. Infuriated by this total rejection, the monster want-ed vengeance on all humanity and on Frankenstein in particular. But, after murdering Frankenstein's young brother William, the monster confronted Frankenstein and requested that he create a mate for him. The monster promised that he and his mate would go far from human civilization and live happily together. Frankenstein began work on creating the female creature, but, fearing that the two creatures would become parents to a race of mon-sters that would terrorize mankind, Frankenstein destroyed the female creature before bringing her to life.

Enraged, the male monster caused the deaths of Frankenstein's friend Henry Clerval and of Franken-stein's wife Elizabeth. Pursuing the creature into the Arctic, Franken-stein fell victim to cold, fatigue, and hunger. He was brought aboard the ship of Captain Robert Walton, to whom he told his life story, before dying while aboard. The monster, finding his corpse aboard the ship, was repentant and intended to com-mit suicide in expiation for his crimes. But instead the monster was frozen within ice and went into sus-pended animation.

In 1818, the writer Mary Shelley published Walton's account of Frankenstein as Frankenstein or, The Modern Prometheus, and she allowed the public to think of the book as a work of fiction.

In 1898 Walton's great-grandson found the monster, who had been revived by heat. The monster wan-dered in Europe for a time. The crea-ture suffered an injury to his vocal cords in a clash with the vampire Dracula, leaving him unable to speak.

Frankenstein's monster again fell into suspended animation within ice, but was revived again in recent years. One of Frankenstein's descendants, Veronica, operated on the creature's larynx so that he is once again able to speak.

The history of Frankenstein's monster has been inextricably linked with that of Victor Frankenstein's descendants, many of whom became scientists. Among them are Vincent Frankenstein, who died in 1898 after an encounter with the monster, and his son Basil Franken-stein, who was killed in 1942 by his own monstrous creation. Descen-dants in recent years include the late Boris Frankenstein, who created a short-lived duplicate of the Silver Surfer, Baroness Victoria Franken-stein, heiress to her family's ances-tral title, and Veronica Frankenstein, a surgeon and biophysicist. None of these people are direct descendants of Victor Frankenstein, who died childless, but are descended instead from near relatives of Victor's.